What does "lerve" mean?

Question

I've been reading Busman's Honeymoon again and came across the sentence:

I put it down first of all to the effect of gold lamé, but, on consideration, I think it was probably due to "lerve".

Where a don of the female college Harriet Vane went to is talking about her "looking like she stepped out of a Renaissance portrait". What does the word lerve mean here?

Susan Malkin · Answer

Lerve is a word used to describe a love about which the word "love" is not adequate. An overpowering and overwhelming sort of love such as one may experience with a true soul-mate

hotshotjosh · Answer

It's a slang form of 'love'. Sometimes also spelled 'lurve'. Usually spoken in a humorous parody of a romantic slurred voice. Today, I learned it was used as far back as 1936!

1936 Daily Mirror 1 Oct. 27/4 Which means..that (a) you're in Lurve,
  but (b) you're not sure he's in Lurve with you. 1937 D. L. Sayers
  Busman's Honeymoon Prothalamion 23, I put it down first of all to the
  effect of gold lamé, but, on consideration, I think it was probably
  due to ‘lerve’. - See more at:
  http://findwords.info/term/lurve#sthash.EhtfV5g5.dpuf

I thought it was interesting that your specific quote is in the Oxford English Dictionary as an example of another spelling of the slang 'lurve'. Source

What does "lerve" mean?

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