The Sun.
London, England, 1832-01-17 00:00:00

SITTING OF THE 13th OF JANUARY.

In proportion as this judicial proceeding ap-
proaches its end, public curiosity increases. The
body of the Court was even more crowded than on
former occasions. Every seat wai occupied at an
early hour. •
M. Ilennequin then addressed the Court in reply,
as follows :

If simple and unsophisticated statements have
been n ickedly perverted by calumny—if the most
tragical event of the age is, by the hand of personal
interest, stamped with the characters of assassination
only with the intention of throwing the weight of
suspicion on an innocent head, we can comprehend
the grief of the person thus outraged, and pardon the
warmth of his defenders.
If, scarcely disguising itself under the appearance
of a judicial proceeding, the spirit of party, always
watchful, always skilful in seizing upon the means
of exciting t4e passions, has introduced itself into
Courti- with the view of acquiring the tri-
bune, which they wished to erect in the high-ways,
is it not clear that the plausible adversary, who en-
deavoured in vain to disguise himself from my eyes,
has been seized with a sentiment of indignation,
which could not find a more eloquent advocate?
If those hypotheses upon which my antagonists
have relied are to be admitted, then I grant that
those searching words and those impassioned accents
of which the echoes seem hardly yet to have died
away, were neither more or less than the expression
of legitimate feelings ; but I would ask whether
those hypotheses were admissible in the opinion even
of the parties who have turned them to so great
account ?

Is she, then, ignorant of her life—she who has
obtained for herself the honours of notoriety ? Was
it not well known that amidst the sad demonstra-
tions which will soon again exhibit themselves, the
voice of blood could not be stifled, and that thus the
fear of traditional reproach, which inveiglers are in
the habit of addressing to the families which they
have plundered, could no longer condemn the re-
lations of the Doke of Bourbon to render them-
selves accomplices of acts which were the torment
of his latter days ? Finally, no person can be de-
ceived with respect to the true character of the
present suit. There are no families who would con-
sent to remain silent in the face of facts known pre-
viously to the present moment, and it is in vain that
by a scheme which cannot escape the observation of
any one, it is attempted to convert a question re-
specting a will into a question of dynasty and a
system of government. It was, moreover, very
clever to represent as harmless an influence which
it was impossible to conceal. These are not merely
the indiscretions of an imprudent friendship ; they
are the means of defence and apologies which you
have heard. It was also of importance to the "de-
fence to efface, if possible, some cruel impressions
which, in a cause where violence is charged, ought
to exercise a just influence. Doubtless it was a
master-stroke to turn the current of opinion, and
to put aside the contemplation of unfortunate con-
descensions and afflicting participations, by exciting
the inquietudes and indignation of all the friends to
the new order of things.
Thus the private life of Madame de Feucheres,
the causes of the death of the Duke of Bourbon, the
question of who ought to be accused of speculating
in political passions in this cause, are problems which
my adversaries have introduced into the discussion.
What has constituted their strength must, on that
very account, become the subject of my examina-
tion ; and if, in this melancholy discussion, some
melancholy truths should be established, let them
blame themselves only for the consequences which
they have provoked.
I will proceed in the track which they have opened
to me, and what obstacle can stop me ? Do not
believe that, deceiving- your hope, trifling with
my duty, I will confine within my breast the useful
truths which it contains, and state only facts co-
loured and perverted. An appeal has been made to
me : 1 will answer it. I have been in some mea-
sure reminded of my duty, and I proceed to devote
myself to it entirely.
It is indisputable that the morality of parties is
implicated in an accusation of suggestion, inveigle-
ment, and violence. If it be useful to refer from an
action to its author, it is often not less useful to
travel from the cause to the effects produced, and it
is in this respect that the action, of which I am the
organ, has always given me the right of entering
into explanations as to what concerns Madame de
Feucheres ; and yet, relying on public notoriety, I
have confined myself to a single word. I am now
relieved from this reserve. I am furnished with a
text on which I have not commented. I am, as it
were, forced into the necessity of a more severe ex-
amination.

I ought, however, to bless such imprudence. Per-
haps, indeed, I had not said enough for the Chamber
of Council. It is known, that if the relations which
I am about to explain were not a cause of incapa-
city, it has been allowable to consider them as a
dangerous preparation for suggestion and inveigle-
ment, and even the most dangerous of all. These
relations are, therefore, a legal ground, which the
fact explained in my first speech did not sufficiently
appropriate to my cause.
" Stop ! stop !" cries the powerful voice which
we have all heard with religious attention, and which
my friendship obeyed, forge►ting for a moment the
intere.ts of my client, " Stop! do not commit the
dime of Shem."

