A SKETCH OF "LOTHAIR."
The greatest conquest made by the Roman Catholic clergy, of late years, is that of the young Marquis of Bute, the original of Mr. Disraeli's "Lothair," in his social and politico-religious novel of that name. This young and noble lord was born on the 12th of September, 1847, and is now in his twenty-third year. His father, the second Marquis of Bute, married Lady Maria North, eldest daughter and co-heir of George Augustus, third Earl of Guilford. This estimable lady died childless, in 1841, and the old Marquis married again in 1845, Lady Sophia-Frederica-Christina Hastings, second daughter of the first Marquis of Hastings. The young Marquis was unfortunate in losing his mother when he was in his twelfth year. Lord Bute has been a great traveler for a man of his age, and being an only child he has had the best of tutors that Europe could afford.
bute
"LOTHAIR," (MARQUIS OF BUTE.)
Nearly every young lady of wealth and rank in Englandset her cap for the young Marquis when he attained his majority; but this nobleman is very unlike the Marquis of Waterford or the Duke of Hamilton, who by the way are distant relatives of his. He is not fond of dissipation, and since his boyish days he has been of a reflective turn of mind, with deep religious yearnings—yet withal he is not guilty of cant, and does not bore one with his religious views. He is good looking, but is not showy in his dress, and just now he is the lion of fashionable Europe from the fame which attends him everywhere as the hero of Disraeli's novel. The Marquis was reared a Presbyterian with decided Church of England leanings, and was converted one year ago, to the Roman Catholic faith through the efforts of Monsigneur Capel, who has also a niche in "Lothair," under the title of Monsigneur Catesby. He is a most accomplished ecclesiastic, who unites with a fascinating exterior the greatest ability and perseverance.
BUTE, MANNING, AND NEWMAN.
The income of the Marquis is about £380,000 annually, and he has decided to give one year's income, which is nearly two millions of dollars, toward the construction of a Catholic Cathedral at Oxford, in which all the glories of the Medieval Gothic shall be renewed. The roll of this young nobleman's titles is enough to startle an American. They are as follows: John Patrick Crichton-Stuart, Marquis of Bute, Earl of Windsor, Viscount Mountjoy in the Isle of Wight, Baron Mount-Stuart of Wortley and Baron of Cardiff Castle, Wales, in the Peerage of Great Britain. He is also Earl of Dumfries and Bute, Viscount of Ayr and Kingarth, Baron Crichton, Lord Crichton of Sanquhar, Lord Mount-Stuart of Cumbrae and Inchmarnock, and Hereditary Keeper of Rothesay Castle (formerly a Royal residence). Besides, he is a Baronet of Nova Scotia among the Blue-Noses.
Through his mother he is a Crichton, which is a royal House, and by his father he comes of the equally royal House of Stuart, and he holds the title of "Lord of the Isles." The motto of his family is "Avito viret honore." (He flourishes in an honorable ancestry.) The motto of the Hastings family, with which Lord Bute is connected, is "Trust warrants troth."
The most beautiful woman of the English nobility is Lady Victoria-Maria Louisa Hastings, who is now in her thirty-third year. This lady was a great pet of Queen Victoria, and when a child Her Royal Highness, the Duchess of Kent, the mother of the Queen, held the pretty baby in her arms as sponsor at the baptismal font, for the sake of a dear friend, Lady Victoria's mother, who was Stephanie, Duchess of Baden, and a relation of the Emperor Napoleon. The young girl grew up, and is now the wife of John Forbes-Stratford Kirwan, Esq., of Moyne, County Galway, Ireland.
The Marquis of Bute is a relation of the late Baron Stuart de Rothesay, for many years English Ambassador at Paris.
It has been variously hinted and rumored that the Marquis of Bute was at one time engaged to the Lady Albertina Hamilton, a daughter of the Duke of Abercorn, and also to a young lady of the Sutherland-Leveson-Gower family, which has for its head the Duke of Sutherland. It is said that the "Lady Corisande" of "Lothair," is none other than a daughter of the Duchess of Sutherland, the former firm friend of Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe.
If the Marquis of Bute was indeed a suitor for the hand of a daughter of the Duke of Abercorn, I am quite sure that he might have succeeded in his endeavor, for I believe that that worthy nobleman has been blessed with ten daughters and four stalwart sons, who can all answer to the Slogan of the Hamiltons.
The young Marquis has residences and castles, and immense domains, at Mt. Stuart; Isle of Bute, at Cardiff Castle, Glamorganshire, at Dumfries House, and he has a town house in London; besides, his name is inscribed on the registers of four London and three Parisian Clubs.
