Sir Jasper Carew Part 71

"Alas, however, for his prospects! every doc.u.ment, every letter, every sc.r.a.p of writing that could have authenticated his claim was gone.

Of the very nature of these papers he scarcely retains a recollection himself; he only knows that Madame de Gabriac, whose name I have already introduced to your notice, deemed them all-sufficient, if only backed by one essential doc.u.ment,--the certificate of his father's marriage with his mother. To obtain this had been the great object of her whole life.

"With a heroic devotion to the cause of her friend's orphan child, she had travelled over Europe in every direction, and during times of the greatest peril and disturbance. Accompanied by one trusty companion, Mr.

Raper, she had never wearied in her pursuit.

"Probably, if the occasion permitted, the story I could tell of her efforts in this cause would surprise you not less than that of my client himself. Enough that I say that she stooped to poverty and privation of the very severest kind; she toiled, and labored, and suffered for years long; and, when having exhausted every resource the Old World seemed to offer to her search, she set out for the New! Since that she has not been heard of. The solicitors with whom she had corresponded have long since ceased to receive tidings of her. The belief in her death was so complete that her father, a well-known citizen of Dublin, who died two years back, bequeathed his vast fortune to various charitable inst.i.tutions, alleging his childless condition as the cause.

"I have told you how, originally, my client, then a mere boy, became separated from her he had ever regarded as his mother; I have traced him through some, but far from the whole, of the strange incidents of his eventful career; and it now only remains that I should speak of the extraordinary accident by which he came upon the clew to his long sought-for, long despaired-of, inheritance.

"A short statement will suffice here, since the witnesses I mean to call before you will amply elucidate this part of my case. It was while travelling with despatches to the North of Europe my client formed acquaintance with a certain Count Ysaffich, at that time himself employed in the diplomatic service; and though at the period a warm friends.h.i.+p grew up between them, it was not till after the lapse of many years that the Count came to know that a large ma.s.s of papers--copies of doc.u.ments drawn out by Raper, and which had come into the Count's hands in a manner I shall relate to you--actually bore reference to his former acquaintance,--the casual intimate of a journey.

"These two men, thrown together by one of the most extraordinary chances of fortune, sit down to recount their lives to each other. Beside the fire of an humble chalet, in a forest, Carew hears again the story he had once listened to in his infancy; the very tale his dear mother had repeated to him in the midst of the Alps, he now hears from the lips of one almost a stranger. Names once familiar, but long forgotten, come back to him. The very sounds thrilled through his heart like as the notes of the Swiss melody awaken in the far-away wanderer thoughts of home and fatherland. In an instant he throws off the apathy of his former life, he ceases to be the sport and plaything of fortune, and devotes himself heart and soul to the rest.i.tution of the ancient name of his house and the long dormant honors of a distinguished family.

"We cannot," writes the journalist, "undertake at this late hour to follow the learned counsel into the minute enumeration he went into, of small circ.u.mstances of proof, memoranda of conversations, sc.r.a.ps of letters, allusions in the course of correspondence, and so on; the object of which was to show that although the late Walter Carew had some secret reason of his own for maintaining a mystery about his marriage, that of the fact of the marriage there could be no doubt,--nor of the legitimacy of him who claimed to be his heir; neither are we able to enter upon the intricate question of establis.h.i.+ng the ident.i.ty of the present claimant; suffice it to say that he succeeded in connecting him with a number of events from the days of his earliest childhood to a comparatively recent period, all corroboratory of his a.s.sumption; the possession of the seal and arms of his family, his name, and, above all, the unmistakable traits of family resemblance, being wonderful evidences in his favor. Indeed, we are not aware of a more dramatic incident in the administration of justice than our court presented yesterday, when, at the close of his seven hours' speech, full of all its details, narrative and legal, the able counsel suddenly paused, and, in a voice of subdued accent, asked if there chanced at that moment to be present in the court any of those who once enjoyed the friends.h.i.+p or even the acquaintance of the late Walter Carew. He was one, continued he, not easily to be forgotten, even by a casual observer. His tall and manly figure, the type at once of dignity and strength, his bold, high forehead, his deep-set blue eyes, soft as a child's in their expression, or sparkling like the orbs of an eagle; his mouth more characteristic than all, since, though marked by an air of pride, it never moved without an expression of genial kindliness and good-humor,--the traits that we love to think eminently national; the mingled nature of daring intrepidity with a careless ease; the dash of almost reckless courage with a still milder gayety,--these were all his. Are there not some here, is there not even one who can recall them? And if there be, let him look there! and he pointed to the gallery beside the jury-box, at the end of which was seated a young man, pale and sickly-looking, it is true, but whose countenance at once corroborated the picture. The vast mult.i.tude that filled the body of the court, crowding every avenue and s.p.a.ce, and even invading the seats reserved for the Bar, rose as one man, and turned to gaze on the living evidence of the description. It would be difficult to conceive a more striking scene enacted within walls where the solemnity of the law usually represses every semblance of popular emotion; nor was it till after several seconds had elapsed that the judges were enabled to recall the Court to the observance of the rigid propriety of the justice-seat.