Vain terror ! who is not aware of the marked dis-
tinctions which public opinion has in this respect
for a long time established between the two sexes ?
It is known that hardly any sentiment of virtue
survives the loss of chastity in a woman : it is abso-
lutely necessary that they should be rigidly chaste.
Are the faults of our sex judged with equal severity ?
And which of us, when recovered from the excite-
ment caused by a brilliant display of oratory, has
not been satisfied that the Duke of Bourbon has
not forfeited his character for courage and inex-
haustible benevolence, and is not less the most
lamented of men for having the same failings as
Francis 1., Bayard, Henry IV , and Louis XIV. ?
Vain illusion, or rather revelation of a concert,
which afflicts me. It is not the Duke d'Aumale
that this eloquent display has defended, and his de-
fender did not perceive that it was to Madame de
Feucheres he lent his brilliant shield.
I might appeal as to the private life of Madame
de Feucheres to some writings which she has not
refuted. Putting out of the question anonymous
pamphlets, whose attacks it is sometimes allowable
to disdain, it becomes no person to remain silent
under strati grave accusations. The Courts of Law
are open. Silence may justly be considered as
want of power to refute, and therefore as an ad-
mission of the truth of accusations. I do not find,
however, that the appeal to opinion and the myste-
ries of St. Lett supply me with elements of a dis-
cussion sufficiently legal to warrant me in calling
your attention to those publications.
I will found all my arguments on the documents
read in the cause, and on the speech of Madame de
Feucheres' defender. -
Madame de Feucheres' defender has told you that
his client was born in an honourable family, and
doubtless it was not without come object that he

represented the person whom he was defending as
having a favourable origin. In the reply, you
doubtless will receive an explanation relative to the
occupation and situation of this family, and, above
all, a statement of their name, for, after reading all
the documents in the cause, that is still a mystery
to me.

You have been told that Sophia Dawes, an Eng-
lishwoman by birth, and still young, was distin-
guished iri the midst of her numerous family by the
Prince, who was then in exile. You' have also been
told that he was charmed with her graces ; and I
can make out that when he was consulted by her, IN
1817, respecting a marriage which did not take place,
he spoke to her of her pretty face and her glass; but
I cannot so easily understand why insinuation should
be resorted to when it is impossible that the advo-
cate could be ignorant of what the documents in the
cause contained. -

You know that by a protecting principle of pub-
lic manners, it is requisite that Frenchmen who
marry abroad should publish their union in Coe
mayoralty in which they reside. You know also
the celebrated discussions to which the application
of this principle has given rise. I hold in my hands
the act of the publication of the marriage of M.
..Adriane de Feucheres with Madame Sophia Clarke,.
widow of William Dawes, residing at Paris, Rue
Neuve des Capucines, No. 9, eldest daughter of
Richard Clarke and Jane Walker his wife.
They departed for London where the widow
Dawes arrived the first, and wrote to the Prince on
the 25th of July, 1818, in the following terms:—
" I await but the arrival of M. de Feucheres to
conclude this grand affair." The marriage was ce-
lebrated in London on the 6th of August, 1818,
and the name of Clarke does not occur in the certi-
ficate of the marriage in the parish of St. Martin-
in-the-fields. This name of Clarke, which Madame
de Feucheres never used in England, she was of
opinion that she ought to resume in France. The
act of transcription is subscribed by her under the
signature of S. Clarke, widow Dawes. What, then,
is this marriage which my opponent has not men-
tioned to us ? When he was detailing to us stories
of the marriages which his client had failed to make,
why did lie not give u s some explanation of that
which she actually had made ? but here is the
wonder! Sophia Dawes had about her person
both a nephew and a niece, James Dawes and M:,-
tilda Dawes, and, of course, you must suppose
them to stand in that degree of relationship to
wards her husband ; well, undeceive yourselves, they
are her own nephew and niece, and the marriage ot-
Matilda Dawes leaves us no room to doubt it. In 1827
Matilda Dawes, with a dowry of a million (francs),
bestowed 'on her by the Prince, married the 'Mar-
quis of Chabannez. The father of Matilda, James
Dawes, who lives in England, in the Isle of Wight,
not desiring to undertake a journey, gave, by the
act of the 31st of May, 1827, an authority i;,
writing to M. Robin, empowering his sister, the
Baroness de Feucheres, and his son James to repre-
sent him at this marriage. In the agreement and I
the contract of this marriage the members of the
family do not assume the name of Dawes alone,
their name is Daw, otherwise Dawes. And, what
is very remarkable, the mother of Madame de Feu-
cheres, resident for several years in Paris, was not
present at the marriage of her grand-daughter Ma-
tilda. You will have the opportunity of reply, and
you will tell us if the maiden name of your client is
Clarke, Daw, or Dawes. Epochs of birth are inte-
resting; and you should edify the tribunal on the
subject of the first marriage. Do not forget that,
in 1817 Madame Dawes consulted the Prince with
respect to the projected marriage; thus the date of
the decease of her first husband is necessarily ante-
cedent to this period. The certificate of marriage
—the certificate of death—are necessary : ou will
say why those explanations are not found on record
in the biography presented in the name of your
client ; and if you have no satisfactory explanation
to give, what a precedent will this not afford of the
falsification of paternal names, and perhaps of the
forging of vouchers. Young Dawes was not worse
treated than his sister Matilda by his aunt de Feu-
cheres. Ile became a Baron, was enriched in his
turn, at first with a sum of 200,000 francs, and
subsequently with the estate of Flassans, which is
actually one of the demesnes which the house of
Rohan brought into that of Conde. You have
been told that the marriage of Sophia was long
happy, and yet certain deep sorrows of old standing
are expressed in a letter of 1822, which I ought to
bring to your knowledge. M. de Feucheres wrote
to the Prince of Conde in the following terms :