The ablest man in the English Roman Catholic Church is Archbishop Manning, who has been such a firm supporter of the Papal Infallibility in the Ecumenical Council. In due time, no doubt, this prelate will have the Cardinal's red hat conferred upon him for his services.
The greatest scholar in the Roman Catholic Church, in England, is Dr. J.H. Newman, the celebrated Oxford Tractarian, or Puseyite, who became a convert to Catholicism, with Manning, and since 1840 has devoted his brains to the service of his new Mother Church with great learning and zeal. His picture shows one of the most spiritual faces in England—it is almost weird in its nature.
There is a monument erected to a man named Dow, in St. Botolph's Church (Church of England) Aldgate, who bequeathed a sum of money to the clerk of the church, to pay him for ringing a bell at midnight, on the occasion of the execution of a criminal at Newgate. This was to call the attention of the condemned man to his soul.
It was this same Robert Dow who left, by will, in the year 1612, the sum of £1 6s.8d., annually, as a fee to the Sexton of St. Sepulchres, which is just opposite Newgate Prison, for pronouncing two solemn exhortations to condemned criminals on the night preceding and on the morning of their execution, as they passed the church-door on their way to Tyburn-Tree.
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CHAPTER XLII.
THE LEGION OF THE LOST.
VERY different estimates have been made as to the extent of the Social Evil in London, but that made some fifteen months ago by the Right Reverend Dr. Wilberforce, Bishop of Oxford, from facts and figures furnished him by medical men, the police returns, and the minor clergy, places the number of abandoned or public women in London, at the startling aggregate of eighty thousand unfortunates.
This estimate of Vice and Sin is certainly calculated to intimidate and terrify the Christian people of England, were it not for the fact that a hundred agencies are constantly at work, upheld and supported by good men and women, to lessen the number of these fair and frail members of the Legion of the Lost.
The great parade ground of the abandoned women of London, is the Haymarket, when all London is at rest—when bed-room blinds are drawn down, and street doors locked and chained—when lights are rarely seen but in the windows of the sick wards of hospitals—then the Haymarket is in its glory, gay and lively as a ball-room, and swarming with gaudily dressed women sauntering and flaunting up and down its broad pavements, crowding them as on an illumination night. The dissolute and idle, the debauchee and the debauched, pour into this market of sin, this Exchange of Vice and Harlotry, like moths attracted by the glare that must sooner or later utterlydestroy them. This street is always at night full of cabs, drunken men, noisy women, jugglers, and thieves.
The Haymarket is the Republic of Vice, where all who enter are hale fellows well met, for every one knows why the other has come here, and caution being cast off for the time, all ranks and stations mingle.
"SCOTT'S" IN THE HAYMARKET.
Outside the tavern doors are gathered clusters of swells talking to the poor souls, who, disguised by some flash dressmaker, have hidden the figure of the servant-maid under the toilette of the mistress. The heir to a title stands bowing to some pretty faced girl, who mixes her bad grammar with oaths. The door of a public house swings back to let the hope of a family enter, who is about to sip wine at the counter with the chip bonnet at his side.
scotts
"SCOTT'S" IN THE HAYMARKET.
Let us enter "Scott's" in the Haymarket. "Scott's" is the great Oyster House of London. It is a little cosy, crowded place, and not more than fifty feet deep by half as many feetin width. At any hour of the night and until two o'clock in the morning, it is possible to get oysters, fried, roasted or raw, at "Scott's." They are also cooked with cracker dust, which makes them taste as if they had been broiled in sawdust. Oysters are quite dear at "Scott's," and will cost three shillings a dozen, raw, which is a very high rate when compared with the price of our American oysters. They are small and bitter, and black, and the best of the bivalves come from Ostend in Belgium.
There is a counter at the front of the shop, and behind this counter are exposed all kinds of shell-fish, lobsters, prawns, crabs, periwinkles or "winkles," and oysters, as well as mussels. The bounding clam is unknown in England, however, and is not found amongst the edibles. Behind this counter the proprietor and his wife, and three or four male assistants in white aprons, are busily engaged opening oysters and serving up lobsters and dressed lettuce, to the customers who prefer to eat standing. To eat standing, however, is not the common custom in England, and the majority who wish to eat oysters take seats in the little stalls behind in the back room, which are exactly like our American oyster stalls, only that they are furnished with plush cushions. In these stalls are clerks, swells, men about town, Englishmen and foreigners, eating oysters and drinking Stout, or supping on lobsters and champagne, and as it is now after eleven o'clock, nearly every man in these stalls has a girl of a certain class with him, who is of course eating supper at his expense.