"Himself exhausted by his efforts, and really overborne by feeling, the counsel was unable to continue his address, and the Court, willingly granting an indulgence that his exertions amply deserved, adjourned till to-morrow, when at ten o'clock this remarkable case will be resumed; though it is believed, from the number of witnesses to be examined, and the necessary length of 'the reply,' the trial cannot be completed before Sat.u.r.day evening."

CHAPTER L. A TRIAL--CONCLUSION

The second day was chiefly occupied in examining witnesses,--old acquaintances of my father's, for the most part, who had known him on his return to Ireland, and who could bear their testimony as to the manner in which he lived, and the acceptance he and my mother had met with in the best society of the capital. Though their evidence really went no further than a mere impression on their part, it was easy to perceive that its effect was most favorable on the jury; nor could cross-examination elicit the slightest flaw in the belief that they lived amongst their equals, without the shadow of aspersion on their honor.

An uninterested spectator of the scene might have felt amus.e.m.e.nt in contrasting the description of manners and habits with the customs of the present time; for although the evidence referred to a period so recent, yet were all the details mixed up with usages, opinions, and ways that seemed those of a long-past epoch. Men were just then awakening after that long and splendid orgie which had formed the life of Ireland before the Union. With bankrupt fortunes and ruined estates, they saw themselves the successors of a race whose princely hospitalities had never known a limit, and who had really imparted a character of barbaric splendor to lives of reckless extravagance.

A certain Mr. Archdall was examined as to his recollection of Castle Carew and the company who frequented there. He had been my father's guest when the Viceroy visited him; and certainly his account of the festivities might well have startled the credulity of his hearers.

It was not at first apparent with what object these revelations were elicited by the cross-examination; but at length it came out that they were intended to show that my father, having no heir, nor expecting to have any, suffered himself to follow a career of the wildest wastefulness. With equal success they drew forth from the witness stories of my mother's unpopularity with the ladies of her own set in society, and the suspicion and distrust that pervaded the world of fas.h.i.+on that she had not originally been born in, or belonged to, the cla.s.s with which she was then a.s.sociating.

It was but too plain to what all this pointed; and although old servants of the family were brought forward to show the deference with which my mother's position was ever regarded, and the degree of respect, almost amounting to state, with which she was treated, yet the artfulness of the cross-examiner had at least succeeded in representing her to the jury as self-willed, vain, and capricious, constantly longing for a return to France, and cordially hating her banishment to Ireland.

My mother's friends.h.i.+p and attachment to Polly f.a.gan was ingeniously alluded to as a strange incident in the life of one whose circ.u.mstances might seem to have separated her from such companions.h.i.+p; and the able counsel dwelt most effectively on the disparity which separated their conditions.

