The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-10-03
AUTHORS UNHAPPY WIVES.
something About the Married Lives
of Dickens and Carlyle.

of Dickens and Carlyle.
From the NeD York Star.
A correspondent, who has read with in
terest Mrs. Cards article on Marriage
and the interview with that lady published
| in our columns last week. sends us the sub
Joined communication. 1t will be observed
that he makes no attempt TO prove anything
either one way or the other, but contents
himself with briefly setting forth few
facts concerning the married life of Dickens
and Of Carlyle, merely pointing out that, as
1t seems to him, in the one case a mutually
agreed upon separation resulted in disaster,
while in the other the marriage bond,
though strained, remained unbroken, as it
was best for both that it should. We print
his note without further introduction.
The marriage of the future, as | under
derstand it from Mrs. Cards famous ar
tlcle and the interview published in the
Pau Mall Gazette, is to be a contract which
shall, in the event of certain contingencies
happening, be dissoluble at the instance of
either party. Mrs. Card protests-and
rightly protests-against any inference
being drawn of what will happen when a
new relation is legalized from the occur
FENCES which take place when that same re-
lation is under ban. Yet | think l may
be allowed to point out that there are two
J
history of the last fifty years or so, in each
of which have no doubt Mrs. Card would
have advocated voluntary separation. In
the one case-aud here there were several
children-such a separation did actually
take place; in tire other, childless mar
riage, the pair, in the face of the gTavest
misunderstanding, lived together It'll death
them did part" 1t is not my intention to
generalize upon these two cases; whatever
weight thaV will | make no
doubt, be ultimately accorded to them.
Charles Dickens married at the age of "a.
His wife was the sister of a brother journal
list, for at the time of his marriage Dickens
was still parliamentary reporter for the
Morning Chronicle. The young couple ap-
pear to have lived very happily together
for some years; she bore him considerable
number of children, and his references to
her are always of an atfectionate character.
Years rolled on, and the reporter Became a
rich and famous novelist He anassed con-
siderable wealth; his books were in every
body's hands and his name became house
hold word. Dickens and his wife lived
together for twenty years. How the es-
arrangement which eventually ended in their
separation arose it is very difficult to dis
cover. Mr.. Foster, as becomes an expert
enced and discreet biographer, touches the
episode as lightly as possible. But, it seems
to me, there is every reason to accept the
statement of Dickens latest biographer MR.
Frank Marzials) that for some time pre-
vious to 1868 Dickens was in an "over-
excited, nervous, morbid state" He was
feverish, and could not be quiet. As Har-
riet Martineau remarked, 1T must have
been terribly wearing to his wife" And, on
the other hand, Mrs. Dickens dissatisfac-
ton must have reacted upon her husbands
peculiar frame of mind. Things could not
go on like this for long. We find him writ
ing to Forster: Poor Catherine and l are
not made for each other, and there Is no
help for it. 1t is not only that she makes
me uneasy and unhappy, but that | make
her so, too. and much more so. She is ex-
actly what you know i'll the way OF being
amiable and complying, but we are
strangely ill-assorted for the bond there is
between us. Her temperament will not go
with mine" Such letter only too clearly
foreshadowed the end, and they parted
soon afterward. She was not present at
Gadshill when her husband died; one does
not know whether she was sent for or not;
one only knows that it was the arm of his
wife's sister and not that of his wife which
supported him as he rose dying from his
dinner table. Dickens reference to his wife
in his will, made year before his death, is
anything but affectionate. There is no men,
tion of second best bed with furniture ;,
such as Shakespeare bequeathed to his wife;
but instead of it we find a selfgratulatory
sentence which reads almost like a reproach.
And l desire here simply to record the
fact that my wife since our separation by
consent has been in the receipt from me of
an annual income of 9600, while all the
great charges of numerous and expensive
family have devolved wholly upon myself. u
In this wise the mournful chapter is brought
to close.
We pass from the consideration of the
married life of Charles Dickens to contem-
plate that of Thomas Carlyle
My soul. turn from them; turn we to survey
Where rougher chimes nobler race display.
When Carlyle married he had still to win
position neutrality-suspicious. from that sternest
of taskmasters, Literature. No kindly fate
smiled upon him, rendering his first book SO
successful that be might command a small
fortune for everything he wrote afterward.
For years he and his brave little wife could
scarcely make ends meet. A solitary
farmhouse like Craigenputtock, with tact
turn husband for company, is not thing
exactly calculated to promote sweetness of
disposition in u woman. Nor, on the other
| hand, DO years of unremitting, unremuner-
alive, and unrecognized literary labor CON
duce to suavity of deineanor in a man. Mrs.
| Carlyle was a remarkably clever woman,
unequaled in the art of saying bitter and
mordant things. Charming, witty, brill
liant, affectionately playful as she naturally
was" remarked Mr.. Froude, ''she has a
hot temper, and a tongue, when she was
angry, like cats, which would take the
| skin off at touch.n She and Carlyle often
misunderstood one another. Possibly they
| may not have been altogether well matched
they certainly quarreled. Rising from the
perusal Of Mrs. Carlyle's Memorials and
Froude's Life of Carlyle" one is almost
tempted to believe that it might have been
well if they could have separated. And yet
would it have been well2 Assuredly not
For, in spite of all vain surface shows; in
spite of Carlyle's everlasting grumbline
and frequent neglect of his wife; in spite Of
Mrs. Carlyle's "heart-cutting words;'' il
spite even of Lady Ashburton, the pair
| loved each other with love that was in
tense and enduring.