Upstairs there is a room somewhat similar to the one below, which is now densely crowded; but the upper room is more select. I went upstairs, and here I found a number of couples lounging in a free and easy manner, and some were calling loudly upon the waiters for brandy and water. Seated in one of these stalls is a pink-faced boy, fresh from his country home, helping with delicate attention the painted woman beside him to costly viands.
She laughs noisily as a man, flinging her arms about, and as the Champagne foams in her glass, she tosses her head likea Bacchante. But an action that by daylight would seem disgusting to the boy, is charming in the blaze of the Haymarket gaslight, and the lad looks with admiration upon the companion whom on the morrow he would pass without a nod of recognition.
The police returns for the year 1868-9, give the following figures as to the number of public women, or prostitutes, who are known to the police in the metropolitan district of London:
For the one public woman here registered there are five who do not reside in brothels, but live alone, hiring lodgings for which they pay from eight shillings to five guineas a week, according to the manner in which the apartments are furnished, and the character of the neighborhood in which they are situated, so that it is calculated that there are seventy to eighty thousand women in London whose names do not appear in the official list of the Lost, yet lead immoral lives, and whose sin is as great in the sight of God, but less in the sight of man, as their infamy is not of that nature that the law can punish them for it.
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THE MIDNIGHT MISSION.
God knows it is from no persistent desire to uncover the sores and ulcers of the huge city, that I state these facts.
Great and unceasing efforts are being made by the clergy and philanthropic citizens of London to diminish this terrible Traffic in Souls, which is the distinguishing mark of infamy that clings to the Haymarket.
"MIDNIGHT MISSION."
For some years past these unfortunate women have been collected together while plying their avocation, in an apartment in the vicinity of the Haymarket, in which some slight refreshments are prepared for them, ices and cooling but temperate drinks being served up gratis to all who will attend and listen to the words of repentance and hope from the mouths of clergymen who visit this place nightly for the purpose of reclaiming these Lost Ones. This is called the "Midnight Mission," or "Meeting," and the girls are gathered by having circulars presented to them in the street as the hour nears midnight. A great number attend, and they generally listen with patience and decorum. This Mission was founded by the Hon. and Rev. Baptist Noel, who first preached to the unfortunate girls.
A high officer of the London police informed me that there were in that city about seven thousand lost women who are always well dressed, well gloved, and well shod, who live comfortably, and many of them elegantly. These women, of course, are all Free Lances, and prey upon the fashionable young men of London and strangers who visit the great Babylon.
Of this number, he stated that three thousand five hundred were what is called under protection, or kept mistresses. The remainder have hired lodgings for themselves in Pimlico, Fitzroy square, Portman street, Howard street, Winchester street, Sutherland street, Gloucester street, and other respectable localities of the metropolis, paying two or three sovereigns a week for a suite of apartments, and furnishing them at their own expense. This latter class, as a general thing, live individually apart from each other, and keep each a servant of all work, to do their cooking and washing.
Some of these girls have furnished their apartments at a cost of from two to five hundred pounds, ordering the most costlyarticles of furniture with the extravagance and profusion peculiar to their class. Pictures, etageres, buffets, mirrors, ormolu clocks, tapestry carpets, and the most luxurious articles of bijouterie and the toilet are to be found in their apartments; and, unlike their frail sisters in New York and Paris, these London girls act with complete independence of their landladies, who in the cities mentioned, as a rule, treat the unfortunate women placed in their power more like dogs than human beings. In London, these girls are in the strictest sense their own mistresses, and therefore do not come under any police regulations; nor can they receive the designation of professionals, as they never solicit men on the street, or live in what is called a house of ill-fame. The persons who rent apartments to these girls in the districts which I have thus enumerated, are not supposed to know anything about the occupation or business of tenants, and they never, by any possibility, attempt to interfere with them.
One of the most frequented resorts of Lost Women in London is the Cremorne Gardens at Chelsea, on the Thames river bank, and distant about four miles from the Post Office and St. Paul's Cathedral.
These Gardens comprise about four acres, which are covered with trees, and ornamented with fountains, flower-beds, and statues. This is the maddest place in London, after ten o'clock in the evening. Until that hour, the middle class of London citizens, shopkeepers, tradesmen, and clerks, and their wives and sweethearts, have possession of the Gardens; but at that hour they leave the place, and from thence until one and two o'clock in the morning Cremorne is in the possession of Lost Women and their male friends and abettors.
