Morning journal and courier., 1884-04-08


and gratitude" :" or Mrs. Peg Wellington, or
Mrs. Jordan, the queen of romps and hoy>
dens, who looks out charmingly from Rom
ney's canvas on the walls of the Royal Acad-
emy. Then came revulSion OF feehng, ana
peers sought their wives upon the stage.
TennyEon had not yet written the line teach
ing that AZ the husband so the wife Is, and
was in fact not born when the twelfth Earl
of Derby married his second wife, Miss Eliz-
abeth Farren. Whatever envy and detrac-
ton may have invented against Miss Farren,
her personal appearance at least ls made clear
to this age by the engravings OF the msgniiS
cent full length portrait by Sir Thomas Law
renee in the possession of her grandson, the
present Lord Wilton, as is that OF Harriet
Mellon by the many admirable pictures of
her treasured by the Baroness Burdett
Coutts, one of which shows her in an exqui-
site costume of the period of the Directory,
composed entirely of white India muslin
with gsrniture of coral There are carica-
lures of Miss Farren, of course, notably one
of DARBY and Joan," and another repre-
senting the Earl of Derby, from whom the
Derby stakes at Epson were named, and his
Countess at Christie's Auction Rooms, al
ready fashionable resort between eighty
and ninety years ago. The daughter of an
Irish apothecary, Who became an actor, Eliz-
abeth Farren, otherwise Eliza and Betsy
made her mark in London in Coleman's com
she played Lady Newbury in default of Mrs.
Arlington. Curiously enough, Miss Farren
became, like another and perhaps greater &C.
tress, Mile. Sarah Bernhardt, the talk of the
critics and of the town on account OF her
excessive thinness. Everybody knows the
story of N. Alexander Dumas, who described
the picture of Mile. Bernhardt and her dog
as that of ga dog who had found bone :"
but although there were such wits as Sheri-
dan in Miss Farren's day, they never said
anything so rudepof that lady. Miss Farren,
who was the pink of propriety, abode in
Suffolk street with her mother and sister,
and lived on shoulder of mutton and slices
of boiled beef from Pudding Island, but was
prudent enough to resist the advances of
Charles James Fox and of the Earl of Derby,
known as the "Obese Earl" as his son in
law was subsequently known as the Wicked
Earl" Lord Derby waited and waited for
years until his wife died and then married
MisR Farren, who held the trein of the
Princess Royal at her Wedding. She was a
clever woman who conducted herself we'll,
bidsd her time and won the position she Gov
eted She had several children, but only one
who married, the lady previously referred to
as the first wife of 'attenusted Wilton, the
best allAround sportsman of his day, whether
on the fiat, in the hunting field or on board
of his ill-famed yacht.
Ten years after Miss Farren's marriage
Miss Louisa Brunton, a celebrated actress,
became the wife of the first Earl of Craven
and anoestress of the present earl. The next
actress to make brilliant marriage was Miss
Harriet Mellon, the daughter of Lieuten-
ant Mellon, of the Royal navy, and of the
Irish wardIobe-woman of a strolling compa-
ny of comedians. There was no doubt
about the beauty of this waif. whose father
had long since sailed away to the West Indies
to die of yellow fever. Harriet Melons
schooling was of the toughest. She wan-
dered about with her mother, the wardrobe-
woman and her second husband, one Ent-
wisle musician in the theatrical orchestra,
but she picked up some education neverthe-
less, and after appearing as Little Pickle and
Priscilla Tomboy in :'The Romp," she was
introduced to no less person than Richard
Brinsley Sheridan, whose Lydia La1guish
she was permitted to play when Drury Lane
numbered among Its company Mrs. S1ddons
Miss Fsrren, Mrs Jordan, Mrs. Crouch,
John and Charles Ksmble, Suett, BSnnfster
and Braham. By degrees her beauty, for
she was never . great actress, made its inn
preston, and Harriet Mellon Was allowed to
play Violante in "The Honeymoon" and
Mrs Ford in "The Merry Wives of Wind
sor," in the latter of which characters she
vas painted, Shs became one of the glsries
of Drury Lane theatre and the friend of the
Ladies Butte, Guildford and Burdett, whose
father, Thomas Coutts, the banker, married
Miss Mellon. gave her Holly Lodge, High
gate, for q residence, and finally died, lesy-
ing her all his property to distribute among
his children. This trust she acquitted her
self of in the handsomest msnner, and final
ly married in 1927 the ninth Duke of st.
Albans. Lady Morgan, also wild Irish
GIRL" went to see this famous actress and
peeress and was very unfavorably impressed.
event to see the celebrated Duchess of st.
Albaus, " wrote Lady Morgan. Her gown
much too fine for the morning; all ridicu-
lousIy bsspattersd with lace and jewels
dukes coronets upon all the footstools-s
fat, fubsy (whatever that may be), coarse
featured woman. And only to think she was
once so lovely Now she's all over gewgaws
like an idol and wears huge falcon in brill
lisRts on her ret1cule." But she was good
natured and sensible woman and had been
very beautiful. The duchess, moreover,
Who had no children, knew to whom she
fortune and selected Miss Angela, now the
Baroness Burdett-Coutts
Mrs Maria Foote, when she became Count
sss of Harrington, was the wife of one OF
the oldest men in England. Her husband,
while Lord PetarshRm, had acquired an ex-
traordinary reputation as an amateur tailor
and halter, and is ssrtorially immortal as the
inventor of the rough cloth worn for winter
overcoats and the curly -brimmed hat known
az the Petersham, and thus distinguished
from the Anglessy bell-top and the shape af-
fsctsd by D'Orsay, who wore hat brims of
different widths, according to the thickness
of his other raiment. The Countess of Har
rinRton, Who was one of the acknowledged
beauties of her time, WAS, like the Countess
of Derby and the Duchess of st. Albans, not
the proPsnitrix of the present wearers of
those titles, but her daughter married the
present Marquis Conyngham, and is the
mother of Lord Mount Charles, hsir-appR-
rent to the narquisats. A dozen years be-
fore Miss Foote became the wife of the &C.
centric peer who had private tailor's shop,
and cut and fitted his own servants over
coats, which were the talk OF the town, Cap
tain Beecher married the beautiful Miss
O'Neill, who, with her relations. is said by
malicious chroniclers to have suggested to
William Makepeace Thackeray the idea of
"the Fotheringay" and Costigan. Be this as
it may, Lady Becher, whose husband gave
the name to "Becher's Brook" on the Grand
National Steeplechass course at Aintree, and
who only died twelve years ago, was entirely
unlike s'the Fotheringay," and lived long and
greatly beloved by all who had the privilege
of knowing her. She was the mother of the
present baronet, and left behind her the rep
utation of beautiful woman of great talent,
if not actual genius. Singers of foreign
birth would appear to have been far less for
tunate in brilliant matrimonial alliances than
our native actresses, for the stories of Nine
Patti (Marquise de Caux), Nine. Sontag
Nine Malibran, and of the dancer Taglioni
are, sither from financial or other reasons
by no means so pleasant az those of the IA
nous actresses whose names and careers have
just been glanced at
Kisses and Cream for Two.
A True story of the seIf-Abnegarion of