THE CONSISTORY COURT
I
Sailing from Calcutta for London in an East Indiaman, at the end of
1840, Lola was consigned by her step-father to the "special care" of a
Mrs. Sturgis who was among the passengers. He obviously felt the
parting. "Big salt tears," says Lola, "coursed down his cheeks," when
he wished her a last farewell. He also gave her his blessing; and,
what was more negotiable, a cheque for £1000. The two never met again.
But although she had left India's coral strand, a memory of her
lingered there for many years. In this connection, Sir Walter Lawrence
says that he once found himself in a cantonment that had been deserted
so long that it was swallowed up by the ever advancing jungle. "A
wizened villager," he says, "recalled a high-spirited and beautiful
girl, the young wife of an officer, who would creep up and push him
into the water. 'Ah,' he said, with a smile of affection, 'she was a
_badmash_, but she was always very kind to me.' She was better known
afterwards as Lola Montez."
At Madras a number of fresh comers joined the good ship _Larkins_ in
which Lola was proceeding to England. Among them was a certain Captain
Lennox, aide-de-camp to Lord Elphinstone, the Governor. An agreeable
young man, and very different from the missionaries and civil servants
who formed the bulk of the other male passengers. Lola and himself
were soon on good terms. "Too good," was the acid comment of the
ladies in whose society Captain Lennox exhibited no interest. The
couple were inseparable. They sat at the same table in the saloon;
they paced the deck together, arm in arm, on the long hot nights,
preferring dark and unfrequented corners; their chairs adjoined; their
cabins adjoined; and, so the shocked whisper ran, they sometimes
mistook the one for the other.
"Anybody can make a mistake in the dark," said Lola, when Mrs.
Sturgis, remembering Captain Craigie's injunctions, and resolved at
all costs to fulfil her trust, ventured on a remonstrance.
Ninety years ago, travellers had to "rough it;" and the conditions
governing a voyage from India to England were very different from
those that now obtain. None of the modern amenities had any place in
the accepted routine. Thus, no deck sports; no jazz band; no
swimming-pool; no cocktail bar; not even a sweepstake on the day's
run.
But time had to be killed; and, as a young grass widow, Mrs. James
felt that flirting was the best way of getting through it. Captain
Lennox was the only man on board ship with whom she had anything in
common. He was sympathetic, good-looking, and attentive. Also, he
swore that he was "madly in love with her." The old, old story; but it
did its work. Before the vessel berthed in London docks, Lola had come
to a decision. A momentous decision. She would give David Craigie the
slip, and, listening to his blandishments, cast in her lot with George
Lennox.
"I'll look after you," he said reassuringly. "Trust me for that, my
dear."
Lola did trust him. In fact, she trusted him to such an extent that,
on reaching London, she stopped with him at the Imperial Hotel in
Covent Garden; and then, when the manageress of that establishment
took upon herself to make pointed criticisms, at his rooms in Pall
Mall.
Naturally enough, this sort of thing could not be hushed up for long.
Meaning nods and winks greeted the dashing Lennox when he appeared at
his club. Tongues wagged briskly. Some of them even wagged in distant
Calcutta, where they were heard by Lola's husband. Ignoring his own
amorous dalliance with a brother officer's spouse, he elected to feel
injured. Resolved to assert himself, he got into touch with his London
solicitors and instructed them to take the preliminary steps to
dissolve his marriage. The first of these was to bring an action for
what was then politely dubbed "crim. con." against the man he alleged
to have "wronged" him.
The lawyers would not be hurried; and things moved in leisurely
fashion. Still, they moved to their appointed end; and, the necessary
red tape being unwound, interrogatories administered, and the evidence
of prying chambermaids and hotel servants collected and examined, in
May, 1841, the case of James v. Lennox got into the list and was heard
by Lord Denman and a special jury in the Court of Queen's Bench. Sir
William Follett, the Solicitor-General, was briefed on behalf of the
plaintiff, and Frederick Thesiger appeared for Captain Lennox.
In his opening address, Sir William Follett (who had not been too well
instructed) told the jury that the petitioner and his wife "had lived
very happily together in India, and that the return of Mrs. James to
England was due to a fall from her horse at Calcutta." While on the
passage home, he continued, pulling out his _vox humana_ stop, the
ship touched at Madras, where the defendant came on board; and,
"during the long voyage, an intimacy sprang up between Mrs. James and
himself which developed in a fashion that left the outraged husband no
choice but to institute the present proceedings to recover damages for
having been wantonly robbed of the affection and society of his
consort."
At this point, counsel for Captain Lennox (who, in pusillanimous
fashion, had loved and sailed away, rather than stop and help the
woman he had compromised) cut short his learned friend's tearful
eloquence by admitting that he was prepared to accept a verdict, with
£1000 damages. As the judge agreed, the case was abruptly terminated.