The Cremorne is in many respects very like the Mabille at Paris, but decency is better enforced, and the women at Cremorne have not such a debased look as their unfortunate sisters of the Mabille.
At Cremorne there is a circular platform on which a band of music is constantly stationed during the evening, and here the dancing is principally done. Between the dances the girlspromenade, or take supper with their male friends in the numerous restaurants, which are always crowded to excess by noisy people of both sexes, drinking Champagne and Moselle, or eating lobster or devilled kidneys. Cold suppers are provided for the girls in an upper saloon, for which they are charged two shillings and sixpence a piece, without wine. Then there are fireworks, two or three theatres and music halls, Japanese jugglers, bowling alleys, shooting galleries, and other modes of diversion and amusement.
Swarms of young fashionables from the Opera, where they have been listening to the enchanting strains of a Tietjens, a Nillson, or a Patti, in evening dress with thin overcoats, may be seen here of a warm night, or perhaps they may have come from the clubs in St. James or Piccadilly, to kill time.
skittles
"SKITTLES" AND THE PRINCESS MARY.
"SKITTLES" AND THE PRINCESS MARY.
"Skittles," now dead, who was at one time the most famous woman of her class in London, was very fond of attending Cremorne, where she was in the habit of drinking large quantities of Champagne. "Skittles" was at one time a great personage in London, and bore on her brougham the crest of a Marquis. This audacious woman had the temerity to dispute the way with the Princess Mary of Cambridge, while that member of the Royal family was riding in Rotten Row. "Skittles" was on horseback, being in full riding dress, and the Princess Mary was also on horseback, when they met, and itis said that "Skittles" lifted her dainty little riding whip at the astonished Princess, and demanded that she should give her precedence in the Ride.
Cremorne is a great place for rows between the women and the fast young men who attend the amusements there. While promenading around the Dancing Ring one evening, I noticed a crowd gathering, and heard a female voice uttering screams of distress. The young lady with the unearthly voice I ascertained was a habitue of the place, known as "Mad Rose," and the offending biped was a certain fast baronet named Sir Frederick Johnstone, who has since figured in the Mordaunt Divorce Suit.
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A ROW AT CREMORNE.
It seems that this "Mad Rose" had been at one time under the baronet's protection, and the afternoon before the rencontre he had met her in the Park, and passed her without recognition, although she sought it from him. She was determined to have her revenge for this, besides some old scores she had to settle with him; or it was that he had not settled some old scores with her.
The girl was tall, elegantly shaped, and dressed in a tasteful and rich manner, becoming her blonde hair and complexion. Seeing the baronet with his friends, she stepped up to him, and singling him out, struck him across the face with her gloved hand, which was glittering with diamonds.
A ROW AT CREMORNE.
Then she uttered a scream of feminine distress, and a crowd of swells gathered around her. Then she knocked off his hat and screamed again. The baronet uttered no remonstrance, but backed up against a railing, his hat lying on the ground. Attempting to pick it up, she knocked it off again and screamed. This thing went on for the space of ten minutes, the girl, in a passion—whether fictitious or not, I cannot tell—slapping the exquisite in the face at intervals, knocking off his hat and screaming, but not forgetting to pour volleys of abuse upon the baronet's head in the meanwhile. A great crowd collected and enjoyed the fun. But I noticed that not a man in the assemblage offered to interfere, and the baronet's friends refused to molest her, with the exception of one, who caught hold of her wrists, and he had to let go his hold of her in an instant, as he was attacked in a body by the other girls, who put him to flight immediately. The baronet begged for mercy, but got none; and, finally, a grand charge was made on the crowd by the Cremorne police, and it was dispersed.
This movement relieved the baronet from further persecution, and the mad woman was taken away. One fact was noticeable—not a man in the crowd even attempted to raise his hand to the girl during her repeated assaults. Had it been in America, I am certain she would, under such circumstances, have met with very rough, if not brutal treatment.
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CHAPTER XLIII.
SCARLET WOMEN.
WE were standing on the smooth, grassy lawn, at Goodwood, a wandering American and the writer, strangers in a strange land, with the bustle and uproar which are always adjuncts to a Race Course in any country, and the Babel exclamations of a multitudinous assemblage sounding in our ears.
GOODWOOD RACES.