These circ.u.mstances were, however, not pressed home, but rather left to make their impression, with more or less of force, while other incidents were being related. To rebut in some measure these impressions, Foxley showed that my mother had been a guest at the Viceroy's table,--an honor which could not have been conferred on her on any questionable grounds.

Unimportant and trivial as was the fact, the mode of eliciting it formed one of the amusing episodes of the trial, since it brought forward on the witness-table a well-known character of old Dublin,--no less a functionary than Samuel Cotterell, the hall trumpeter, now pensioned off and retired, but still, with all the weight of nearly fourscore-and-ten years, bearing himself erect, and carrying in his port the consciousness of his once high estate and dignity.

It was some time before the old man could be persuaded that in all the state and pomp of the justice-seat there was not occasion for some exercise of his ancient functions.

He seemed ashamed at appearing without his tabard, and looked anxiously around for his trumpet; but once launched upon the subject of his recollections, he appeared to revel with eager delight in all the a.s.sociations they called up. It was perfectly miraculous to see with what tenacity he retained a memory of the festivities of old Viceregal times; they lived, however, in his mind like distinct pictures, unconnected with all around him. There was a duke in his "garter," and a d.u.c.h.ess in her diamonds; a gorgeously decked table; pineapples that came from France; and a dessert wine newly arrived from Portugal, some of which Sir Amyrald Fitzgerald spilled on Madame Carew's dress; at which she laughed pleasantly, and, in showing the stains, displayed her ankles to Barry Rutledge, who whispered his Grace that there was not such a foot and leg in Ireland. Lord Gartymore backed Kitty O'Dwyer's for fifty pounds, and lost his wager.

"How, then, was the bet decided, Mr. Cotterell?"

"We saw her dance the minuet with Colonel Candler, and my Lord said he had lost."

"Madame Carew was, then, much admired at Court?"

"She was."

"And a favorite guest, too?"

"We asked her on Wednesdays generally; they were the small dinners, but many thought them the pleasantest."

"Her Grace noticed her particularly, you say?"

"She did so on one Patrick's night, and said she had never seen such lace before; and Madame Carew told her she would show her some still handsomer, for it had been given by the king to her grandmother, whom I think they called Madame Barry, or Du Barry, or something like that."

Though little in reality beyond the gossiping revelation of a very old man, Cotterell's evidence tended to show that my mother had been a welcome and a favored guest in all the best houses of the day, and that, living as she did in the very centre of scandal, not the slightest imputation had been ever thrown upon her position or her conduct.

The counsel probably saw that, not having any direct proof of the marriage,--when, and how, and where solemnized,--it was more than ever necessary to show the rank my mother had always occupied in the world, and the respect with which she was ever received in society.

He had--I know not with what, if any, grounds--a little narrative of her family and birthplace in France, and most conveniently disposed of all belonging to her,--fortune, friends, and home,--by the events of "that disastrous Revolution, which swept away not only the n.o.bles of the land, but every archive and doc.u.ment that had pertained to them."

When he came to my own birth, he was fortunate enough to obtain all the evidence he wanted. The priest of Rathmullen, who had officiated at my christening, was yet alive, and related, with singular clearness of recollection, every circ.u.mstance of that sorrowful night when the tidings of my father's violent death reached the village beside Castle Carew. Of those present on this occasion, among whom were Polly f.a.gan and MacNaghten, he could not yet point to where one could be found.

There now only remained to sum up the evidence, and impart that consistency and coherence to the story which should carry conviction to the minds of the jury; and this task he performed with a most consummate ability, concluding all with an account of my own visit to the home of my fathers, and the reception which there had met me. The pa.s.sionate vehemence of his indignation seemed fired by the theme; and, warming as he proceeded, he denounced the infamy of that morning as not only a stain upon the nation, but the age, and called upon the jury, whatever their decision might be in the cause itself,--whether to restore the heir to his own, or send him a beggared wanderer through the world,--to mark by some expression of their own the horror and disgust this act of barbaric cruelty had filled them with.

A burst of applause and indignation commingled saluted the orator as he sat down; nor was it till after repeated efforts of the criers that silence was again restored, and the business of the trial proceeded with.

