The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1858-08-17
THE DICKENS DOMESTIC AFFAIR.
The following letters are in circulation among
the friends of Mr. and Mrs. Dickens

tne IflenuS OF MI. ana MIS-. dickens
TAvIsrocK HOUSE, TAvIsroCK SQUARE, J
LONDON, W. E., Tuesday, May 25, 1858. 7
My DEAR AUTHUR You have not only my full
permission to show this, but beg you to show, to
any one who wishes to do me right, or to any one
who may have been misled into doing me wrong.
To ARTHUR SMITH, Esq. Faithfully, &C., C. ID.
TAvIsTOCK House, TAvIsroCK SQUARE,
LONDON, W. f., Tuesday, May 35, 1858.
Mrs. Dickens and have lived unhappily together
for many years. Hardly any one who has known us
intimately can fail to have known that we are, in
all respects of character and temperament, wonder
fully unsuited to each other. suppose that no two
people, not vicious in themselves, ever joined
together who had greater difficulty in understand
ing one another, who had less in common. An
attached woman servant (mOre friend to both of us
than a servant,) who lived with us sixteen years,
and is now married, and who was, and still is in
Mrs. Dickens confidence and in mine, who had the
closest familiar experience of this unhappiness, in
London, in the country in France, in Italy, wher-
ever we have been, year after year, month after
month"; week after week, day after day, will bear
testimony to this.
Nothing has, on many occasions, stood between
and separation but Mrs. Dickens sister,
GeOrgne Hogarth. From the age of fifteen,
she has devoted herself to house and
children. She has been their playmate, nurse, in
structress friend, protectress adviser and compan-
ion. In the manly consideration toward Mrs. Dick
ems which l owe to my wife, will merely remark of
her that the popularity of her character has thrown
all the children on some one else. do not know
| cannot by any stretch of fancy imagine-what
would have become of them but for this aunt, who
has grown up with them, to whom they are devoted,
and who has sacrificed the best part of her youth
and life to them.
She has demonstrated, reasoned, suffered and
toiled, and came again to prevent separation be-
tween Mrs. Dickens and me. Mrs. Dickens has of
ten expressed to her her of her aectionae
and devotion in the house-never more strongly
than within the last twelve months.
For some years past Mrs. Dickens has been in the
ha nj rpn IN mo hat hn hiatt
for her to go away and live apart; that her always
increasing estrangement made mental disorder
under which she sometimes abors-more, that she
felt herself unfit for the life she had to lead my
wife, and that she would be better far away. l
have uniformly replied that we must bear our mis-
fortune and fight the fight out to the end; that the
children the first consideration, and that |
feared they must bind us together Sin appear
ance."
At length, within these three weeks, it was sug-
gested to by Forster that for their sakes it
would surely be better to reconstruct and rearrange
their unhappy home. | employed him to treat with
Mrs. Dickens, the friend of both of us for one
and twenty years. Mrs. Dickens wished to add on
her part, Mark Lemon, and did On Saturday
last Lemon wrote to Forster that Mrs Dickens
gratefully and thankfully accepted" the terms
proposed to her.
of the pecuniary part of them, l will only say
that believe they are as generous if Mrs. Dick
were lady of distinction and a man of for
tune. The remaining parts of them are easily de-
scribed-my eldest boy to live with Mrs. Dickens
and take care of her; my eldest girl to keep my
house; both my girls, and all my children but the
eldest son, to live with me, in the continued com
panionship of their aunt Georgine, for whom they
have all the tenderest affection that have ever
among young people, and who has higher
claim (as have often declared for many years.
upon my affection, respect and gratitude than any
body in this world.
hope that no one who may become acquainted
with what write here, can possibly be so cruel