It was the first day of the annual races, which are run for three days in every year, at Goodwood, the princely residence and grounds of the Duke of Richmond. This is the most aristocratic race meeting held in England, and it is always frequented by the nobles and people of high social position, with their wives, daughters, and lady friends.
The meeting is divided into three separate days running, each day having a distinctive title, and known to those familiar with equine sport, as the "Stakes Day," the "Cup Day," and the "Duke's Plate Day."
It was a beautiful and unclouded English July noon, and the smell of the hawthorn hedges, and the faint breath of the hollyhocks made a perfume in the air, which banished all humors and sulkiness from the crowds of well dressed and well bred people who had been waiting to hear the saddling bell rung before the start. Lithe and sinewy little jockeys, clad in parti-colored silk shirts, and wearing kaleidoscopic caps of the same material, walked the fresh-looking, silken-maned, and symmetrical-limbed horses, up and down the velvety green sward, to give the high bred English girls an opportunity to inspect theirfavorites, whose colors predominated in the shades of their gloves, parasols, and gracefully-hung robes, which rustled around their supple and elegant figures.
Under high, sheltering greenwood trees, cosy seats were arranged for the ladies, who made the Lawn picturesque with their bright colored dresses that shone with splendor as their owners gathered in brilliant patches on the velvety turf, gossiping and chatting while Guardsmen, and Clubmen, Heavy Swells, and noisy boys, from Eton and Harrow, gamboled and shouted as if at cricket, and sedate gownsmen from Cambridge, and Double Firsts, and Wranglers, from Oxford, made wagers, and drew from their coat-pockets small betting books to record the sums invested.
The Embankment, a high, long, and well-kept mound of grass-covered earth, was swarming with the fair sex, all of whom had their swan-like necks encircled with white lace ruffs, which serve so well as a setting for a well-shaped and milk-white throat.
Afar off we could observe, through yawning gaps in the ancient and stately trees, which were pierced by the ruddy beams of sunlight, the tall towers and fair proportions of Goodwood House, the magnificent mansion of the Duke of Richmond. Twenty to twenty-five thousand people were gathered in the noble old Park whose vistas stretched off into dells, copses, and woodland nooks, for thousands of acres.
Here were gathered all the well-known aristocratic patrons of the turf in England, men who would hardly be seen at Newmarket or Epsom, and here again were the racing men, whose names are met with everywhere in England, where the warning bell is rung to saddle, and where thousands may be lost and won in an hour—the Westmorelands, the Savilles, Chaplins, Anneslies, Prince Soltykoff, Count de Lagrange, who owned "Gladiateur," Lord Vivian, Sir Frederick Johnstone, Lord Roseberry, Sir Joseph Hawley, Admiral Rous, Captain Hall, Lord Wilton, Lord St. Vincent, Lord Ailesbury, Sir C. Legard, Baron Rothschild, the Duke of Beaufort, Mr. W.S. Crawfurd, Lord Poulett, Lord Falmouth, Lord Calthorpe, Mr. E. Brayley,Lord Strafford, Mr. Bromsgrove, and many others, titled and untitled, who are leaders among the racing aristocracy. The Marquis of Hastings, and the Duke of Newcastle, that day, were absent—the first in his grave, the other beggared by his extravagance, and an outcast among his peers.
As the day grew apace, the swarms of people became more densely packed until all classes of the sporting multitude were represented. There was the "Welcher," who makes bets and does not pay when he loses, a low-sized, stumpy fellow, in cutaway frock coat and drab beaver hat, a huge horse's head pin sticking out of his gaudy, blue scarf, which is dotted with small white balls, and wearing a shaggy moustache, which he twists with the head of his cane, that has for a knob a nag's head, in bone-work.
Yonder, stopping to ask for a noggin of gin from one of the proprietors of the numerous ginger beer and refreshment stands, is the London prize fighter—a model, in his way—thick set, broad in the loins, and having a murderous forehead and a battered face, from some recent encounter, one of those dangerous-looking, suspicious fellows, whom you may meet with any night wandering about the docks in Wapping, or lounging at the notched doorway of a tavern in Shoreditch, or Whitechapel.
Sauntering this way, where I stand in a shady spot with my American friend, are two "heavy swells," dressed in the height of fashion, and mincing their vowels in a feminine manner; yet effeminate as their language sounds, they are both massive-looking fellows, and now I recollect having seen both leaning out of the bow window of the Guard's Club, in Pall Mall, and one of the pair I have also noticed trooping his company at St. James' Palace, at the unusually early hour—for him—of nine o'clock, of a summer's morning.
