The Magnificent Montez - Page 165/177

The last lectures in the series dealt with "Comic Aspects of Love," and "Strong-minded Women." Among the typical specimens offered for consideration were such diverse personalities as Semiramis, Queen Elizabeth, the Countess of Derby, George Sand, and Mrs. Bloomer. In the discourse on "The Comic Aspects of Love" the range swept from Aristotle and Plato to Mahomet and the Mormons. If the B.B.C. had been in existence, Lola would undoubtedly have been booked for a "talk." As it was, two of the lectures were reprinted in The Welcome Guest, "a magazine of recreative reading for all," with Robert Browning, Charles Kingsley and Monckton Milnes among its contributors. Thinking they had a market, an enterprising publisher rushed out a volume, The Lectures of Lola Montez. When a copy reached the editor, it was reviewed in characteristically elephantine fashion by the Athenæum: "We can imagine the untravelled dames of Fifth Avenue listening with wonder to a female lecturer who seems to have lived hand in glove with all the crowned heads of Europe; and who can tell them, not only Who's-Who, but also repeat their conversations, criticise their personal appearances, and describe the secret arts by which the men preserve their powers and the women their beauty."