" I pray you, Monseigneur, to judge of my cruel situa-
tion with indulgence, and to give me back my honour, or
permit me to relinquish your favours.'
We see, then by the contents of this letter (strange
as it must appear) that at the period in question
Colonel de Feuetteres was persuaded of the purity
of the connexions which he remarked to have sub-
sisted between his wife and the Prince : that he ex-
plained them only by ascribing them to a motive
which imputed to them a high character for chastity;
and that whe❑ he said to the Prince at the close of
this letter. " I pray you, Alonseigneur, to judge of
my cruel situation with indulgence, and to do me
honour or allow me to resign your favours," the
word " honour" only applies to considerations of
public esteem and reputation.
Very soon after, gentlemen, and in 1824, this ex-
pression " honour" reappears in a letter of M. de
Feucheres, but it occurs there thenceforward in a
different sense, and in its true acceptation. We
read thus :

" I consider myself from this moment, Sir, as having
cease' to form part of the household of your Highness,
into which, for the sake of the honour and repose of all
I ought never to have entered."
_ _ _

And in truth, at this period, he knew every thing,
as he tells us himself in a letter to the Minister of
War, of which a copy which was taken at the Mi-
nisterial office by a member of the Prince's house-
hould will be found in the inventory. Here is a
passage of it :
" Many years have elapsed since, in consequence of A
quarrel which arose in my household, I learned from the
very lips of Madame de Feuelieres that she was not the
daughter of Monseigneur the Duke of Bourbon, as she was
pleased to make me believe, but that she had been his
mistress. From thenceforth all the reports were ex-
plained," &c.

Thus it appears that it was from Madame de
Feucheres' own mouth that her husband first learned
of this cruel disclosure. This sufficiently accounts
for his precipitate retreat in 1824; and when in
this cause our adversaries have supposed they were
in a condition to justify themselves by the letters of
NI. de Feucheres, of course none of them would
attempt to refuse their own evidence, yet still have
they proposed to themselves in this cause to subject
you to the same error which already had so long
been passed off upon M. de Feucheres and society in
general.
Thus you see what culpable artifices follow
Madame de Feucheres, even to the feet of her
judges; and it is necessary to resort to her own
confessions, to her former declarations, for such
proofs as no longer permit her to pervert any thing
whatever.

You must be aware, gentlemen, that among my
difficulties in this cause, I am obliged to impose
upon myself inevitable reservations. I shall con-
fine myself here, then, to reading a letter which, in
consequence of the disaster that had taken place,
and the return of the Baroness to the Chateau, that
lady wrote to the Duke of Bourbon, from the wa•
ters of Aix, whither the had gone to sojourn. This