TABLE TALK.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7186, 10 June 1891, Page 2

TABLE TALK.

fJFaoM Our London Cobrkspondbnt.J London, April 24. THB VBRNBT CASK. It is in Captain Verney'a favour that he returned to England and gave himself up to the police directly he learnt there was a warrant out for hia arrest, but the prim& facie evidence in the Crown's possession, seems terribly strong. For one thing, there appears no doubt that for some reason or another, Verney was in Paris during September last year, passing under tbe name of Wihon. An ex-shipmate moßt unwillingly testifies to having forwarded letters to Verney in Paris, addressed Wilson. Then, the handwritings of Wilson and Verney are identical, and at Bow street on Saturday, Mips Baakett recognised the prisoner as her would-bo seducer. Mdme Florent, alias Bouillier, served her term of imprisonment out by Christmas.and disappeared into the vortex. No inducements availed to persuade the woman to betray her accomplice, and unless her evidence should be in Captain Verney'e favour the police will not find her now. It is urged in extenuation of Wilson and Bouillier's conduce that no attempt was made to force Miss Baskett's inclinations; she was simply tempted. What seems uncertain is whether the Baakett caße was an isolated one, or whether Bouillier's statement, that she had previously procured maidens for Wilson's gratification, was correct. The police incline to the latter view, but many think Bouillier's storieß were invented solely in order to persuade Nellie Baskett to give way. Evidently no protracted liaison was intended. Had the poor girl succumbed Bhe would have doubtless returned home at the end of the month.and " no one," as Bouillier remarked, " have been &ny the wiser." How many young thingß, one wonders, who left home light-heartedly enough on trips like Nellie Baskett's, have come back with, their hononr gone and their purity smirched, and " no one any the wiser." A FAITHPU& AND TRUSTWORTHY LADT's MAID. Some facts which throw an odd light on the manners and customs of certain sorts of "our old nobility," cropped up on Saturday in the course of a civil action which the Marchioness of Huntley is bringing against a Brighton Hotel Company. Her ladyship lost jewellery valued at £1000 whilst stopping at the Bedford Hotel, at Brighton, and sues the proprietary for the value thereof. The Company resist the claim, averring that if any jewellery was lost in their house, which they are by no means prepared to admit, it was lost through tbe negligence of Lady Huntley herself, or Lady Huntley's maid Hannah Moore. This young person proved to be the damsel who committed adultery with that sprightly peer Lord Connemara, and whose evidence sufficed to give Lady Connemara freedom. The discovery of his lordship's p'ebeian amourette with Hannah was generally contidered at the time moßt fortunate, as otherwise Lady Connemara would have been obliged to disclose a far worse scandal and smirch several noble families. That neither she nor Lord Connemara was ungrateful to the girl was apparent from the character Miss Moore produced in Court on Saturday. In this (written after the divorce) her ladyship "cannot speak too highly of the fidelity and trustworthiness of Hannah Moore." What is one to make of such a statement, or of the fact that a blameless lady like, the Marchioness of Huntley has deliberately taken into her service a selfconfessed adultress. Most people in Court on Saturday, after hearing Miss Moore's orosß-ezamiDation, doubted exceedingly the woman's having ever committed herself with any man. The law of libel being what it is, one had better not speculate further.