her dismay to find that a most grotesque figure of a lady, any age after seventy, was posing at the window in rouged cheeks, powdered hair, and a dress of damask silk with scarlet flowers, as Lady Morgan, "who had written so well about French Industries." This was too much, and elicited the exclamation—"I am the real Lady Morgan!"
Publishers were invariably liberal to the "Wild Irish Girl." Colburn was so delighted at reading the proofs of "Florence MacCarthy," that he sent her a beautiful parure of amethysts—necklace, cross, and brooch. She was as nimble with her hands as she was with her brains. She writes to her sister, Lady Clarke, from London—" I have made myself a very pretty dress with my own two hands—white satin; with a deep lace flounce. With the skirt I got on beautifully, but as to the corsage, fortunately there is hardly any, what there is, being covered with frills, falls, and lace, so it does not signify how the body is made. Over the flounce is a rouleau of satin, which you make with a quarter of a pound of lamb's wool."
In 1837 she was granted a Government pension of £300 a year, and soon afterwards she persuaded Sir Charles to leave Dublin, and to take a house in London. One who saw her in her prime thus describes her appearance at a Dublin Drawingroom:
