absurdities, had been increased, by the operation of those very
circumstances, by which her mind had been rapidly advanced in the race
of independence.

The event, immediately introductory to the rank which from this time she
held in the lids of literature, was the publication of Burke's
Reflections on the Revolution in France. This book, after having been
long promised to the world, finally made its appearance on the first of
November 1790; and Mary, full of sentiments of liberty, and impressed
with a warm interest in the struggle that was now going on, seized her
pen in the first burst of indignation, an emotion of which she was
strongly susceptible. She was in the habit of composing with rapidity,
and her answer, which was the first of the numerous ones that appeared,
obtained extraordinary notice. Marked as it is with the vehemence and
impetuousness of its eloquence, it is certainly chargeable with a too
contemptuous and intemperate treatment of the great man against whom its
attack is directed. But this circumstance was not injurious to the
success of the publication. Burke had been warmly loved by the most
liberal and enlightened friends of freedom, and they were proportionably
inflamed and disgusted by the fury of his assault, upon what they deemed
to be its sacred cause.

Short as was the time in which Mary composed her Answer to Burke's
Reflections, there was one anecdote she told me concerning it, which
seems worth recording in this place. It was sent to the press, as is
the general practice when the early publication of a piece is deemed a
matter of importance, before the composition was finished. When Mary had
arrived at about the middle of her work, she was seized with a temporary
fit of torpor and indolence, and began to repent of her undertaking. In
this state of mind, she called, one evening, as she was in the practice