MRS. JORDAN.

lent man, and has a very good private property: she will make the best of wives-a better girl never yet lived: it makes me quite happy, and I intend to give her the value of £10,000.

&c.

"DORA JORDAN."

The days of Mrs. Jordan continued to pass on alternately in the exercise of a lucrative profession, and the domestie enjoyment of an adoring family, when circumstances (which, because mysterious, the public construed necessarily to imply culpability somewhere or other) occasioned a separation:-certainly an event most unexpected by those who had previously known the happy state of her connexion. In me it would be worse than presumption to enter into any detail on a subject at once so private, so delicate, and so interesting. Suffice it to say, that of all the accounts and surmises as to that event in which the public prints were pleased to indulge themselves, not one that came under my eye was true: indeed, there was scarcely a single incident whereto that separation was publicly attributed, that had any degree of foundation whatsoever. Such circumstances should ever remain known only to those who feel the impropriety of amusing the readers at a news-room with subjects of domestic pain and family importance. I will, however, repeat, that the separation took effect from causes no way dishonourable to either party: that it was not sought for by the royal personage, nor necessary on the part of the lady. It was too hasty to be discreet, and too much influenced by feelings of the moment to be hearty. Though not unacquainted with those circumstances, I never presumed to make an ob servation upon the subject, save to contradict, in direct terms, statements which, at the time I heard them, I knew to be totally unfounded; and never was the British press more prostituted than in the malicious colouring given upon that occasion to the conduct of His Royal Highness.

General Hawker, one of the late King's aids-de-camp, had married Miss Jordan; and in the punctilious honour and integrity of this gentleman, every body who knew and knows him did and does rely with unmixed confidence. Such reliance His Royal Highness evinced by sending, through him, carte blanche to Mrs. Jordan, when the separation had been determined on, enabling her to dictate whatever she conceived would be fully adequate to her maintenance, without recurrence to her profession, in all the comforts and luxuries to which she had been so long accustomed; and every thing she wished for was arranged to her satisfaction. Still, however, infatuated with attach

ment to theatrical pursuits, she continued to accept of temporary engagements to her great profit and it will perhaps scarcely be credited, that so unsated were British audiences with Mrs. Jordan's unrivalled performances, that even at her time of life, with certainly diminished powers and an altered person, the very last year she remained in England brought her a clear profit of near £7,000. I cannot be mistaken in this statement; for my authority could not err on that point. The malicious representations, therefore, of her having been left straitened in pecuniary circumstances were literally fabulous; for to the very moment of her death, she remained in full possession of all the means of comfort-nay, if she chose it, of luxury and splendour. Why, therefore, she emigrated, pined away, and expired in a foreign country (of whose language she was ignorant, and in whose habits she was wholly unversed,) with every appearance of necessity, is also considered a mystery by those unacquainted with the cruel and disastrous circumstances which caused that unfortunate catastrophe. It is not by my pen that miserable story shall be told. It was a transaction wherein her royal friend had, directly or indirectly, no concern, nor did it in any way spring out of that connexion. She had, in fact, only to accuse herself of benevolence, confidence, and honour: to those demerits, and to the worse than ingratitude of others, she fell a lingering, broken-hearted victim,

When His Royal Highness was informed of the determination that Mrs. Jordan should take up a temporary residence on the continent, he insisted on her retaining the attendance of Miss Kitchley, who for many years had been attached to the establishment at Bushy, and was superintendant and governess of the Duke's children. This lady, therefore, whose sincere attachment had been so long and truly proved, accompanied Mrs. Jordan as her companion, and to the time of her death continued to administer to her comforts-endeavouring, so far as in her lay, by her society and attentions, to solace the mental misery which pressed upon her friend's health and had extinguished her spirits. She was also accompanied by Colonel Hawker, the General's brother: but, as she wished, during her residence in France, to be totally retired, she took no suite. She selected Boulogne as a place of convenient proximity to England; and in a cottage half a mile from that town awaited with indescribable anxiety the completion of those affairs which had occasioned her departure, rapturously anticipating the happiness of embracing her children afresh after a painful absence.

MRS. JORDAN IN FRANCE.

Decline of Mrs. Jordan's health-Description of her cottage and grounds at Boulogne-sur-Mer-Madame Ducamp and her servant Agnes-Their account of Mrs. Jordan's habits and manners-Removal of that lady to Versailles and subsequently to St. Cloud-Account of her illneas and last moments.

SUCH was the nature of the circumstances which impelled Mrs. Jordan to repair to the continent; and, after what has been said, the reader will not think it extraordinary that a deep impression was made upon her health-not indeed in the shape of actual disease, but by the workings of a troubled spirit, pondering and drooping over exaggerated misfortunes, and encountering obstacle after obstacle. Estranged from those she loved, as also from that profession the resort to which had never failed to restore her animation and amuse her fancy, mental malady soon communicated its contagion to the physical organisation, and sickness began to make visible inroads on the heretofore healthy person of that lamented lady.

