LAW OF DIVORCE—LORD ELLENBOROUGH.
LORD BYRON once declared, that of all the women he had ever asso- ciated with, the women of high rank in England were the most profli- gate. We are not sure how far BYRON 15 to be trusted in a nice ; discrimination of the differing shades of morality, but few men of his day had better opportunities of judging women's conduct both at - home and abroad. The profligacy which BYRON describes does not arise out of any laxity in our laws touching marriage. Among no people under heaven are they so strict as among ourselves. A man who wants to ,vet rid of his wife must go to Doctors' Commons to satisfy the civil law ; he must go to Westminster to satisfy the com- mon law ; time was when he must go to Chalk Farm to satisfy the law of fashion ; and all existing statutes being complied with, he must carry his case and his witnesses to the bar of the House of Lords, and ask fora new statute for his special relief. To one that has not a few thousand pounds to sport, it divorce is .of impossible attainment ; and accordingly we hear it very frequently urged as a reason why a large. compensation should be assigned to a husband for being deprived of his partner, that without a large compensation he will not be able to keep her away when she is away. It is passing strange, under such circumstances, that divorces should be on the increase ; and yet this seems to be the case. The fact was elicited in what for its rarity is not unworthy of notice, a debate in the Lords on a bill for separating a man from his wife.
• n 1824, EDWARD, Lord ELLENBOROITGFI, married JANE ELIZA7. B TiTH, a daughter of Admiral DIGBY, a very young and a very pretty. woman. The lady some time ago was introduced to ayoung Austria nobleman attached to the Embassy here, 'tamed Prince SCHWARIL. ZENBERG, who figured as the gentleman on the first floor, No. Harley Street. Prince SCHWARTZENBERG is the best gallopader it. Europe, and .a likely man to shuffle himself into the good gram: of a fair lady. Lord ELLENBOROUGH also is an exquisite in his way ; but his attention has, it is said„ been chiefly directed to tit( head,—not unnaturally, considering the character of his spouse , —but this is tender ground. The irregularities of Lady ELLEN.' BOROUGH seem to have been gone about with a most edifying cool ness. Her visits to Harley Street were made at mid-day ; she drovs: thither in her own phaeton—twice—thrice a week, some account' say—there was no disguise—no bribing of abigails—no dropping o window-blinds. A gentleman who lodged opposite, and in whom disposition to peep was not unnaturally produced by these flirtations saw the lady one day standing before the parlour-fire, and the Prim, tout en bon homme busily occupied in lacing her stays ! All thi time, poor Lord ELLENBOROUGH was in profound ignorance of wha' was going forward. First he had the Privy Seal to look aften—thel he had the Corporation in Leadenhall Street to look after,—it we , impossible he should attend to everything, so he was compelled to le' his wife look after herself. At length chance let out the secret, at leas as much of it as was required to arouse the suspicions of the noble Lord and a temporary separation between him and Lady ELLENBOROUG1 ensued. She was rusticating it- Roehampton when she wrote th following letters. We give them as one proof more, in addition t the thousands which former cases supply, of the extreme simplicit of understanding that is ever found in those pretty women who nu away from their husbands. "5— [Roeluunpton], Saturday night. "Forgive me if I do wrong in writing to you. A note just received fror Lady Anson seems to imply that you have expected it. I had begun a leuE to you this morning, thanking you from the bottom of my soul for your un bounded kindness in act and manner : it was far more than I deserved, and am deeply grateful. I again renew all the assurances I gave you last night, that in act I am innocent. I hardly know what or how to write to you. I dare not use the language of affection : you would think it hypocrisy. But though my family naturally wish all should be again as it was once between us, those feelings of honour which I still retain towards you make me still ac- quiesce in your decision. I continue to think it just and right. I have not been able to speak to them on the subject I confessed to you last night. I have spoken little today, but have never for an instant swerved from my own original opinion. I write this to you, if it is possible, for you to keep what I have said from them. Do as they would, only set it down as another proof of unkindness on my part. Could you write me a line through Henry, were it only to tell me your opinion, be assured I should think it right. But oh ! Edward, dear, dear Edward! ought not time, solitude, and change of scene to be tried by me to conquer or obliterate sentiments so inimical to our mutual peace ? Pray write to me all you think upon the subject—all you wish me to do. I will now answer you candidly, and without a shade of deception. God bless you, dearest Edward. JANET." "If my aunt has misunderstood any expression, and you did not expect or wish to hear from me personally, forgive me ; although I long to tell you how gratefully I feel towards you, yet I confess I shoUld never have ven- tured to write.—Ever yours."
This epistle, which was dated 23d May last, and superscribed "To the Lord Ellenborough," at Connaught Place,—and in which " inno- cence," "honour," "mutual affection," and " deary, dearying," are so conspicuous,—was followed on the 28th by another equally sweet, but briefer and more business-like.
" My dearest Edward,—I know you will believe me when I say I feel myself utterly unequal to writing to you to-day. I cannot thank you for your kind- nesses, but entreat you will not think of making me such an allowance ; in- deed it is more than I can possibly want. I will send back the green box to-
morrow morning.—Ever, ever yours, JANET."
