III
A doughty, but anonymous, champion jumped into the breach and issued a counterblast to Papon's effort in the shape of a second pamphlet, headed "A Reply." But this was not any more remarkable for its accuracy than the original. Thus, it declares, "She [Lola] lived with the King of Bavaria, a man of eighty-seven. The nature of that intimacy can best be surmised by reading the second and third verses of the First Book of Kings, Chapter i. It is evident to any reflecting mind that it was a sort of King David arrangement." As for the rest of the pamphlet, it was chiefly taken up with an elaborate argument that, all said and done, its subject was no worse than other ladies, and much better than many of them.
Among extracts from this well intentioned effort, the following are the more important:
A certain Marquis Auguste Papon, a quondam panderer to the natural desires and affections which are common to the whole human race, published and circulated throughout Europe a volume which stamps his own infamy (as we shall have occasion to show in the course of this reply) in far more ineffaceable characters than that of those whom, in his vindictiveness, he gloatingly sought to destroy.
But, before we proceed to dissect his book, it may be permitted us to ask the impartial reader what there is so very remarkable in the conduct of the King of Bavaria and Lola Montez as to distinguish them unfavourably from the monarchs and women celebrated for their talent, originality, and beauty who have gone before. Where are Henry IV of France, Henry V, Louis XIV, and Louis XV, with their respective mistresses? Who of their people ever presumed to interfere on the score of morality with the favours and honours conferred on those distinguished women? Nay, to come down to a later period, has the Marquis Auguste Papon ever heard of the loves of Louis XVIII and Madame de Cuyla, and that after the monarch's restoration in 1814? Is he ignorant of those of Napoleon himself and Mademoiselle Georges? Have not almost all the royal family of England—even those of the House of Hanover—been notorious for their connection with celebrated women? Has he never heard of Mrs. Walkinshaw, ostensible mistress of Charles Edward the Pretender, of Lucy Barlow, mistress of Charles II, mother of the Duke of Monmouth? Of Arabella Churchill and Katherine Sedley, mistresses of James II? Of the Countess of Kendal, mistress of George II, who was received everywhere in English society? Or of George IV and the Marchioness of C——? Of the Duke of York and Mary Anne Clark? Of the Duke of Clarence and the amiable and respected Mrs. J——? And last, not least, of the present King of Hanover and late Duke of Cumberland, who labours even unto this hour under suspicion of having murdered his valet Sellis, to conceal his adultery with his wife? In what differs the King of Bavaria from these?
Lola Montez in caricature. "Lola on the Allemannen Hound"
But even to descend lower into the social scale of those who have occupied the attention of the world without incurring its marked and impertinent censure, has the Marquis Auguste Papon ever heard of the beautiful Miss Foote, who, first the favourite of the celebrated Colonel Berkeley (a natural brother of the Duke of Devonshire) and secondly of a personal friend of the writer of this reply—the celebrated Pea Green Hayne—became finally the charming and amiable Countess of Harrington, one of the sweetest women that ever were placed at the head of the Stanhope family or graced a peerage?
Who, that ever once enjoyed the pleasure of knowing this fairest flower in the parterre of England's aristocracy of beauty, would, in a spirit of revenge and disappointed avarice, have had the grossness to insult her as the Marquis of Papon—the depository of all her secrets—has insulted the Countess of Landsfeld with the loathsome name of "courtesan," because, yielding to the confidence of her woman's heart, she had been the adored of two previous lovers? Never did Lord Petersham, afterwards the Earl of Harrington, take a more sensible course than when he elevated in a holy and irreproachable love—a love that strangled scandal in its bloated fullness—the fascinating Maria Foote to the position she was made to adorn, being twin sister in beauty as well as in law to the charming Miss Green, whose ripe red lips and long dark-lashed blue and laughing eyes were, before her marriage with Colonel Stanhope, the admiration and subject of homage of all London. Should her eye ever rest on this page, she will perceive that we have not forgotten its power and expression.
To descend still lower in the scale of social life, has the Marquis Auguste Papon ever heard of the celebrated Madame Vestris, now Mrs. Mathews? Is he ignorant that her theatre—the Olympic—was ever a resort of the most fashionable and aristocratic people of London? Did her moral life in any way detract from her popularity as a woman of talent and of beauty, and an artiste of exceeding fascination and merit? And yet she had more lovers than the Marquis Auguste Papon can, with all his ingenuity, raise up in evidence against the remarkable woman he, in his not very creditable spirit of vengeance, has sworn to destroy.
Let us enumerate those we know to have been the lovers of Madame Vestris, who, after having passed her youth in all the variety of enjoyment, at length became the wife of a man, not without talent himself, and whose father stood first among the names celebrated in the comic art.
First was a personal friend of the writer of this reply to the unmanly attack of the Marquis Auguste Papon. And we have reason to remember it, for the connection of Henry Cole with the most fascinating woman of her day led to a duel in Hyde Park, of which that lady was the immediate cause, between the writer and a British officer who was so ungallant as to seek to check the enthusiasm created by her scarcely paralleled acting. To him succeeded Sir John Anstruther, and after Sir John the celebrated Horace Claggett. In what order their successors came we do not recollect, but of those who knew Madame Vestris in all the intimacy of the most tender friendship were Handsome Jack, Captain Best, Lord Edward Thynne, and Lord Castlereagh. These things were no secrets to the thousands who, fascinated by her beauty and the perfection of her acting, nevertheless thronged the theatre she was admitted to have conducted with the most amiable propriety and skill. On the contrary, they were as much matters of general knowledge among people of the first rank and fashion as the sun at noon-day. And yet what gentleman ever presumed to affix to the name of this gifted woman, whose very disregard of the opinion of those who hypocritically and sub rosa pursued in nearly ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the same course—what gentleman, we ask, ever dared to commit himself so far as to term her a "courtesan"?
There was a good deal more of it, for the "Reply" ran to seventy-six pages.
The title-page of this counterblast ran:
LOLA MONTEZ
or
A REPLY TO THE
"PRIVATE HISTORY AND MEMOIRS"
of
THAT CELEBRATED LADY
RECENTLY PUBLISHED
By
The Marquis Papon
FORMERLY SECRETARY TO
THE KING OF BAVARIA
AND FOR A PERIOD
THE PROFESSED FRIEND AND ATTENDANT
of
THE COUNTESS OF LANDSFELD
Stet Nomnis Umbra—Junius
NEW YORK
1851