Mr. M'Clelland, to whom the chief duty of the defence was intrusted, requested permission of the court to defer the reply to the following day, and, the leave being granted, the court arose.

I dined that day with Mr. Fozley. I would fain have been alone. The intense excitement of the scene had made me feverish, and I would gladly have felt myself at ease, and free to give way, in solitude, to the emotions which were almost suffocating me; but he insisted on my presence, and I went. The company included many very distinguished names,--members of both Houses of Parliament, and men of high consideration; and by all of them was I received with more than kindness, and some went so far as to congratulate me on a victory which, if not yet gazetted, was just as certainly achieved.

I dare not trust myself to dwell on this subject; the tremors of hope and fear I then went through threaten even yet to come back in memory.

A few more words, and I have done. Would that I could spare myself the pain of these! But it cannot be so; my task must be completed.

I suppose that very few persons have ever formed a rightful estimate of the extent to which the skill and cleverness of an able lawyer have enabled him to wound their feelings and insult their self-love. I conclude this to be the case, not alone from my own brief and unhappy experience, but from reading a vast number of trials and always experiencing a sense of astonishment at the powerful perversity of these men. The cruel insinuation, the imputed meanness, the perversion of meaning, the insinuations of unworthy motive, are all acquired and cultivated, like the feints and parries of an accomplished fencer. The depreciation of a certain testimony, and the exaggerated estimate of some other; the sneering acknowledgment of this, or the triumphant a.s.sertion of that; the dark menace of a hidden meaning here, and the subtle insinuation that there was more than met the eye there,--are all studied and practised efforts, as artificial as the stage-trick of the actor. And yet how little does all our conviction of this artifice avail against their influence!

Bad as these are, they are as nothing to the resources in store when the object is to a.s.sail the reputation and blacken the character; to hold up some poor fellow-man--frail and erring as he may be--to everlasting shame, and mark him with ignominy forever. Alas for the best and purest!

what an alloy of meanness and littleness, what vanity and self-seeking mingle with their very n.o.blest and highest efforts. What need, then, to overwhelm the guilty with more than his guilt, and quote the "Heart"

in the indictment as well as the Crime? No, no; if the best be not all good, believe me the worst are not all and hopelessly depraved. I have a right to speak of these things, as one who has felt them. For eight hours and more I listened to such a character of myself as made me sick, to very loathing, at my own ident.i.ty; I heard a man in a great a.s.sembly denounce me as one of the most corrupt and infamous of mankind! I felt the eyes that were turned towards me, I almost thought I overheard the muttered reprobation that surrounded me. A number of the incidents of my changeful life--how learned I know not--were related with every exaggeration and every perversion that malice could invest them with.

For a while, a sense of guiltlessness supported me; I knew many of the accusations to be false, others grossly overstated. The scenes in which I was often depicted as an actor had either no existence, or were falsehoods based upon some small germ of truth; and yet I heard them detailed with a semblance of reality, and a degree of coherence as to time and place, that smote me with very terror, since, though I might deny, I could not disprove them.

To stamp me as an impostor, and my claim as a cheat, appeared to be the entire line of the defence. Indeed, he avowed openly that with all the evidence so painstakingly elicited by the opposite counsel, he should not trouble the jury with one remark. "When I tell you," said he, "who this claimant really is, and how his claim originated, you will forgive me that I have not embarra.s.sed you with details quite irrelevant to this action, since of Walter Carew or of any descendant of his there is no question here! I will produce before you on that table, I will leave him to all the ingenuity of my learned friend to cross-examine, one who shall account to you how the first impulse to this daring imposture was conceived. You will be astounded. It will be, I am aware, a tremendous tax upon your credulity to compa.s.s it; but I will show to your entire conviction that the man who aspires to the rank of an Irish gentleman, a vast estate, and an ill.u.s.trious name, is a foreigner of unknown origin who began life as an emissary of the French revolutionary party. When secret treachery superseded the guillotine, he served as a spy; this trade failing, he fell into the straits and difficulties of the most abject poverty; the materials of that period of his history are, of course, difficult to come at. They who walk in such paths, walk darkly and secretly; but we may be able to display some, at least, of his actions at this time,--one of them, at all events, will exhibit the character of the individual, and at the same time put you in possession of an incident which, in all likelihood, originated this extraordinary action.