Men are gambling, and singing, and eating, and drinking, and betting shillings and sovereigns all around us, and my companion seems stunned by the noise and uproar which rises and swells in an indistinct way this hot July day, as we movefrom place to place seeking a quiet nook where we may commune together.
ENGLISH MINSTRELSY.
There is suddenly a discordant hum and a party of strolling minstrels halt before a carriage and commence to serenade the fair lady listeners, who fling sixpences to them languidly. These minstrels have their faces blacked, and are appareled in hideous check coats with very small bodies, and have very large buttons sewed to the skirts, which are ornamented with ridiculously long tails. The songs generally sung by those wretched minstrels, are slangy, and sound senseless to an American's ear, as witness the following stanza which they chant with wide-mouthed refrain:—
"Button up your waistcoat, button up your shoes,Have another liquor and throw away the blues,Be like me and good for a spree,From now till the day is dawning.For I am a member of the Rollicking Rams,Come and be a member of the Rollicking Rams,The only boys to make a noise,From now till the day is dawning."
The course was lined and packed with every known manner of vehicle and equipage. There were drags, four-in-hands, dog-carts, landaus, tandem teams, ladies' pony chaises, phætons, carryalls, clarences, broughams, and open barouches. Many of the turn-outs were adorned with the crests of noble families, and some few bore the princely cognizances of great Continental houses.
One of these large, roomy, and handsomely-constructed, open barouches, drawn by four grey horses, served as a focus for many glances drawn toward it. Some of the glances bestowed on the female occupants of the handsome barouche were very unfriendly—and when some proud patrician girl rode by, her eyes shot fire at the borrowed splendor of the three Scarlet Women, who reclined lazily upon the softly-cushioned seats, and no less hostile were the glances thrown on the graceful wavy figure of the handsome girl who sat her thoroughbred and silken-eared and shapely chestnut bay mare by the side of the barouche, andwho bent over like a reed to chat with the principal female figure leaning back on the cushions.
I looked at these four gaily dressed, handsome women, with their loud chatty manners, their indescribably bold flashes of the eye, their familiar and free conversation with the titled fools and giddy young lordlings, and baronets and rich young commoners, and as I looked I saw that these four women represented the Great Social Plague Spot of England. While I looked, a police inspector, from London, who had come down to this ordinarily quiet, Sussex town, to keep an eye on some distinguished pickpockets who were to attend the races, sauntered to where I stood with my friend, and as I had made his acquaintance in the English capital he was not long in informing me as to the character of the magnificently attired women.
"They are the four gayest women in England, Sir," said he, "Those four ladies—wecall themladiesbecause we dare not call them anything else, they have so many protectors of rank and influence—are "Mabel Grey," "Anonyma," "Baby Hamilton," and "Alice Gordon."
"Mabel Gray?" said my friend enquiringly, "I think I've heard of her before—which is she?"
mabel
"MABEL GREY."
"That's her, Sir, as is sitting back in the front seat with a plate of chicken on her lap, with the golden butterflies in her lace bonnet, and the splendid diamond cross hanging from her neck—that's the gal with the blue eyes and auburn hair. The gal that's holding the long necked green glass for that swellto pour champagne into it, is "Baby Hamilton"—ah, she is a wild one—many's the thousand pounds the young Jook of Hamilton squandered on her, and so did the poor Marquis of Hastings, poor fellow—wuss for him. The finest looking gal of all is that "Anonyma" gal as some of these fellows that has book eddication has called her—they say it means "No Name," but I know she has a name, for it used to be Kate Bellingham when she came to London first. Oh, she's a high blooded one—just look at how she sits that chestnut mare—I'll warrant you that mare would bring six hundred guineas at Tattersall's—if she'd bring a pound—ye won't ketch her drinking in public, she's too proud of herself to do that—no, Sir, she wouldn't be seen taking a drink from the Prince of Wales himself at a public place like the Race Course. Now there's Alice Gordon," added the police officer, who began to grow loquacious in his description of these fair but frail and giddy beauties, "she's a quiet, orderly, young creature, and as pretty as a peach, poor little thing—God help her—she never knew a mother's care, and she was lost for want of a kind word and a loving heart to guide her young steps."
"THEY ARE OFF."