A short time after, the actually innocent lady went to Ilfracombe, where she confessed to one of the witnesses examined on the trial and on the bill, that she was with child by Prince SCHWARTZENBERG ! Her farther tricks and travels we have no desire to follow ; she is understood to be at this moment on the Continent with her para. , mour. We should indeed hardly have been at the trouble to mention se very commonplace a personage as this lady at all, whose weak wit, wayward will, and baby face, stand in nowise distinguished from those of hundreds that have gone astray before her, had it not been that a mawkish sensibility has been indulged in with respect to her case, of which it is utterly undeserving. Now for the serious part of the question—the arguments against the divorce. The Earl of MALMESBURY seems to have dwelt much on the alarming frequency of divorce-bills. From 1820 to 1825, there were, it appears, six ; from 1825 to 1830, there have been no fewer than twenty-one. We have generally found, that when burglaries or felonies waxed frequent, there was a corresponding increase in the severity with which juries and judges visited the offenders. This, we have always contended, is very unfair towards the thief; but it is a new doctrine, that when crimes multiply, we are to abate in propor- tion our sympathy with the injured parties. It would be an inversion of the Scripture doctrine with a vengeance, if, instead of letting the wo light on those "by whom. offences come," we should strive to make it light on the heads of the offended. The arguments of Lord RADNOR turn partly on the conduct of Lord ELLENBOROUGH, partly on the conduct of Lady ELLENBOROUGR'S counsel. Lord ELLEN- BOROUGH, it is alleged, was not so careful of his wife as he should have been ; he knew London to be a sad place—he should not have suffered a pretty young woman to drive about the streets unattended. To the charge of negligence, it was properly enough answered, that the lady's relations resided in Harley Street, and therefore her visits there were not fair subjects of suspicion ; and that Lord ELLENBO- BOUGH had a great deal of business to transact, and had not leisure to attend his wife in all her promenades. But the argument of Lord 4RADNOR is not to be met by a mere statement of Countervailing facts. 4111' it be said in a Christian country, and in the year 1830, that the mere fact of a nobleman's wife being allowed to go abroad by her- self is to be construed into a permission or encouragement for her to become a prostitute to the first person she meets ? Is the honour of an Englishman to be held by no other means than bolts and bars and watchings ? Is a husband called on to follow the woman who has vowed before God to be his and his alone, from house to house and from room to room, in order to secure her from physical con- tamination? Who appeals to the nobler and more powerful safe- guards of virtue—the man who practises that Turkish supervision for which Lord RADNOR contends, or he who trusts for the rectitude a his wife's conduct to the dictates of reason and honour and duty ?—But then, Lord RADNOR seemed to insinuate that Lord :ELLENBOROUGH'S own conduct had not been so scrupulous as it blight to have been. We grant that where the conduct of the hus- Pand tends directly to corrupt the mind of the wife, he has very few lelaims on our pity. She is the weaker vessel, and his vicious ex. .iimple may go far to palliate her frailty. But we do not think, plough it may palliate, that it can ever justify the infidelity of the wife. It is a poor plea in law, and worse in morality, that the cii- einal was content to do the Devil's bidding because another had done lit before. There is one case, certainly, in which the criminality laf the husband ought to debar him from relief—where he is accessory to his wife's dishonour. If the wife does wrong with the husband's t2onsent or privity, he has no right to complain. From any charge of such collusion as this, Earls RADNOR and MALMESBURY distinctly vindicated the President of the Board of Control ; but the former 'hinted that there was something like collusion on the trial. This is argument that we do not clearly. understand. Supposing the arty accused to be conscious of having inflicted grievous wrong, is required that she shall notwithstanding instruct her counsel to e advantage of every flaw and weakness in the evidence of her usband's witnesses, in order to deny him such reparation as the Law and Parliament permit ? Collusion in respect of the crime is a proper bar to compensation,—no man ought to reap the advantage of his own tort; but collusion to remove all unnecessary bars to the attainment of justice, is one. of the last things we should expect to hear blamed by a judge called on to dispense it. The Standard says, that marriage is "the one contract among his creatures ratified by God himself." Every contract in which the means are good, and the object good, is ratified of God. Marriage is said to be so xcwr iloycis., because the ceremony, among the Jews as among ourselves, was performed by the priest instead of the notary. But granting it to be of so solemn a character, what has that to do with the question ? The same authority who declares that " those whom God hath joined," no man ought to put asunder,—that a union solemnized by the Church ought not to be dissolved without the authority of the Church,—declares the condition on which the disso- lution may lawfully take place—the adultery of the female. The Saviour does not say that the female, nor the public for the female, is entitled to plead the criminality of the husband in bar of such a dis- solution. Our learned contemporary assumes as a postulate, that the public has an interest in maintaining the "inviolable sanctity of the marriage tie ;" and he goes on to argue from this postulate, that if the sanctity have been thoroughly violated—violated on both sides—the tie ought to remain unbroken ! We confess we are utterly at a loss to see how private happiness or public virtue is to be subserved by compelling a husband and wife who have committed adultery to con- tinue in the commission of it until the death of one of the parties.
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