Free Opinions, Freely Expressed on Certain Phases of Modern Social Life and ConductCorelli, Marie
Religion
Free Opinions, Freely Expressed on Certain Phases of Modern Social Life and Conduct
Corelli, Marie
English essays -- 20th century; Great Britain -- Social life and customs -- 20th century
There is one thing that women generally, in the struggle for
intellectual free life, should always remember--one that they are
too often apt to forget--namely, that the Laws, as they at present
exist, are made _by_ men, _for_ men. There are no really stringent
laws for the protection of women’s interests except the Married
Woman’s Property Act, which is a great and needful boon. But take the
following instances of the eccentricities of English law, both of
which have come under my own knowledge as having occurred to personal
friends. A certain foreign nobleman residing in England made a will
leaving all his fortune to his mistress. His legitimate children were
advised to dispute the will, as under the law of his native country
he could not dispossess his lawful heirs of their inheritance. He had
not naturalized himself at any time as a British subject, and the
plain proof of this was, that but a year before his death, he had
applied to the Government of his own country for permission to wear
a certain decoration, which permission was accorded him. The nature
of his application proved that he still considered himself a subject
of his own native land. The case came before an English judge, who
had apparently eaten some very indigestible matter for his luncheon.
With an apoplectic countenance and an injured demeanour, the learned
gentleman declined to go into any of the details of the case, and
administered “justice” by deciding the whole thing on “a question of
domicile”--namely, that as the man had lived in England twenty-five
years, he was, naturalized or unnaturalized, a British subject and
could make his will as he liked. The fortune was, therefore, handed
over to his mistress, and the legal wife and legitimately-born children
were left out in the cold! Another case is that of a lady, well-born
and well-educated, who married a man with a fortune of some twenty
thousand a year. After the expiration of about fifteen years, when she
had borne her husband three children, he suddenly took a fantastic
dislike to her, and an equally fantastic liking for a chorus girl.
He promptly sought a divorce. As there was no ground for divorce,
he failed to obtain it. He, therefore, adopted a course of action
emanating entirely from his own brilliant brain. Starting for a cruise
on board his yacht, in company with the bewildering chorus girl,
he left orders with his solicitor to have the whole of his house
dismantled of its furniture and “cleared.” This was promptly done, the
wife and children being left without so much as a bed to lie upon, or a
chair to sit upon. The unfortunate lady told her story to a court, and
applied for “maintenance.” This, of course, the recalcitrant husband
was forced to pay, but the sum was cut down to the smallest possible
amount, under the supervision of the blandly approving court, with the
result that this man’s wife, accustomed from her girlhood to every home
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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