LETTER 207 Notes

in petto:  (Italian, from Latin in pectore, in the bosom) Something reserved, kept back, not made public. 

Beelzebub:  Evil spirit; devil. 

She sighed… offered to her^a:  {a See p. 188.} These jewels offered to Clarissa by Lovelace are the second set of riches to be offered to her.  The first set of jewels and riches she eludes to here were offered to her by Mr Roger Solmes, as he procured for her hand in marriage earlier in the novel. 

ex mero motu:  (Latin) By one’s own free will; (in law) ‘of [his] mere motion’ indicates the royal will. 

CLARISSA:  This word is capitalized because it is used in a context which suggests that it is the title of the book. 

Women are born to be controlled.¹:  This is a quote by Edmund Waller (1606-87): ‘For women (born to be controlled)/ Stoop to the forward and the bold’, Of Love, 13-14. 

plaguy:  Vexatious, troublesome, tormenting. 

varlet:  A servant, therefore, a low fellow; a scoundrel; a rascal. 

couchant:  Lying down with the head raised, which distinguishes the posture of couchant from that of dormant, or sleeping; -- said of a lion or other beast. 

St Stephen’s Chapel¹:  In the ancient royal palace of Westminster, the chamber where the House of Commons met, which gave the system of two facing blocks of benches.