Now the saddling bell has rung amid the greatest excitement, and the multitude who have been flirting, eating, and drinking, betting, and playing at divers games of chance, become suddenly hushed, and a great quiet comes over the populated fields, stands, and tents, as the jockeys ride forth to the starting point, five famous horses held in the leash and straining their necks with avidity and equine eagerness for the race. The ladies of the demi-monde settled themselves well forward in their seats. "Anonyma" swept by on her chestnut to get a good position for a look at the horses. "Mabel Grey" allowed her knife and fork, which she had been using on the unoffending chicken, to fall into her plate, and the tangled curls of "Baby Hamilton" reclined on her shoulders as a fool of a Guardsman gave her his arm to assist her to stand up in the drag, and handed her his glass to sweep the field. The stately looking footman who is bustling among the dishes and wine bottles, assisting "Anonyma's" butler in preparation forthe coming feast, stops in his occupation to listen to the thundering roar of the crowd, and to look at the gallant animals as they come forward to the stand. The butler, who is a grave and elderly personage, receives his orders from "Anonyma," with dignity, and he is lost to sight among the game-hampers and the champagne bottles, and Moselle flasks, for a moment.
Listen to that cheer and long-continued shout! They are off, they are off; and the whole vast swarm of human beings is aroused. The ladies clap their hands and utter weak sounds of joy or distress, and the cadgers, tramps, and more polished pickpockets, are now beginning to reap their harvest in the midst of the excitement and momentary frenzy.
The race is a two-mile stretch, and only five horses are entered. The prize is the Goodwood Cup, valued at three hundred sovereigns.
Two of the horses entered are four-year-olds, and the others are three-year-olds. The great Jewish banker and member of Parliament, Baron Rothschild, has entered "Restitution," a four year old, who is ridden by Daley, an Irish jockey of fame. Sir Frederick Johnstone's entry is "Brigantine," a three year old. Mr. Saville's "Blueskin," Lord Calthorpe's "Robespierre," and Lord Strafford's "Rupert," make up the number of horses who have darted by the Grand Stand in the storm of wild huzzas.
"ANONYMA."
"Anonyma," whose chestnut was pawing the turf in a frisky manner, grips the bridle of the blooded mare, and pulls hardily at her mouth. A number of roughs around a booth salute her with not very choice language, for she is known at the races, and the blood mantles in her cheek and the crimson tide surges up to her temples as a coarse blackguard repeats an opprobious epithet, and before he can draw back she lays his cheek open with her dainty riding-whip, and giving the mare more rope, the crowd opens wide for her with a cheer, and she dashes across the Course on a canter, just as the Rothschild's jockey, with his head bent down to the mane of "Restitution," and his silken cap flying in the hot wind, sweeps by, "Blueskin" following fast, and the great banker's jockey swerving asidefrom his course, wins, by a miracle; "Restitution" having been for a moment blinded by the long skirts of "Anonyma," in her mad canter across the turf, and now there is a huzza, and a rending, wild hurricane of applause, as Rothschild's colors go forward to the Weighing Stand, and "Restitution" is pronounced winner of the Goodwood Cup of 1869, "Robespierre" being a bad fourth, and "Rupert" coming in last of the field.
Now the principal race of the day is ended, and great acclaim having been given to the victor, the crowds disintegrate and separate into little knots for refreshments, and hard-faced fellows, in flashy costumes, may be seen pulling from capacious pockets, greasy wallets, to settle their debts of "honor," and much beer is drank among the humble people, and floods of costly wines are poured out in drags and dog-carts, and bright eyes and smiling lips meet one everywhere, and there is a clatter of knives and forks, and a popping of corks in the vicinity of the carriages occupied by the Scarlet Women of London, who are here to-day in swarms, and who are caressed and welcomed as if their position was assured and the dark shadow of a Shameful Life had not fallen upon them.
anonyma
"ANONYMA."
Leaning over the side of the drag, and talking to Mabel Grey, are three of the "fastest" young men in England, Lord Arthur Pelham Clinton (since dead), Courtenay, Earl of Devon, and the Duke of Newcastle, brother to Lord Arthur. All three are bankrupt in fortune as well as in morality. Lord Arthur'smother, a daughter of the former Duke of Hamilton, dishonored her husband, and there seems to be a taint in the blood of the young noble, who has been living on his wits for years. He is a languid-looking fellow, and does not look as if he could fall-to and saw a load of wood.
Mabel Grey says to Lord Arthur, with a lisp: "Clinton, do take a bit of chicken and a glass of fizz. No? Well then, take a glass of hock, like a dear good boy. You look awfully cut. What can be the matter with the man?"