This, however, was only the first round. In December of the following
year, the next step was adopted, and a suit for divorce was commenced
in the Consistory Court. As neither Mrs. James nor the Lothario-like
Captain Lennox put in an appearance, Dr. Lushington, declaring himself
satisfied that misconduct had been committed, pronounced a decree _a
mensa et thoro_. All that this amounted to was merely a judicial
separation.
The report in _The Times_ only ran to a dozen lines. Considering that
the paper cost fivepence a copy, this was not a very liberal
allowance. Still, readers had better value in respect of another
action in "high life" that was heard the same day, that of Lord and
Lady Graves, which had a full column allotted it.
II
This was all that the public knew of the case. It did not seem much on
which to blast a young wife's reputation. Dr. Lushington, the judge of
the Consistory Court, however, knew a good deal more about the
business than did the general public. This was because, during the
preliminary hearing, held some months earlier and attended only by
counsel and solicitors, a number of damaging facts had transpired.
Mrs. James, said learned counsel for the petitioner, had "been guilty
of behaviour at which a crocodile would tremble and blush." A serious
charge to bring against a young woman. Still, in answer to the judge,
he professed himself equipped with ample evidence to support it. His
first witness was a retired civil servant, a Mr. Browne Roberts, who
had known the respondent's husband, first, as a bachelor in India, and
afterwards as a married man in Dublin. At the beginning of 1841, he
had received a call, he said, from a Major McMullen to whom Captain
Craigie had written, asking him to take charge of his step-daughter on
her arrival in London and see her off to his relatives in Scotland.
When, however, the major offered this hospitality, it was refused.
Thereupon, Mr. Roberts had himself called at the Imperial Hotel,
Covent Garden, and suggested that she should come and stop with his
wife; and this invitation was also refused.
Not much in this perhaps, but a good deal in what followed. Mrs.
Elizabeth Walters, the manageress of the Imperial Hotel, said that on
February 21, 1841, "a lady and gentleman arrived in a hackney cab,
with luggage marked G. Lennox and Mrs. James, and booked a double
room." Mrs. Walters had not, she admitted, "actually discovered them
undressed, or sharing the bed," but "she would not have been surprised
to have done so." Accordingly, when her travelling companion left the
next morning, she taxed Mrs. James with misconduct. After telling her
to "mind her own business," Mrs. James had declared that she and
Captain Lennox were on the point of being married, and had then packed
up and left the establishment.
"What exactly did she say?" enquired the judge.
"She said, 'what I choose to do is my own affair and nobody else's.'"
On leaving the somewhat arid hospitality of the Covent Garden Hotel,
Mrs. James had removed to a lodging-house just off Pall Mall, where
she stopped for a month. Mrs. Martin, the proprietress, told the court
that, during this period, Captain Lennox settled the bill, and "called
there every day, often stopping till all hours of the night."
The testimony of Mrs. Sarah Watson, the sister of Captain James, was
that her brother had written to her in the autumn of 1840, saying that
his wife had been thrown from her horse and was coming to England for
medical treatment; and that he had written to his aunt, Mrs. Rae, of
Edinburgh, suggesting that his wife should stop with her. Mrs. Watson,
having "been told things," then called on Mrs. James in Covent Garden.
"I spoke to her," she said, "of the shocking rumour that Captain
Lennox had passed a night with her there, and pointed out the
unutterable ruin that would result from a continuance of such
deplorable conduct. I begged her to entrust herself to the care of
Mrs. Rae. My entreaties were ineffectual. She positively declared,
affirming with an oath, that she would do nothing of the kind."
Among the passengers on board the East Indiaman by which Mrs. James
had voyaged to England was Mrs. Ingram, the captain's wife. "The
conduct of Mrs. James," she said, "was unguarded in the extreme, and
her general behaviour was what is sometimes called flirting." Captain
Ingram, who followed, had a still more disturbing story to recount.
"On several occasions," he said, "I heard Mrs. James address the
gentleman who joined us at Madras as 'Dear Lennox,' and she would even
admit him to the privacy of her cabin while the other passengers were
attending divine service on deck. When I spoke to her about it, she
answered me in a very cool fashion."
All this was distinctly damaging. The real sensation, however, was
provided by Caroline Marden, a stewardess.
"During the voyage from Madras," she told the astonished judge, "I
more than once saw Captain Lennox lacing up Mrs. James's stays."
"Did you see anything else?" faltered counsel.
"Yes, I also saw her actually putting on her stockings while Captain
Lennox was in her cabin!"
There were limits to intimacies between the sexes. This was clearly
among them. For a man to assist in adjusting a woman's stays, and
watch her changing her stockings, could, in the opinion of the learned
and experienced Dr. Lushington, only lead to one result. The worst
result. Hence, he had no difficulty in pronouncing the decree for
which the husband was applying.
