‘It is with great sadness that the publishers of the multifarious works a works by the author are obliged to insist that any writings originating from that unfortunately poisoned pen that that person should cease and desist from being further spread, and any of the unfortunate words and illustrations already in existence are forthwith ordered utterly destroyed for fear of the probable most unfortunate consequences of availability.’
So read a notice published the within the hallowed pages of the Times newspaper on the twenty second of December in the cursed year of our Lord seventeen ninety-five. The fierce blaze that gutted the mansion on Putney Waters but few months previous was of course still fresh in the minds of the three-pence paying purchasers of that well honored rag. Any real effect that such a highly inflammable warning had upon an audience thirsting for rumor or gossip about the most recent paragon of highest society, and the strange and unnatural circumstances that had swept him violently from fame to the lowest shame and ignominy, was unsurprisingly of little meaningful consequence.
Daily Abstract Thoughts 