Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 2/Divorce a vinculo - Part 4
DIVORCE A VINCULO; or, THE TERRORS OF
SIR CRESSWELL CRESSWELL.
(Continued from p. 232.)
The day had at length arrived when the cause of outraged womanhood, in the person of Mrs. Barber, was to be avenged. I had lain awake half the night, meditating on that amiable lady’s wrongs; and when sleep visited my feverish eyelids, even in my dreams, I continued to persecute her monster of a husband. I imagined myself to be addressing the Court in the lady’s behalf, in the character of amicus curiæ, and so withering were my sarcasms—so full of tenderness and pathos my description of the agonised wife and mother—that Sir Cresswell, raising his hand, implored me to desist for a moment, and directed that the jury should be supplied with fresh pocket-handkerchiefs—two, for the foreman—and immediately fell off himself into strong hysterics. The morning came at last—ten minutes to nine—I suppose over-tasked nature had been exacting an instalment of over-due sleep. Flora was doing her back hair at the glass, with a succession of fascinating little tosses of the head as the brush accomplished each sweep. I must have remained for a few minutes in contemplation of this—not unpleasing—performance, when memory vaulted once more into the saddle, and I recollected that there was work to be done before that day’s sun had set. Barber, look to yourself!
The dressing-process was executed with wonderful despatch. In a general way I love to linger over this period of my existence; to trifle now with a book—now with a letter; and to add a storey or two to that castle in the air which has already attained the proportions of a magnificent pile indeed. Not so upon this eventful day. I felt I was assisting to form square in order to repel Mr. Barber and his unprincipled advisers. When it came to the turn of the shower-bath—although upon ordinary occasions throughout the winter months there is a certain exhibition of coquetry on my part, before I can make up my mind to give the fatal jerk to the string which hangs in readiness to pull down the Arctic regions on my warm, comfortable shoulders—upon this day I was so fully possessed with my subject, that I imagined I had thrust Mr. Barber into that ungenial hermitage, and without a moment’s hesitation gave him the cold drench with savage glee.
“That will teach you—wretched man!—to shear off your poor wife’s hair! Do it again, sir, and I will keep you there all day!”
I must in fairness add, that before the refreshing operation was over, I became quite aware that this was but the fancy of an overwrought and heated imagination.
By a quarter past ten I was in Great George Street; and wished to hurry off with Lamb at once to the Court, although the lady had not yet arrived, lest we should be too late. Lamb laughed at my precipitancy, and informed me, that there was no such hurry, because it had been arranged that the Court was to take a short case—Thoper v. Thoper and Boggs—before the great trial of Barber v. Barber was called on. Thoper and Thoper would probably occupy about half an hour. However, Mr. Lamb, in tender consideration of my inexperience, and supposing that it would be agreeable to me to be initiated into the mysteries of the Divorce Court, entrusted me to the care of one of his clerks, and gave me a bundle of papers duly tied up with red tape, and indorsed "Barber v. Barber.” The deposit was a sacred one in my hands—not even the policeman with the red whiskers should tear that from my possession. The clerk was charged with a message for Mr. Muddle, Q.C., in the robing room, a circumstance which was so far fortunate that we were able by a series of back passages to get into the Court without passing through Westminster Hall; and therefore without being compelled to face that band of outraged Mænads, whom I had seen but two days back waiting for wicked husbands.
