The Sun.
London, England, 1863-05-22 00:00:00

Mr. Jordan and Mr, Boucicault.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.

SIR,—In a letter which appeared in The Sun of the 19th
inst., Mr. Dion Boucicault attempts to explain away the
sworn facts proved on the trial against Colonel Gibbon for
false imprisonment. Will you grant me the favour and jus-
tice of an equal publicity to my reply ? Ido not desire to
prejudice Mr. Boucicault by an ex parte statement of mine,
but am willing that he shall be judged by his own explana-
tion of the shameless and heartless drama in which he
played so unenviable a part. The cruel and ungenerous
inuendoes he has thrown out in reference to conduct on my
part, in order to relieve himself from the onus pertaining to
his own acts, will be the subject of investigation elsewhere.
My wife had never appeared on the stage during the five
years of our marriage, and accepted the engagement under
Mr. Boucicault's management at Drury-lane Theatre, in
direct opposition to my expressed wishes. It had been my
pride to maintain her from my own resources, and we had
lived h ippily together until the time wnon, by her engage-
ment at the Drury-lane Theatre, she had been brought
within the influence of Mr. Boucicault. The insinuation
that we had previously lived unhappily, in consequence of
my intimacy with another lady, is entirely untrue.
Immediately after my wife's engagement I observed a
marked neglect on her part towards our child, towards
myself, and her duties as mistress of our home. Mr.
Boucicault says Mrs. Jordan left her home in May,
1862, and, by my desire, he gave her an engagement at
Drury-lane Theatre, when he opened it in June of the
same year. I deny that Mrs. Jordan left her home until
after her engagement with Mr. Boucicault, in June, when
the theatre opened for the first time under his management.
My constant practice, after my professional duties for the
evening were ended, was to bring my wife home from
Drury-lane Theatre. Mr. Boucicault says Mrs. Jordan and
myself were in the habit of riding with him to our home, I
" generally preferring to sit on the box." I reply that he
very rarely drove us home. I never sat on the box except
upon one occasion, when, being about to call a cab, Mr.
Boucicault said there was plenty of room in his brougham,
and offered to drop my wife and myself at our door. On
that occasion ray wife was accompanied by another lady
connected with the theatre, the brougham was constructed
to hold only three persons, and I, having just lighted a
cigar, volunteered to ride outside. Mr. Boucicault never
with my sanction or to my knowledge escorted n'y wife
home, and the first time I heard of his having done so it
gave rise to the trouble and misery which have ensued. In
consequence of information ob,ained by me, I went about 12
o'clock on the night of the 3d Sept., 1862, to Pall-mall, and,
while standing in front of the house, I saw Mr.Boucicault's
brougham drive up to the door, and my wife alight from it
and enter the house. I saw Mr. Boucicault himself driven
round to his chambers, in King street, and the brougham
discharged, and in a few minutes afterwards Mr. Bouci_•
cault walked round to Mrs. Jordan's residence—he states,
" with some books." My wife's statement was, that "he
brought her some figs."
We have it, therefore, from Mr. Boucicault, that he went
to my wife's lodgings at 12 o'clock at 'midnight on 3d Sep-
tember last. My evidence on oath proved that he was ad-
mitted without knccking at the door by my wife—that she
had been watching his corning from her window. "I had

scarcely," he says, "entered the hall when I heard a knock

• , _ ---
at the door. Presuming it was some lodger in the house,
and fearing my presence in the hall might cause some re-
mark, I withdrew to let them pass."
Mr, Boucicault, therefore, by his statement, lest he should
be discovered in the p,rformance of an act of innocent ciNi-

lity to my wife, " withdrew" himself to the third floor, up
two flights of stairs above the apartments occupied by her,
and into the bed-room of the only other lodger in the house,
where, according to Col. Gibbon's evidence, he locked him-
self in, and from whence he did not emerge until I had been
removed to the station-house ; that was my complaint
against .2,1. Gibbon. Mr. Boucicault states that I manifested
" neither anger nor excitement, and exhibited no violence
whatever ;" that he "heard no distill banco ;" but he admits
that he heard a remark by me that I only desired " to see
Mr. Boucicault, that he might be identified." I leave the
public to judge th© truthfulness of Mr. Boucicault's expla-

nation by the evidence sworn to by Col. Gibbon. According
to Mr. Boucicault's statement he did not hear or know any •
thing of what was taking place, although all that transpired
was within 12 inches of the door of his self-made prison.
I have never seen nor had any communication of any
kind with Mr. Boucicault since that night, except that
four days after the occurrence I received a letter from him
endeavouring to palliate his conduct. Mr. Boucicault says,
" shortly after the occurrence (September 3, 1862) Mrs.
Jordan left for America." Mrs. Jordan did leave his
theatre, I believe, under the pretext of going to America,
but she remained at an expensive hotel in London, without
any engagement, until February, 1863—at whose expense
may be inferred. Mr. Boucicault says, in his explanation,
"Mrs. Jordan returned to America, and I afforded her the
means to do so."

