THE TRUTH TOLD.

NZ Truth, Issue 82, 12 January 1907, Page 7

THE TRUTH TOLD.

CONCUPISCENT CASTELLANE. A Cash-Cov&ing Couiit. Marries Jay Gould's Daughter, and Squanders Her Money. He also has Adulterous " Amours "—The Potential Ambassador to England: His Pelf-Pursuing, Prurient Pranks— Facts Forbidden Publication m France.

Considerable sensation has been created m Europe and America by the proceedings for a divorce from her husband that were taken by the daughter of the dead American millionaiire, Jay Gould/ The husband, the Comte de Castellane, does .not appear to have turned out the best bargain m the world, and the proceedings for divorce revealed a deplorable state of domestic infelicity. Tie French newspapers have been forbidden to report the trial ;, but the editor of London "Truth" has obtained the pleadings on both sides from

A SPECIAL SOURCE, aiwl he • publishes the --following, account of the case :^- •'■ '■■".

"The daughters of American millionaires who marry European noblemen tor the sakeof theuj titles are not always happy m their choice. Miss Levi Morton, gladly renounced the ducal coronet of; Valencay to be rid of the Due who conferred it on her. The Gould-Castiellane divorce suit is not yet over, but the issue is not open to much doubt. The mst stage of the .proceedni"; was purely technical, and devoted to the claims of creditors for ?,.ooo,(H)0 francs of the Gould fortune. Their claim depended on the reading of "the marriage contract. This case has .

NOT BEEN REPORTED . . m the French papers, but very widely m the salons and the chateaux, where opinions are divided, not as to matters of fact, but as to the merits or demerits of the parties to the suit. Donniay and Descaves, and other dramatic authors, have been Riving their opinions, and may see in' Franco-American' marriages m high life a mine, to work. Descaves sees a just judgment m the facts stated by counsel (Maitres Labor i and Cruppi, the Deputy; for the plaintiff, and Bonnet for the defendant). Had not Jay Gould, .been what Jie was, Anna GouM, would not toave^-oeen baughtby Comte Boni de Castellane. : This noble viveur, to whom SHE BECAME A PREYI iquote Maitre, Cruppi— at the age of nineteen asserted his^ marital right to the management of her income almost immediately after their mar-? ri&ee. Fortunately, as -. she fell m love with him. m her minority, her guardians and the trustees of her father's will insisted on tying) up the best part of the capital. But as it produced at moderate and safe interest 3,soO,CK>Ofrs. a year there was every reason for . him to wish for a free hand. At the end of five years the trust fund was dipped into the amount of many millions of francs. We remember how he and ; ,; THE COMTES3E HASTENEp to New York some years ago ~ to soften the hearts of the trustees, and other members of the Gould family, m order to rid themselves, of a load of debt. Her family proposed to place him under the tutelage of a conseil judiciare. She reflected that to attempt to do so must give occasion to scandal, and ruin his political prospects, then good, as the Nationalists seemed to have the ball at' their feet. I can say, without, reference to Maitre Cruppi's speech/ that had M. Doumer beaten M. Fallieres m the race for the Presidency, Comte de Castellane would have obtained the post of Ambassador to the Court of St. Jatoes. He had industriously prepared, with the help of the late M. Syveton, his candidature for the post. Articles on diplomatic questions, said at the time to be from the pen of Syveton, appeared m one of the, morning papers atbove the signature of COMTE BONI DE .CASTLELANEv "I now come back to Maitre. Cruppi. He declared that the 'injures graves,' of which the Comtesse complained, began soon after marriage, and that personal violence was ofiered to her m the presence of witnesses. In short, he pulled her ears. But did not Napoleon, somebody asked on hearing this charge, pull the. ears pf his favorite marshals ? He also threatened— and it affected her, as she is ambitious— rto resign Ms seat m the Chamber, if money difficulties were raised by her family. But he only went so far as to disappear from Paris without leaving his address. After ait anxious search, for which she bad to pay a heavy foilli he was found at Trouville (the scene of their first meeting and early courtship), AND NOT AL.6NE. At length the Comtesse determined to sue for a divorce. The Comte,, to quote Maitre Cruppi again, 's'in-ter-essant a la question d' argent,', wrote those letters contained m his brief. Here is one that may serve us as a sample .-—'l have .never had any "<amie" ' (an untranslatable word as used here) 'but you. I think of you only. Had you but chosen, y ou JJ oul^ have found m me the tenderest of husbands. Act, I beseech you, on you better feelings, and come and see me. If you only kne\s how horribly I have suffered you would relent. Think of all the broken^-up menages we have known, andiof those —the Gallifets, the Radzivils, the Sagans— who have made up after separating. I implore your pardon. PARDON, PARDON, PARDON ME.' "The answer is rather for an analyst of present-^ay manners of the Balzac school than for an amiable trifler such as Capus :— 'You had better leave off writing to me. You have always behaved badly towards me. You were all the time since our tmartiage grieving nm I have no lonp^r any affection for you. My patience is exhausted, and. to be frank, je vous trouve infect Try, for the sake of your children, to give them a good exnn^. T^o r-o! i ima.-eine I am as Mme. . Cn" 1 rot rccrivr i th» visits of- om> '•"'■'ft'' 1 is cnUv «"'i