This time all was easy. The policeman smiled upon us, and the doors flew open at our approach. It would be a mere waste of time to describe at length the old Chancellor’s Court at Westminster; but, for the benefit of the uninitiated, let me say, in a very few words, that it is not large—square in shape—with a gallery cut in a circular form—and a gas chandelier in the middle. There is a canopy and a bench with three desks for the Judges—the Judge Ordinary sits in the middle—on one side. Beneath their position is a long table at which sits a gentleman in barrister’s robes; no doubt an official of the Court, and possibly the person whose voice I heard the other day, through the trap, reading out that impassioned appeal to somebody’s “Adored Louisa.” If so, I am glad to see that he has partially recovered from his cold. He is perpetually opening and shutting a despatch-box, and looks like a man who would be always losing and finding his papers. Beneath him again is a well, where sit the Solicitors, with their backs to the Judges and their faces to the Bar. On the same level with them, but facing the other way, are the Queen’s Counsel, and the chief matrimonial gladiators from the Commons. Behind these, but slightly elevated, sit the junior practitioners who have devoted themselves to the honourable undertaking of promoting the domestic happiness of their country. Right at the back of their benches—divided from it by a species of “Fops’ Alley”—and against the wall, facing the Judges, is the box for the jurymen in waiting. It would seem as though the desire had been to exclude the public as much as possible, by leaving very little room for their accommodation. Against the wall, to the left of the Judges, and forming one side of the well, is the box for the Jury who are trying the case. The witnesses are made to ascend three or four steps to the raised platform on which the Judges sit. A portion of this, between the seats of the Judges and the Jury-box, has been railed off into a kind of pen. If a gross man is under examination, he is shouted and growled at until he stands well forward in sight of the Jury; if it be a delicate and susceptible lady who is invited to impart her sorrows into the sympathising ears of the Court, she is blandly invited by the Judges to be seated at the end of their own bench, though always within the pen. As the dividing rail is very slight, a stranger who entered the Court for the first time would imagine that, as all four are seated in a row, and as, on the same bench, there are three elderly Judges and an extremely fascinating member of the opposite interest, the lady was sitting there as assessor or adviser of the Court. This is not so. What adds to the illusion is, that when the Judges are seated two heavy red curtains are drawn, which inclose them and the lady in their gorgeous sweep. Mr. Lamb’s clerk was obliging enough to point out this fact to me, with the additional information, that no circumstance connected with the arrangements of the Court had given his “Governor” more trouble; indeed, he added, that my poor friend often lay awake for nights thinking how to get over the difficulty, which consisted in the fact that when the curtain was drawn the Jury were debarred from the privilege of scanning the face of the lady-witness under examination.
“You see, sir, Mr. Lamb is obliged,” said this enthusiastic student of matrimonial difficulties, “Mr. Lamb is obliged to teach ’em how to take it out in sobbing, and then there’s always the chance of their over-doing it when they once begin. More way with the jury—worse luck with the bench.”
This appeared to me a very matter-of-fact and disagreeable view of the question; but as the young gentleman had been exceedingly obliging in pointing out to me the wonders of the Court, I thought it better not to insist with him on the propriety of greater earnestness in speaking of these distressing cases. Finally, he showed me the spot where my friend Lamb was in the habit of placing his injured client when the leading counsel was opening the story of her agony to the Jury. As it seemed only fair that the gentlemen who were to decide upon her fate should have the opportunity of observing her demeanour upon so trying an occasion, Mr. Lamb used to place his client in full sight of the jury during the opening address; whilst she herself was under examination she sate upon the Bench; then his usual habit was to place her by the side of the jury-box, out of ken of the jury, but in full sight of the Court, with general directions to stand up during the examinations in chief on her own side, but to sit during the cross-examinations, so that she could not be seen. When the Respondent’s case was brought on, the process was reversed. The lady then retired from public view during the opening address and the examinations in chief, but revealed herself during the cross-examinations. There were, of course, many fine distinctions, when exceptions were made to these general rules; as, for example, if a maid had turned against her mistress, or the husband was hinting a suspicion at her perfect propriety of conduct, on which occasions my friend Lamb had often, and with success, practised the tactics of the great Lord Nelson. “Win all, or lose all,” he used to say on such occasions, “I make the signal for the lady to rise, and let Nature have her way. Women are surprising creatures, sir. I have seldom known them to fail me at a pinch; and I’ve seen them many a time fling the oldest hands at the Bar on their backs like so many turtle,—when they had winning cards in their hands, too.”
Lamb had evidently made human nature his study.