Mr. Boucicault undertakes also to say that "she (Mrs,
Jordan) wrote to Ler husband to inform Lim whcro eho was
to be found." This I utterly deny. After leaving my
house, my wife wrote to the nurse having the care of our
child to send her (my wife's) trunks to 60, Pall-mall, but
on no account was she to inform me where they were to be
sent.

Mr. Boucicault states he had no opportunity to defend
himself in the action against Colonel Gibbon. Re was,
however, served with a subpoana to attend on the first notice
of trial being given, and every exertion was used to have
him subpoenaed for the day when the trial came on. The
answer given to my solicitor, who endeavoured to subpama
him, was, that he had left town "for the benefit of his
health." I was unable to obtain his attendance at the trial,
as I desired.

I regret to have been myself compelled to refer to the
unhappy circumstances attending the separation with my
wife, but I should not be satisfied to let any matters re-
lating to my conduct (or his) rest on Mr. Boucicault's
explanations.—l am, Sir, yours, &c.,
Lyceum Theatre, May 21.

GEO. C. JORDAN.

A Walk in the Streets of Canton.

(PROM A PRIVATE LETTER.)

I have been spending a week at Canton. I went up by an
American steamer, one of their own peculiar kind, and cer-
tainly for comfort and speed they beat ours, Canton is
rather more than 80 miles from Hongkong. We ran up in
six hours, leaving at 8 a.m. and breakfasting on board ; but
for all the advantages you have to pay—Xl 11s. 6d. for 80
miles of steamboat travelling!
Oa the way up there is nothing particular to see, the
country lying low, with the White Cloud Mountains in the
distance. The Europeans live on one side of the river, the
city of Canton being on the other. The next day I crossed
over to the city. The usual mode of conveyance here is in
boats; you are rowed out to dinner in large boats, which
have a cabin like a small room. I went about the western
suburb. The city itself is almost knocked down, thanks to
our bombardment. It was very tiring work, not a single
street, if that word can be used, being more than eight feet
wide, most of them being about six feet; and, as there are
supposed to be three millions of people in the place, you can
imagine the walking to be something like the Poultry at
4 p.m. In addition to this thronging, the streets are paved
with granite stones like our curb stones, laid across, not
along the paths, and these are very uneven, and, of course,
with the least wet very slippery. Every minute you meet
chairs carried along, and then you have to bolt into a shop
or make a pancake of yourself against the wall. You can
easily imagine that all this, combined with the scarlet and
bright colours of the signboards, makes a walk in Canton
rather fatiguing than otherwise. The city is, however, well
worth seeing. It would be impossible to write down all the
peculiarities of the place, but I will jot down one or two of
the things which struck me most. In nearly every street
you see something connected with gambling, and there are
regular gambling houses where one monotonous game goes
on all day. You know the Chinese "cash," with a hole in
the centre ? Well, a man has a lot of this polished bright,
and, taking a handful, he counts them off by fours, the
spectators laying their stakes whether, when the last four are
taken away, there will be one, two, three, or none left. This
is
th e gamblingstreetand goes on all day long.
At stallsyo you see boys throwing dice, whe •
game
thor they shall have one, two, or no cakes for their "cash."
You see a wheel with a needle, like a compass, for the same
purpose. Fortunetellers are frequent, some of them having
a mechanical, others a live canary, that hops out and picks
an envelope from a number of others, and that contains
your fortune. Besides these outdoor attractions they have
peepshows and toy stalls similar to those in London, selling
quills to blow in water to imitate birds' notes, and such like
my thestr they have barricades
eet
place is, however, ver
good ll ; a
t wares.
the
end The
of n disciplinee ay eve ofr y
that are closed at sunset, and to each district between these
s a
barriers a man is appointed who is responsible for any row
that may take place, if he can't find the offenders. There
are many curious things to be seen in the shops. In one I
saw glass-blowing, small bottles and large cylinders more
than seven feet high being made.
In another, one of li
the baker's shops, a narrow building stretching back-
wards for about 10) yards, I counted 40 bullocks, about 12
at a time, engaged in turoing th't grindstones and grind-
ing the corn. I went into a confectioner's, and found
everything laid out quite in Purseli's style, two or three
rooms, each with cakes and sweetmeats of more or less
value, according to the means of the customer. 'I here were
also lists of prices hanging up against the walls. The pawn-
sh are someth;nr, wonderful. They are tall, square,
brick-built towers, higher than any
of the ne ghbouring
shops, an quite fire-proof front outside. They aro of dif•
ferent classes, some lending money for three months, some
for eight months, and others for three years, I went over
one, and the arrangement cf the articles was very curious,
every separate article being
carefully done up in paper and
labelled. I went over several temples, one containing 600
images of mandarins, each with a different expression of
countenance. I also saw the ponds of carp and gold fish. I
looked in at the exe utiou hall, and saw some of the police-
station cells, with the prisoners having the square blocks of
wood round their necks, and others in fetters. 1 also saw
the painting of the China vases, the process of dying silks,
&c.—in fact, I completely " did" Canton, and it is well
worth spending some time there,