MRS GORDON-BAILLIE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 6185, 13 March 1888, Page 4

MRS GORDON-BAILLIE.

Her Career in Christchurch It is seldom that a lady becomes to such. an extent a public character as to engage the attention of the agents who supply us with our European news. This has, however, lately been the untoward fate of Mrs Gordon-Baillie, the disinterested friend of the Skye crofters, as she persuaded many people to believe when in Christohurch and other antipodean towns and cities were honoured with her fascinating presence. Leaving out of sight for the moment several puzzling questions, such as — " Who is Mrs Gordon-Baillie, really ? " " How did she come to represent, or even pretend to represent, the the crofters ? " and " How did she succeed in gulling even the shining lights of the English Press for a time ? " — we will trace her short and rather merry, career in Christchurch. If ever the account should fall into the hands of her unwilling admirer, Professor Blackie, it may possibly permit him to gain a yet deeper insight into the complex mysteries of her character. It was in January of last year that Mrs Gordon - Baillie's brilliant effulgence baamed on our horizon. She at first took up her quarters at the Terminus Hotel, and very quickly attracted soniß notice in the town. The magnificence of her dress, and three of the sweetest little cherubs of children — perhaps, too, a spark of that legendary jealousy which is fabled to consumo the sex at times — were sufficient to account for this, as far as ladies were concerned. The equally fabulous attractiveness which a very handsome and intellectually superior woman is said to possess for the sterner half of the human race had possibly something to do with it as far as gentlemen were concerned. With regard to Mr 3 Gordon-Baillie's charms there is only one opinion : all the manly susceptibilities of those who met her were stirred by that " personal magnetism " which the American acknowledges in phrase and the rest of the world in practice. To put it shortly she was a most fascinating woman. And a curious thing wa3 that her fascination was native : it did not depend on education. She was by no means a woman of culture. Her letters are bad in grammar and shaky in spelling ; her signature, of which only too many specimens are extant in Christchurch, is that of a strong, dashing, but illiterate character. But to come to detail. Fascination and brilliant conversational powers do not pay bills. The landlord of the Terminus recognised the truth of this, and summoned his interesting but not profitable guest. He got his money, which is more than plenty of other people did. For very soon after this, by a mixture of assurance, and the exhibition of apparently good securities from Home, Mrs GordonBaillie installed herself in a comfortable house, and began operations for the good of those poor crofters. Sumner Lodge, in Lichneld street, was the place of her abode, and the establishment was carried on with a show of magnificence that lent colour to the lady's stories of her movements in the highest circles of society in the Old Country. There was a governess and companion, an elderly lady, well and favourably known to many of the clergy and gentle-folks of the town, a lady's ; maid, and everything in keeping. The hourß kept were of the most fashionable. Eising about 12, Mra Gordon-Baillie, after a dainty little champagne lunch, used to transact what business there was in hand. Her story, to those who became her confidants, was, that she had been married to Knight Aston- White, the tenor singer, who is well-remembered here by his two first names ; that she had been divorced from i him, and that her then husband's name ■. was Frost. The discrepancy between Frost and Gordon-BailHe was explained to the trusted. The latter was a title to which her birth had given her claim, and marriage could not take from her, and it says something for her dazzling powers that, in some cases at all events, the explanation was quietly accepted. He was reprej sented to be the editor of the Mark Lane ' Express, and his name Has since turned up in thetelegrams. Frequent visits were made to the newspaper offices, to get editors to advance her views regarding the necessity for settling the crofters in New Zealand. But editors are in reality often as cautious as they are reputed to be cunning, and in spite of portraits from Society papers, .paragraphs in the Times and Scotsman, and little descriptive articles in which the name of " that incomparable woman,, Mrs Gordon - Baillie," figured largely, the Christchurch newspapers did not espouse her cause with all the heart and soul she evidently expected. The Survey Office, too, were most hard-hearted. In the dayß when she was Mrs Knight Aston- White, it appeared the crofters' friend had acquired certain property near Springfield. A deposit had been paid on it, and the rest of the purchase money was now forthcoming, in order that the Skye coasters might have a snug inland home when they were welcomed to the Colony. But the Survey Office were so blind, or so red-tapeish, or so wedded to conventionality, that they threw difficulties in the way. They needed identification of the singer's wife and the fine lady, the champion of the crofters. The singer was in Melbourne, so a trip thither was determined on ; nothing could be better than the identification an exhusband could have furnished. In the meanwhile time had slipped along. The day's business finished a j drive to Sumner, or out into the suburbs, with the lady companion, was one of the amusements such charitable work demanded. In the evening a look-in at the " Mikado" or " lolanthe," a necessary recreation after toil. A famous theatrical manager felt the force of the lady's blandishments, and these last enjoyments cost her nothing. But other things did, and the providers thereof soon demanded payment. Gordon-Baillie had not the family credit which Becky Sharp manipulated so astutely, and things reached a climax sooner. While the late Mr Macandrew was having his national feelings worked on, while Sir Robert Stout and Mr Ballance were having their sympathies aroused, and Sir Julius Vogel's Fisheries Act was being studied, the tradesmen grew impatient. The cabman rendered [ his accounts, the landlord put the bailiffs | in, the grocer, the butcher, and the wine merchant issued summonses, and, to be brief, the financial question became most pressing. But as Becky Sharp had her various standbys, so had Gordon-Baillie. How they were come by is not the question; but there were pictures of undoubted excellence in her possession, magnificent and costly dresses by Worth and by Kate Biley. The latter vrere sold — or some o£ them— ; for others remain here, dulccs exuviae, I to this day, interesting mementoes of a career which will probably furnish the novelist, the journalist, and the moralist, with much "copy " of varying degrees' of worth and interest. The dresses, we say, were sold, and on the pictures, and other good security, money was raised by hook or crook. The elderly lady, the companion, was furnished by the church people here, who knew her here, with introductions, which floated the adventuress and her dupe in the clerical world of Melbourne, and the start was made. How things went " on the other side "is fairly known. Tasmania was exploited, and the officials were most courteous. Victorian officials received the friend of the crofters open-armed. Only the savage bureaucracy of New Zealand were not responsive. The bitterness of tone towards thia Colony in the Pall Mall interview is thus, perhaps, explained. What became of the unfortunate elderly lady is not quite known. There are stories to the effect that, filled with champagne and chagrin at the failure of her schemes, the other fell upon her with reproaches and with contumely in Melbourne, and that the veil at length fell from those curiously charitable and credulous old eyes. The time it remained over them is yet another proof of the uuuaual skill and power of her whose fascinations placed it there with many others before the more penetrating gaze of masculine believers in the mission of "that incomparable woman," Mrs GordonBaillie.