Whilst I was looking round, the barristers were hurrying into Court; and, situated where I was, I could not help gathering scraps of their conversation. I confess that, on the whole, I was considerably shocked at the levity of their remarks. One young gentleman, who, despite of his robes, appeared to me far too youthful to take part in the discussion of differences so serious, and so pregnant with the misery or happiness of families as these, observed to a friend that Barber and Barber was likely to prove unusually “spicy!” Could a look have brought him to a sense of his situation, and of the gravity of the interests concerned—he had it from me. Then the talk began to smack of the stables, for Mr. Barber, as it appeared, was connected with the turf. Then, “what sort of looking woman was Mrs. Barber?” These irreverent boys would soon see, and learn to respect outraged innocence in the person of that injured lady. There was a striking difference between the appearance of the professional gentlemen who—to judge by the papers they spread out before them—had some share in the business in hand. The more dogged-looking and thick-set men were, as Mr. Lamb’s clerk informed me, “importations from the Common-Law Courts:” the blander and more feeble ones “the old hands from the Commons, and wasn’t it fun to see Sir Cresswell flinging them over.” This young gentleman had an odd notion of fun. Who was that Q. C. who had entered and quitted the court half-a-dozen times, as if he was overwhelmed with business, and was trying to be in half-a-dozen places at a time? “That was Mr. Muddle, who was in Thoper and Thoper,—but, Lord! sir,” added the clerk, “he hasn’t got his foot in here yet. He’s just doing the regular business, like the Doctors when they get themselves called out of church during the Lessons.” At this moment there was a call for silence. The Bar rose, and the three Judges entered—here was Sir Cresswell at last. They took their seats—Sir Cresswell in the middle—and the business began.
After leave had been asked and given to “mention” a few cases, Thoper v. Thoper and Boggs was called on. Sir Cresswell tried the case, and contrived to pour daylight in a very few words upon many points where the learned gentlemen concerned had thrown a thick haze over the proceedings. I always observed that a look of unusual politeness stole over the face of that learned functionary just as he was about to administer a body-blow to a gasping civilian, and he contrived to deliver it in a way that conveyed to your mind the idea that the recipient was quite enjoying the joke. I was told that his fault, as a Judge, was that he was apt to display impatience; but I can only say that I saw him put out but once, and that was when the learned civilian, who was conducting the cross-examination, asked a good many questions as to whether two eggs of which, as it was alleged, Captain Boggs had partaken upon a particular occasion were poached or fried. The point at issue was as to the identity of Captain Boggs. After this had gone on for a time Sir Cresswell certainly did observe, with something like a growl, “The question, Dr. Dolly, is not as to the identity of the eggs, but the identity of the Co-Respondent.” To be sure the point about the eggs did not seem very material. On the whole, I could not help thinking that if I had right on my side I should be well enough content to leave my case in Sir Cresswell’s hands.
But as for the particular case of Thoper v. Thoper and Boggs, if it could be at all accepted as a sample of the ordinary business of the court, I am sorry for any gentleman who is, by his duty, compelled to sit and listen to such tissues of filth and abomination. If glasses of brandy-and-water had been served out all round, and the three Judges had lighted up three clays, and in the various intervals the gentleman at the table with the despatch box had obliged us with a comic song, I can only say that the performances at the Divorce Court would have been nearer to the entertainments provided by Baron Nicholson for his friends on Field-Nights than anything else of which I am aware.
There must be an end of all things, and at last there was happily an end of Thoper v. Thoper and Boggs. There was next a call for Barber v. Barber, and the moment for the struggle had arrived. But where was Lamb?—and where Mrs. Barber? As I whispered my anxiety to the clerk, he told me not to make myself uncomfortable, because the Governor upon such occasions was in the habit of introducing his client to this Court, not without a certain solemnity,—besides, he pointed out to me that Mr. Battledove, Q.C., was in his place, and panting for the combat; and, as the young gentleman informed me behind his hand, “he was a regular good ’un, and never went off at score.” There, too, was my friend of the previous day. Dr. Dodge, in the row behind the Q.C.s, ready to support his chief. He was supposed at the Commons to be ‘up to trap’—but he was nothing here, only it “was always good to have a civilian to speak to the old state of the law.” Then there was a lively, pleasant young gentleman with curly hair—I could see the ends of it from beneath his wig—who was our third combatant, and I confess I was greatly gratified at his personal appearance, but my gratification was sadly dashed by a whisper “that he knew the rigs of town better than most men.” So young!—he wasn’t above two or three and forty,—and so ingenuous!—but so he did good service in unmasking Barber, and displaying him in his true colours, I cared not.
On the other side, the leading champion was not forthcoming,—he was no doubt a monster,—but in the first row of barristers there sate side by side two gentlemen, with a superabundance of whisker—one of whom was Dr. Lobb, from the Commons; the other a Mr. Cobb, from the Welsh Circuit—who had undertaken the thankless task of defending Barber; but of course even the worst criminals have a right to be heard, as it is essential to preserve the forms of justice inviolate. The leading counsel on this wretch’s behalf was Mr. Shuttlecock, Q.C., but it was not probable that he would come into Court until such time as it was necessary to open Mr. Barber’s case, unless indeed he could make time to look in during Mrs. Barber’s cross-examination. He was just then in the Exchequer, busily engaged in proving to the satisfaction of a British jury that a certain Mr. Aaron Levi, of London Wall, was the innocent holder for value of a bill of exchange which had been obtained for discount from the acceptor by a set of bill-sharpers, but of which, or of the money, he had never heard anything until the bill was presented for payment.