We have seen that she established herself, in the first place, at Boulogne-sur-Mer. A cottage was selected by her at Marquetra, about a quarter of a mile from the gate of the fortress. Often have I since, as if on classic ground, strolled down the little garden which had been there her greatest solace. The cottage is very small, but neat, commodious, and of a cheerful aspect. A flower and fruit garden of corresponding dimensions, and a little paddock (comprising less than half an acre) formed her demesne. In an adjoining cottage resided her old landlady, Madame Ducamp, who was in a state of competence, and altogether an original. She had married a gardener, much younger and of humbler birth than herself. I think she had been once handsome: her story I never heard fully; but it appeared that she had flourished during the Revolution. spoke English well, when she pleased; and, like most Frenchwomen, when d'áge múr, was querulous, intrusive, and curious beyond limitation, with as much professed good nature as would serve at least fifty of our old English gentlewomen. She was not, in good truth, devoid of the reality as well as the semblance of that quality: but she over-acted the philanthropist, and consequently did not deceive those accustomed to

look lower than the surface. This good lady is still in statu quo, and most likely to remain so.

Under colour of taking her vacant cottage for a friend, a party of us went to Marquetra, to learn what we could respecting Mrs. Jordan's residence there. The old lady recognised her name, but pronounced it in a way which it was scarcely possible for us to recognise. A long conversation ensued, in some parts as deeply interesting, and in others nearly as ludicrous as the subject could admit of. Madame Ducamp repeated to us a hundred times, in five minutes, that she had "beaucoup, beaucoup de vénération pour cette chère, chère malheureuse dame Anglaise!" whom she assured us, with a deep sigh, was "sans doute un ange supérieur!" She was proceeding to tell us every thing she knew, or I suppose could invent, when, perceiving a child in the garden pulling the flowers, she abruptly discontinued her eulogium, and ran off to drive away the intruder-having done which, she returned to resume: but too late! in her absence her place had been fully and fairly occupied by Agnes, an ordinary French girl, Madame Ducamp's bonne (servant of all work,) whom we soon found was likely to prove a much more truth-telling person than her mistress.

Agnes informed us, with great feeling, that "the economy of that charming lady was very strict: nécessairement, je crains," added she, with a slow movement of her head and a truly eloquent look. They had found out (she said,) that their lodger had been once riche et magnifique, but when there she was very very poor indeed. "But," exclaimed the poor girl, her eye brightening up and her tone becoming firmer,that could make no difference to me! si j'aime, j'aime! J'ai servi cette pauvre dame avec le même zele (peut-être encore plus) que si elle eut été une Princesse !”

This frank-hearted display of poor Agnes's sentiments was, however, not in fact called for in speaking of Mrs. Jordan, since she might have commanded, during the whole period of her continental residence, any sums she thought proper. She had money in the bank, in the funds, and in miscellaneous property, and had just before received several thousands. But she was become nearly careless as well of pecuniary as other matters, and took up a whim (for it was nothing more) to affect poverty, thus deceiving the world, and giving herself, a vantage-ground to the gossiping and censorious.

Agnes's information went on to show that Mrs. Jordan's whole time was passed in anxious expectation of letters from England, and on the English post-days she was peculiarly miserable. We collected from the girl that her garden and guitar

were her only resources against that consuming melancholy which steals away even the elements of existence, and plunges both body and mind into a state of morbid langour-the fruitful parent of disease, insanity, and death.

At this point of the story, Madame Ducamp would no longer be restrained, and returned to the charge with redoubled assertions of her own friendship to the poor lady," and bonne nature in general.

"Did you know her, Monsieur?" said she: "alas! she nearly broke my heart by trying to break her own."

"I have heard of her since I arrived here, Madame," replied I cautiously.

"Ah! Monsieur, Monsieur," rejoined Madame Ducamp, "if you had known her as well as Agnes and I did, you would have loved her just as much. I am sure she had been accustomed to grandeur, though I could never clearly make out the cause of her reverses. Ah!" pursued Madame, she was amiable et honnête beyond description; and though so very poor, paid her louage like a goddess." At this momeet some other matter, perhaps suggested by the word louage, came across the old woman's brain, and she again trotted off. The remaining intelligence which we gathered from Agnes, related chiefly to Mrs. Jordan's fondness for music and perpetual indulgence therein-and to her own little achievements in the musical way, whereby, she told us with infinite naïveté, she had frequently experienced the gratification of playing and singing Madame to sleep! She said that there was some little mutual difficulty in the first place as to understanding each other, since the stranger was ignorant of the French language, and she herself had not the honour" to speak English. "However," continued Agnes, "we formed a sort of language of our own, consisting of looks and signs, and in these Madame was more eloquent than any other person I had ever known." Here the girl's recollections seemed fairly to overcome her; and with that apparently exaggerated sensibility which is, nevertheless, natural to the character of her country, she burst into tears, exclaiming, "Oh ciel! oh ciel !—elle est morte! elle est morte !"*

The intermixed French phrases which I have retained in sketching this conversation at Marquetra may perhaps appear affected to some; and I frankly admit, there are few things in composition so disagreeable to me, as a jumble of words culled from different tongues, and constituting a melange which advances no just claim to the title of any language whatever. But those who are accustomed to the familiar terms and expressive ejaculations of French colloquy, know that the idiomatic mode of expression only can convey the true point and spirit of the dialogue, and more particularly does this observation apply to the variegated traits of character belonging to French females.