III
All James had got for his activities in bringing his action was a
divorce _a mensa et thoro_, that is, "from bed and board." But, while
it was all he got, this measure of relief was probably all he wanted,
as he was not contemplating a second experiment in matrimony, either
with Mrs. Lomer or anybody else. Where his discarded wife was
concerned, she would have to shift for herself. She no longer had any
legal claim upon him; nor could she marry again during his lifetime.
Her position was a somewhat pathetic one. Thus, she was alone and
friendless; besmirched in reputation; abandoned by her husband; and
deserted by her lover. But she still had her youth and her courage.
The London of the 1840's, where Lola found herself cast adrift, was a
curious microcosm and full of contrasts. A mixture of unabashed
blackguardism and cloistered prudery; of double-beds and primness; of
humbug and frankness; of liberty and restraint; of lust and license;
of brutal horse-play passing for "wit," and of candour marching with
cant. The working classes scarcely called their souls their own; women
and children mercilessly exploited by smug profiteers; the "Song of
the Shirt"; Gradgrind and Boanerges holding high festival; Tom and
Jerry (on their last legs) and Corinthians wrenching off door knockers
and upsetting policemen; and Exeter Hall and the Cider Cellars both in
full swing. Altogether, an ill place of sojourn for an unprotected
young woman.
Exactly how this one supported herself during the next few months is
not very clear, for, if she kept a diary, she never published it.
According, however, to a Sunday organ, "she entangled the virtuous
Earl of Malmesbury in a delicate kind of newspaper correspondence, an
assertion having been made in public that she visited that pious
nobleman at his own house." An odd story (of American origin, and
quite unfounded) has it that, about this period, she established
contact with a certain Jean François Montez, "an individual of immense
wealth who lavished a fortune on her"; and Edward Blanchard, a hack
dramatist of Drury Lane, contributes the somewhat unhelpful remark,
"She became a Bohemian." Perhaps she did. But she had to discover a
second career that would bring a little more grist to the mill. Such a
course was imperative, since the balance of the £1000 her
step-father had given her would not last indefinitely. Looking round,
she felt that, all things considered, the stage offered the best
prospects of earning a livelihood. Not a very novel decision.
Nowadays, as an attractive young woman, with a little capital in her
possession, she would have had more choice. Thus, she might have
opened a hat shop, or run tea-rooms, or bred pet dogs, become a
mannequin, or a dance club hostess, or even "gone on the films." But
none of these avenues to feminine employment existed in the
eighteen-forties. Hence, it was the footlights or nothing.
[Illustration: _Lola Montez, "Spanish Dancer." Début at Her Majesty's
Theatre_]
She had the sense to put herself in the hands of an instructress. The
one she selected was Fanny Kelly ("the only woman to whom Charles Lamb
had screwed up sufficient courage to propose marriage"), who conducted
a school of acting. Being honest, as well as capable, Miss Kelly took
the measure of the would-be Ophelia very promptly.
"You'll never make an actress," was her decision. "You've no talent
for it."
But, if the applicant had no talent, the other saw that she had
something else. This was a pair of shapely legs, which, as a
ballet-dancer, could yet twinkle in front of the footlights.
This opinion being shared by its recipient, she lost no time in
adopting it. As a preliminary, she went to Madrid. There, under expert
tuition, she learned to rattle the castanets, and practised the bolero
and the cachucha, as well as the classic arabesques and entrechats and
the technique accompanying them. But she did not advance much beyond
the simplest steps, for the time at her disposal was short, and the
art of the ballerina is not to be acquired without years of unceasing
study.
According to a French journalist, an "English Milord" made Lola's
acquaintance in Madrid. This was Lord Malmesbury, "who was so dazzled
by the purity of her Spanish accent that he adopted her as a
_compagnon de voyage_, and shared with her the horrors of bad cooking
and the joys of nights in Granada." This fact, however, if it be a
fact, is not to be found in the volume of "memoirs" that he
afterwards published.
Still, it seems that Lord Malmesbury did meet Lola. His own account of
the incident is that, on returning to England from abroad, in the
spring of the year 1843, he was asked by the Spanish Consul at
Southampton to escort to London a young woman who had just landed
there. He found her, he says, "a remarkably handsome person, who was
in deep mourning and who appeared to be in great distress." While they
were alone in the railway carriage, he improved the occasion and
extracted from his travelling companion the story of her life.
"She informed me," he says, "in bad English that she was the widow of
Don Diego Leon, who had lately been shot by the Carlists after he was
taken prisoner, and that she was going to London to sell some Spanish
property that she possessed, and give lessons in singing, as she was
very poor."
Notwithstanding his diplomatic training, Lord Malmesbury swallowed
this story, as well as much else with which it was embroidered. One
thing led to another; and the acquaintance thus fortuitously begun in
a railway carriage was continued in London. There he got up a concert
for her benefit at his town house, where, in addition to singing
Castilian ballads, his protégée sold veils and fans among the
audience; and he also gave her an introduction to a theatrical
manager, with results that neither of them had foreseen.