Whilst a profound silence reigned in the court, I saw Mr. Lamb coming in with Mrs. Barber on his arm. I am bound to say that the evidence of deep feeling on my friend’s face, whilst he was conducting the lady to her seat, was very creditable to him as a man. He was quite overcome with ill-suppressed emotion. Mrs. Barber’s veil—it was a very thick one—was down, but it was easy to see by the agitation of her manner that she was deeply impressed with the painful nature of the ordeal to which she was about to be submitted. When seated, I distinctly saw her take her handkerchief from her muff, as though anxious to escape observation, and hold it under her veil. Poor soul! this attempt at concealment of her grief will not avail her now. She must nerve herself for the trial. Mr. Lamb descended to his place in the well, but almost immediately rose again, and stood for a moment as if in hesitation whether Mrs. Barber’s distress might not so completely get the better of her, that his personal assistance might be required. He even so far forgot the situation of the parties as to take a bottle of salts from his pocket and request one of the two barristers—I think it was Dr. Lobb—who were sitting there ready to plunge their poniards into her tender breast—to pass the bottle to his injured client. With a look of apology to the Bench and the Jury, Mr. Lamb then resumed his seat. Mrs. Barber’s maid took her place by the side of her unfortunate mistress.
At this moment Mr. Barber was pointed out to me by the clerk: he had placed himself in the back row of barristers, just behind his two hired gladiators—I suppose that he might give them hints how to insult and torture his poor wife with offensive and irrelevant questions. Then there were the two Misses Barber—the two old tiger-cats from Cornwall, who had so wantonly and cruelly insulted poor Mrs. Barber just after her marriage. They sat side by side, close to Mrs. Barber, and so little was there about them of feminine delicacy that they had thrown their veils back, and were staring the Judges and the Jury in the face as bold as you like. Maiden ladies in such a place as this!—and to hear the wicked, wicked details of their own most scandalous and abominable brother’s atrocious biography. A nice family this to have married into! There were some other persons besides who, as I understood, were witnesses; but of them it is unnecessary just now to speak. But what is Sir Cresswell about with that big volume of light legal literature? I hope he is going to pay attention to so important a case. Not a bit of it. He has thrown himself back in his chair with a pile of such volumes before him, and is obviously about to give himself up to an afternoon of intellectual recreation. What can this mean? I soon saw the state of the case. It was the Judge upon his right hand who was to hold the fate of poor Mrs. Barber in the scales of justice. He was a very old man, but seemed very gentle and good-humoured. In a few moments it became clear to me that his hearing was not as good as it need to be. Well—this is a surprise—I can’t but say I wish it had been Sir Cresswell who was to try the case. He seemed to me like Dick Burton, who used to whip in for Assheton Smith, and was never known ‘to have gone off at hare:’ but it is now too late to look back—we must make the best of what we have got.
The formal and preliminary proceedings were then gone through, from which it resulted that Mrs. Cecilia Barber charged her husband, Mr. Augustus Barber, with infidelity to the marriage vow, and with cruelty. Upon the first point, Augustus, overwhelmed with the recollections of his own most guilty and atrocious conduct, offered no defence; upon the second, he maintained that the charge was false; that, the slight peccadilloes involved in the first suggestion apart, he had ever been a patient, an indulgent, and a loving husband. We shall see.
Mr. Battledove rose. You could have heard a pin drop in the Court. I may here as well say once for all that I was somewhat disappointed at the want in this gentleman’s address of that burning, volcanic manner to which, in earlier days, I had been accustomed in the Common Law Courts in Breach of Promise cases, and such like. Mr. Battledove’s tone throughout was distinctly that of a Paterfamilias addressing twelve Patresfamiliarum in a Jury Box. The silence was only broken by a low sob from Mrs. Barber. He paused but for a moment, and then proceeded with his address.