Just under the shadow of the wide-spreading beech-tree, where the drag is stationed, an itinerant preacher is about to commence a phillipic against Vice and Crime. He could not have chosen a better location than this, where the ears of these Painted Women may be filled by him with some truths that they seldom seek after.
alice
"ALICE GORDON."
"Alice Gordon," the fair-haired blonde, with the deep blue eyes, condescends to bestow a glance at the preacher, who, now that he is beginning to draw a crowd by his fiery invective, and denunciatory language, directs a look of scorn and pity at the Lost Women in the drag. The crowd, who naturally dislike women of the class of Lais and Aspasia, give encouragement to the squat-figured and harshly-spoken Boanerges. The swells around the drag, who are now joined by Sir Frederick Johnstone, advise the Scarlet Women to tell the coachman to whip up the horses and "dwive the dwag away from that beastly preacher—the howid little boah."
The preacher thunders at them, "Go, you gaudy libertines, with your harlots and your women of Sodom, England is cursed with such as you. But God will punish you all, and will smite you in your hour of pride. For what says the Book, whose pages you never open:
"The ungodly are forward, even from their mother's womb; as soon as they are born they go astray, and speak lies.
"They are venomous as the poison of a serpent, even like the deaf adder, that stoppeth her ears.
"Break their teeth, O God, in their mouths; smite the jaw-bones of the Lions, O Lord; let them fall away like water that runneth apace; and when they shoot their arrows let them be rooted out."
"Baby Hamilton," one of the women in the drag, shudders at these Inspired Words and grows pale, while "Anonyma," who canters up easily on her chestnut, asks Sir Frederick Johnstone:
"Did you pull off a pot of money on "Brigantine," Sir Frederick?"
"No, the doose of it was I lost two thousand on my own horse. But I hedged and took 'Restitution' against the field, so I am not so badly plucked."
And this is the entertainment and conversation of some of the hereditary rulers of England. Pardon me, reader, if I have brought you into such loose and unprincipled company. I did it to show you who are the female companions of a majority of the young English nobility. It is this class of young men who patronise these Social Pariahs, and look with contempt upon the manners of a respectable girl, and vote the conversation of virtuous women as a bore.
"MABEL GREY."
That woman with the sunny smile, laying back in the drag, toying with her fan—Mabel Grey—was, five years ago, a wretchedly-paid working girl, who eked out an existence as a shoe-binder, in a shop in Oxford street, London, on a pittance of seven shillings a week. Now, the diamonds on her fingers would purchase a comfortable villa, and around her throat, which is white as alabaster, is a necklace of pearls, that cost the Prince of Wales five thousand pounds, it is said. She ridesevery day in Rotten Row, the famous ride and fashionable drive in Hyde Park, and her skirts often touch the garments of the Princess of Wales as they pass each other in the crowded Row. And certainly the Princess has no reason to look pleasantly at Mabel Grey. Mother to five children, and daughter of the Vikings, with clear, unsullied Norse blood in her veins, she may well question herself, when alone, "Why did I marry a profligate and blackguard?"
Mabel Grey is the original of Boucicault's "Formosa," and it was she who gave a name to Dan Godfrey's famous "Mabel Waltz." Godfrey is the leader of the Guard's band, and the musician thought that it would be received as a delicate compliment by his aristocratic patrons, to call a delicious piece of dance music by the Christian name of the chief of England's Hetairæ.
In every shop-window the features of Mabel Grey are flaunted at one along with the portraits of Nillson, Patti, the Queen, the Princess of Wales, and other virtuous and good women. You may meet her and "Anonyma" at the Opera, at the Chiswick Flower Show, at Kensington Gardens, and other fashionable resorts, mingling unrebuked among the noblest ladies in the land. She has a sumptous villa at St. John's Wood, Brompton, a suburb of London, and in her stables are constantly kept twelve to fifteen blooded animals for the saddle or for driving—these horses being the gifts of her numerous aristocratic admirers. She dines off dishes of silver and gold, and has a host of servants. At Ascot she induced the Prince of Wales to bet on a certain horse, whereby he lost the nice little sum of $100,000, or £20,000.
And it is this bold, brazen, and bad woman, who divides the heart of the Prince of Wales with the Princess Alexandra, his lawful wife and the mother of his children, the other half being owned by Mabel Grey, together with his pocket-book, which he is most apt to keep closed to all others.
She was the cause of the ruin of Captain Milbanke, of the Guards—a distant relation of the deceased wife of Lord Byron, I believe—and she has destroyed dozens of young men in their fortunes, social position, and masculine character.