Evening star., 1934-05-17


1.-TWO letters in the collection Of
those which Charles Dickens
wrote his wife have to do with
Il their separation. The hrst,
dated June 4, 1858, refers to
the Address" which appeared IN
Household Words" on June IL. 1t
runs:
Dear Catherine-I will not write
word as to any causes that have
made 1t necessary for me to pub.
lish the enclosed In Household
Words" However there may be
among the living, whom Will
never forgive alive or dead, earn
estly hope that all unkindness Is
over between you and me.
But as you are referred to In the
article, I think you ought to see 1t.
You have only to say to Wills (who
kindly brings it to you) that you do
not object to the allusion.
CHARLES DICKENS.
When Dickens parted from his wife,
by mutual consent, ISLANDERS became
current which had driven Dickens to
insert in his own weekly journal
Household Words" an address" to
his readers, declaring "abominably
false" these Representations most
monstrous and most cruel-involvtng
not only me, but innocent persons
most dear to my heart, and innocent
persons of whom have no knowledge"
The second letter was written by
Dickens to his solicitor, and deals with
what Is known to Dickens students as
the violated letter"
am exceedingly panied Che
says) to find that a letter written
by me as a private and personal
communication has found its way
into some of the London papers,
extracted from an American paper.
The letter was painfully necessary
at the time when it was forced
from me, as private reputation
of monstrous scandals, but that 1t
was never meant to appear in print,
I suppose to be quite manifest
from its own nature and terms.
He wishes the note to be sent to the
lawyer who acted for Mrs. Dickens in
the separation.
The history of the violated letter"
is this. Dickens had entrusted to
friend, Arthur Smith, a detailed ac-
count of his unhappy married life,
with which he sent the following COW
ering letter: You have not only my
full permission to show this. but I beg
you to show it to any one who wishes
to do me right, or to any one who may
have been misled into doing me
wrong"
Smith was Dickens manager for the
reading tours shortly to begin in Eng
land, and was on his way to America
to arrange similar tour in that coun-
try. Dickens wished to stand well with
his public, and with this In view he
sent this communication to Smith, and
later inserted much milder statement
In his own journal and circulated 1t to
other periodicals.
The "violated Letter."
In America, when rumors unfavor-
able to Dickens began to spread,
Smith considered the best thing he
could do was to hand Dickens letter
to a press representative, and in Au-
gust, 1858, the following missive-the
violated letter"-appeared In several
American newspapers, and was copied
by the English press:
"Tavistock House. Tavistock Square,
London, w. c.
Tuesday, May 25th, 1858.
Mrs. Dickens and I have lived
unhappily together for many years.
Hardly any one who has known us in
timately can fail to have known that
we are, in all respects Of character and
temperament, wonderfully unsuited to
each other. suppose that no two
people, not vicious in themselves, ever
were joined together who had greater
difficulty in understanding one an
other, or who had less in common. An
attached woman-servant (more friend
to both Of us than a servanO who
lived with us 16 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, wherever
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 us and separation but
Mrs. Dickens sister, Georgiana
Hogarth. From the age Of Is she has
devoted herself to our home and our
children. She has been their play
mate, nurse, instructress, friend, pro-
tectress, adviser and companion. In
the manly consideration toward Mrs.
Dickens which owe to my wife, I will
merely remark Of her that the Pc
culiarity of her character has thrown
all the children or some one else. I
do not know-I 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 sacri-
feed the best part Of her youth and
life to them.
"She has demonstrated, reasoned,
suffered and toiled again and again to
prevent separation between Mrs.
Dickens and me. Mrs. Dickens has
often expressed to her her sense OF her
affectionate care and devotion In her
home-never more strongly than with
III the last IL months.
For some years past, Mrs. Dickens
has been in the habit Of representing
to me that it would be better for her
to go away and live apart; that her al
ways increasing estrangement made q
mental disorder under which she
sometimes labours-more, that she felt
herself unfit for the life she had to
lead as my wife and that she would
be better far away. have uniformly
replied that we must bear our misfor-
tune, and fight the fight out to the