"There may be some now present in this court sufficiently familiar with London to remember a certain character well known in the precincts of Charing Cross by the nickname of Gentleman Jack. To those not acquainted with this individual I may mention that he swept a crossing in that locality, and had, by a degree of pretension in his appearance, aided by a natural smartness in repartee, attracted notice from many of the idle loungers of fas.h.i.+on who daily pa.s.sed and repa.s.sed there. I am not able to say if his gifts were in any respect above the common. Indeed, I have heard that it was rather the singular fact that a man in such a station should be remarkable for any claim to notice whatever, which endowed him with the popularity he enjoyed. At all events, he was remarkable enough to be generally, I might say universally, known; and it was the caprice of certain fas.h.i.+onable folk to accord him a recognition as they pa.s.sed by. This degree of attention was harmless, at least, and had it stopped at that point, might never have called for any reprobation; but modish follies occasionally take an offensive shape, and this man's pretension offered the opportunity to display such.

"You have all heard of Carlton House, gentlemen,--of the society of wits who frequent there, and the charms of a circle in which the chief figure is not more distinguished for his rank than for the gifts which elevate social intercourse. To the freedom which this exalted personage permitted those who approached him thus nearly, there seemed to be scarcely any limit. Admitting them to his friends.h.i.+p, he endowed them with almost equality; and there was not a liberty nor a license which could be practised in ordinary polite intercourse that was not allowed at that hospitable board.

"You might imagine that men who enjoyed such a privilege would have been guardedly careful against abusing it; you might fancy that even worldly motives might have rendered them cautious about imperilling the princely favor! Not so; they would seem to have lost every consciousness of propriety in the intoxication of this same flattery; and they actually dared to take a liberty with this Prince which had been more than hazardous if ventured upon with a gentleman of private station.

"The story goes that, offended by his Royal Highness having p.r.o.nounced marked eulogium on the manners and breeding of an individual who was not of their set either in politics or society, one of the party--I am not disposed to give his name, if it can be avoided--dared to make a wager that he would take a fellow off the streets, give him ruffles and a dress-coat, and pa.s.s him off on the Prince as one of the most accomplished and well-bred men in Europe.

"Gentlemen, you may fancy that in this anecdote which I have taken the liberty to relate to you, I am endeavoring to compete with the very marvellous histories which my learned brother on the opposite side addressed to your notice. I beg most distinctly to disclaim all such rivalry. My story has none of those stirring incidents with which his abounded. The characters and the scene are all of home growth. It has neither remoteness in point of time, nor distance in country, to lend it attraction. It has, however, one merit which my learned friend might reasonably envy, and this is, that it is true. Yes, gentlemen, every particular I have stated is a fact. I will prove it by a witness whose evidence will be beyond gainsay. The wager was accepted, and for a considerable sum too, and a dinnerparty arranged as the occasion by which to test it. The secrecy which I wish to observe as to the actors in this most unpardonable piece of levity will prevent my mentioning the names of those most deeply implicated. One who does not stand in this unenviable category is now in court, and I will call him before you."

Colonel Whyte Morris was now called to appear, and, after a brief delay, a tall, soldier-like, and handsome man, somewhat advanced in life, ascended the witness-table. I had no recollection of ever having seen him before; but it is needless to say with what anxiety I followed every word he uttered.

The ordinary preliminaries over, he was asked if he remembered a certain dinner-party, of which he was a guest, on a certain day in the autumn of the year.

He remembered it perfectly, and recounted that it was not easily to be forgotten, since it took place to decide a very extraordinary wager, the circ.u.mstances of which he briefly related.