“May it please you, my Lords and Gentlemen of the Jury: I feel that I must for one moment throw myself upon your indulgence. Do not, I implore you, attribute it either to a want of determination on my part to do the best I can for that most virtuous and unfortunate lady who has done me the honour this day of entrusting her cause to my unworthy hands; still less to the imperfect nature of her own wrongs—to any deficiency in those facts which it will be my most painful duty presently to submit to your notice—that I am thus enforced for a moment to pause at the outset of my address. You, Gentlemen, will not, I am confident, think the worse of me that the painful sight we have just witnessed has for a moment unnerved me, and rendered me—but for a moment, I promise you!—unfit for the discharge of the duty I have undertaken. But it must not be—”
Here Mr. Battledove paused, and beckoned to Mr. Lamb. He whispered a few words to that gentleman, and I inferred from the fact that he jerked his head over in the direction of poor Mrs. Barber, that he was sending my friend to the lady’s assistance. Lamb walked over on tiptoe, taking great care not to disturb the proceedings; indeed, had he been about to kneel by the bed-side of a dying father, his demeanour could scarcely have been distinguished by greater propriety. He stooped down to soothe the poor suffering angel—but it was all in vain—her grief would take its course.
“—This must not be, Gentlemen of the Jury, we have a duty to perform, and must not be diverted from our purpose even by so sorrowful a spectacle as this Do not fix your eyes on my unfortunate client.” (The Jury all looked at her.) “Do not attend to her distressing manifestations of grief. She is, I know, doing her utmost to repress them”—(Mrs. Barber here perfectly howled)—“for she has been well trained and tutored in grief. Turn your thoughts rather to the task of listening to a plain unvarnished tale of the wrongs she has endured, and if I can convince your reason and judgment—for that is all I wish to do—let your verdict to-day free her from the barbarity of her inhuman persecutor. Men may take different views as to the reciprocal obligations of husband and wife on many points, but no one, I think, will maintain that it is the duty of the wife to submit to stripes and blows—to go in hourly danger of her life by night and day, without seeking, not for redress—for who can attempt to redress such wrongs as these?—but simply for immunity from further violence.”
At this point I observed Sir Cresswell was fidgetting with his glasses, and beginning to look in a peculiarly bland manner at Mr. Battledove whilst he endeavoured to whisper something into the ear of the old Judge who was trying the case; but apparently without effect. Mr. Battledove’s manner underwent an instant change.
“But now, gentlemen, for the facts of this case. We seek for an absolute dissolution of the most unfortunate union into which Mrs. Barber—then Miss Cecilia Montresor—was entrapped by the artifices of the unworthy Respondent in this case. Unworthy I may well call him, for that he is, upon his own showing. Whatever you may think of the facts which I am about to submit to you, you can’t entertain a moment’s doubt as to his character. He courts an adverse verdict from you on the first point, as the greatest favour you could bestow upon him. Rid him of his wife, and give him his wife’s money—that’s what he wants. The spectacle of her young cheeks sodden with the hot tears which his brutality has caused to flow is too much for his tender heart: like the Antonio of Shylock’s sarcasm, ‘Money is his prayer.’ Give him but money and he will go away infamous and contented. And whose money, gentlemen?—his wife’s money. The money that young and innocent girl brought with her as her dower—for, as I am instructed, the little that Mr. Barber ever had he made away with within three months after coming of age in infamous but unfortunate speculations connected with the Turf. It is his wife’s money he wants—he is sick of her person—her heart and soul such a man was never in a condition to appreciate. But if you give him his wife’s money, what will he do with it? Why he’ll spend it with that distinguished French lady, who, for the moment, retains a hold—and he does not deny it—upon what he calls his affections. Oh! yes, take Ruth’s portion, and cast it to Jezabel. Take Mrs. Barber’s money—and give it to her abandoned husband. It will help him to satisfy his vicious desires—to continue his profligate career—or, as he himself would phrase it, ‘to carry on the war.’”
Here Mr. Battledove paused for a moment, turned round, and glanced at Mr. Barber with an expression of paternal severity which was perfectly appalling.