ingratitude. 'Je vous envoie l'expression de norn plus profond me pris.'." -

M. Gautier, a Nationalist belonging to the electoral division . for which the Comte sits , m the Chamber, wrote to the Comtesse to felicitate her on her husband's election direc.tly he learned it some weeks ago. She wrote back: "Je suis contente . que vous avez pour depute un roue, au lieu dun honnete homme." He had lost his seat for heavy bribery, but had been re-elected.

"There was much said atfotrt

THE COMTE'S AMOURS

His counsel submitted that he had the ordinary morality of the aristocratic » clubman— the morality which appears m most of the present-dayt plays. The Comtesse had been spoken of as the prey of an adventurer. She had all tbat she bargained for. Does vany American heiress bargain for honest, quiet, connubial happiness ? No. She vcunts a splendid stage on whioh to shine m costly be^ longings, a grand name and tittle', illustrious society on the footing of equality. Well, did .not Comte de Castellane eive all that to the late Jay Gould's daughter. ? She had the pick of European society at her .entertainments.

:; MILLIONS WERE SPENT-' , But why; To provide her. with the stage for which her ambition craved —a - Grand Trianon- m the Avenue des Bois, a chateau wiith elaborate gardens, park, and chase m the most nobly inhabited part of : the S-einer&t-Oise, to which the Sovereigns visiting Paris went down to sh.bot and as members of house parties, a yacht second to none m French waters . and which, brought its noble owniers info contact with the Courts and aristocracies of other countries. Women were talked of. Mon Dieu ! Frenchmen sont lets galants, and French wives easily forgive their infidelities. There was much exaggeration m what" had been said against Comte Boni. He'had endless enemies m the political world, and was greatly envied.

:■' ENVY .IS A. VICE that overflows m anonymous letters and calumnious gossip, as he learned to- his sorrow. M. Bonnet* spoke of mutual misunderstanding due to differenoa of nationality, education and race. He had good qualities, but the g6od -qualities of a Frenchman born and bred m a mond-e where atripus views of life and pure puritan virtues do not prevail. The Oomtesse -expected American virt.ii-? 1 * as well. "The French papers do not irivt' reports of this typical trial, as Lh:jy are forbidden. I have had the pi-ai^ ings on both sides from ;u.Ov!w source. Judgment -is reserved ur- i!i the end of next week." Tt iy ;u^l that the marriage of the Co'n-.te- •■■<■' has cost her at least, 4-o. (}(>-:•, v-) francs. That may well "be." From another source v,v; \'-n\n "."jv'v judgment was delivered on No*. r:ai ■ •:-• 14th. The Court grants & divev-v ''•'.:■ the countess on -account of th" • ::;V ; and grievances indicted by ''the H1;:----band : it accords to the conn u-ss ■-;;;? custody of the children; wh.ua rw may not remove from --Fren<* ;-i; without the authorisation o" -i"> -■»■,- father. The latter will have 1-c right of visiting "them m ih.' r'.:t\ldence of their grandmother- at , slated intervals, and: may receive -tlrcm -for. a month during their holidays. Me may exercise the right of controlling the education of the. children. The Court finds that the count' has no ground for bis claim fot; alimony. (Between five and six years ago the American papers teemed with stories of the Castellane-GouM menage and all to the effect that the previously penniless French roue . was Weeding and abusing his. unfortunate wife; The Hearst journals, m New York, Chicago and San Francisco p:irt>lis*ed weekly, for months, page cartoons depicting <l ßoney n cadgiing nickels from Anna to buy ibeer to save his life, ducking out with .the kitchen clock to pawn it, and so on. They were the funniest and cleverest that >have ever appeared since ''The Yellow Kid" series that <♦ made ;the "Journal" after Hearst bought it a rag dying of internal dry rot, and from them the term "Yellow JpuEr naKsm'* arose. 1 Boni has been a sponging loafer on bis wretched wife, ho better than the vilest maqureau of the slums of Paris.— Ed. N.Z, '"Troth 1 .")