“As I am instructed, Gentlemen, Miss Cecilia Montresor—then but seventeen years of age—was residing with her parents in Cadogan Place, when she saw Mr. Barber for the first time. I am not about, Gentlemen, to excuse, however I may attempt to palliate the conduct of my client, when tell you that Mr. Barber forced himself upon her notice in the ride at Hyde Pork. Her habit was—but with the full permission of her parents—to take her exercise there upon horseback every day attended by a groom. Mr. Barber corrupted the groom. They soon understood each other. They were kindred spirits, and the wretched man was induced to violate his sacred trust. I fully and freely admit that Miss Montresor ought at once to have given him in charge, when he began to persecute her with his attentions, or at least to have informed her parents of the circumstance. She did not so, and bitterly has she since rued her imprudence; but, at any rate, whatever amount of blame may attach to her, I think no one will, for a moment, contend that Mr. Barber—a man of the world—a person whom I may well designate as an adventurer—was not infinitely more to blame. The result of this clandestine and most improper intercourse was, that Mr. Barber, by perjury, procured a licence—although the young lady was four years under age, and they were married in the church of Gobblegate Within. Mr. Barber then accompanied the young lady—now, alas! his wife—back to the residence of her parents—threw himself upon his knees before the afflicted mother, and craved her forgiveness and her blessing. Mr. Montresor had actually raised his foot for the purpose of kicking him out of doors, but was restrained by the tears and agony of his daughter—of that most unfortunate lady who, since that time has been so often the victim of his brutality and barbarous violence, and who sits before you this day a helpless woman indeed, unless you, Gentlemen—and I think I can foretell what the action of twelve Englishmen will be in such a case—interfere to protect her from further contumely and wrong. Mr. Barber, however, was forgiven at length by the afflicted parents, but upon the condition that Mrs. Barber’s fortune should be settled on herself.”
There was at this moment an interruption from a scuffle at the door, which was under the guardianship of the policeman with the red whiskers. Silence was proclaimed by the usher, but in vain. Matters indeed went so far that Sir Cresswell actually put up his double eye-glasses, and I trembled to think what might come next, when the upshot was that an elderly nurse-looking sort of woman made her way into court, and to Mrs. Barber’s side. Mr. Lamb rose up, and from a glance which I intercepted between him and the intruder I could not,—perhaps I was wrong,—help suspecting that he had anticipated this little incident. Be this however as it may, he whispered a few words to Mr. Battledove, who continued:
“I must explain, my Luds, and apologise for this interruption. This is the person who received my client in her arms when she drew her first breath—who tended her—who brought her up—who cherished her—and comforted her in her youth, and has ever been ready to stand by her side in this the hour of her affliction. Mrs. Gollop, gentlemen, has nature’s right to be here, but she has a technical right as well, for she is a witness in the cause. To proceed, Mr. and Mrs. Barber were married, and Mr. Barber was forgiven; but within a few days after the marriage he commenced the series of unmanly outrages upon her, of which she is here to-day to complain. These, for the sake of greater convenience, I will divide into two heads—majora delicta, grosser outrages—and minora delicta, lesser grievances, though grievances hard of endurance by a sensitive and delicately-nurtured lady who, in her childhood, had been the delight—the idol—the sunshine of her own family circle! I will now address myself to the category of majora delicta, or grosser outages. Mr. Barber then took his wife to the house of his sisters, in Cornwall, where she received the most cruel treatment at the hands of those ladies. He took all her money, and spent it upon his own dissolute pleasures, threatening to take her life if she ever uttered a complaint to her parents. Well would it have been had he confined himself to threats! I am instructed that upon one occasion he struck her in her dressing-room with some heavy implement—that she fell to the ground, and retained the mark of the injury for many days; that upon another, when they were at Brussels, he seized her by the hair, flung her upon the ground, and dragged her about, concluding this scene of violence by cutting off her hair. Again, when they were at Folkestone, he saturated the lady’s handkerchief with grease, and when she was asleep applied it to her face and set fire to it, thereby putting her in extreme danger of her life. I must also refer to another incident, which I am compelled to characterise as disgusting, which occurred at Folkestone. Mr. Barber here actually accused my pure and injured client of an indelicate desire to show her feet and ankles when getting in and out of the railway train. But enough of this! It was, again, his constant habit to lock her up in a dark room, because he had ascertained that my client has almost a childish fear of the terrors of the supernatural world; but surely something, in such cases, can be forgiven to the constitutional timidity of a woman. He has been known to lock up cats shod with walnut-shells, upon an occasion of the kind, and to draw pictures with phosphorus on the walls, in order to increase her apprehensions.”
At this moment a clerk slipped a paper into Mr. Battledove’s hand, who glanced at it, and continued:
—“And now, Gentlemen, I come to the lesser grievances to which I before alluded. These, taken by themselves, might be held to be nothing—mere trifles—the little cat’s-paws of a summer’s breeze which will ruffle—though but for a moment—the calm felicity of the best-assorted unions. You will, however, I think, in the discharge of your duty, take all the surrounding circumstances into account, and remember that the acts of which I am about to speak were the acts of a husband whose relations with his wife had been signalised in other more important particulars by tyranny and brutality of the grossest kind. Mrs. Barber—when she entered the married state, remember!—had 800l. per annum; Mr. Barber—nothing but his liabilities! Now, it would appear that Miss Cecilia Montresor—when the negotiations for a marriage were pending between herself and Mr. Barber during the course of her most unfortunate rides with that gentleman in Rotten Row—had expressly stipulated that, during the period of her coverture, Mr. Barber would not interfere with her, nor check her in her habit of purchasing, and wearing silk stockings—and no others. These, it was understood, were to be purchased with her own money. What will you think, Gentlemen, when I tell you that very soon after the fatal words were pronounced, which consigned the lady to his mercy—or, I should rather say, his brutality—he proposed to her to use as a substitute certain stockings which, as I am instructed, are known amongst ladies and in the trade as—Cotton Tops! I cannot give you any precise information as to the meaning of the term—whether the foot or the leg of these hybrid articles is made of silk I am wholly unable to say—or it may perhaps turn out that the fabric is a mere mixture of cotton and silk after all. Mrs. Barber herself will, however, give you precise information upon this point—but, at any rate, she indignantly refused to comply with his request. Mr. Barber then replied that he would compel her to wear worsted stockings—stockings of the coarsest kind, calculated to injure and otherwise irritate the limbs of a delicate lady. For a time he did so—though he afterwards relented. Upon another occasion, he absolutely burnt some petticoats adorned with open and curious needle-work, upon which Mrs. Barber set great value, and insisted that she should wear petticoats of thick stuff, with work at the bottom not above three inches in depth. Again, he abstracted from her a little dog who was greatly attached to her—and, poor lady! she had much need of the attachment even of the brute creation!—and caused it to be stewed with button mushrooms, and served up for dinner: and it was not until she had partaken freely of the dish that Mrs. Barber was informed of the nature of her repast. But I had forgotten, whilst we were on the head of drapery, to mention to you that Mr. Barber had absolutely refused to allow his wife to make use of those articles known to all of you, Gentlemen, under the name of Crinolines. Now, I am not here, Gentlemen, to defend all the vagaries of fashion; but, at the same time, I think you will agree with me, that it is a little hard upon a lady not to be permitted to use the dress of her class. What was the consequence?—three of the leading modistes’ houses in town actually struck Mrs. Barber’s name out of their books, and refused further to imperil their credit by working on Mr. Barber’s patterns. Whatever you may think of this, you will, I am sure, agree with me in condemning the profound indelicacy of a husband who, upon one occasion, actually put on his wife’s crinoline outside his own dress; and, entering a room in which a number of their friends of both sexes were assembled, executed in Mrs. Barber’s presence, and in the presence of their guests, a dance—known, I believe, as the Cachucha—whilst the poor lady’s cheeks were burning with shame and confusion. But, Gentlemen, I will not weary you with reciting, at any length, details which you will hear more appropriately from the lips of the injured lady herself; and very confident am I that when you have heard her simple and artless tale, you will at once—under his Lordship’s direction—conclude that Mrs. Barber shall walk out of this Court free from all further servitude—that she may lay her head upon her pillow at night without any longer apprehension that her uneasy slumbers may be disturbed by a curse and a blow. You will stand between that feeble woman and her savage master. You will remember that you have wives, sisters, daughters of your own: that you are men, and Englishmen, in a word, and will not sit quietly by and see sacred womanhood assaulted and outraged in the person of my unfortunate client—if you can prevent it. Never in the course of my professional experience did I leave a cause so confidently in the hands of a British Jury as this one.”
Savage conduct of the Respondent.
So saying, Mr. Battledove sat down, but in a moment rose again, and said:
“Call Mrs. Barber.”
With a few confidential words to Dr. Dodge, the learned gentleman then hurried out of Court. Gamma.