DEMON OF JEALOUSY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7301, 5 January 1904, Page 2

DEMON OF JEALOUSY.

— *-■ . ■ A PAINFUL STORY. In his kindest and most" considerate voice Mr Justice Buoknill turned to a witness in the London Divorce Court on November 6, and, looking over his spectacles^ said :— " I beg. your pardon— no doubt it is my ignorance — but may I'aek what is it- you do? D.P., you sing?" "I sing and dance, my lord," answered tie witness, Ssfo® M'Avoy l wlio looked at this moment as tnougb she would) iav^f rather faced the largest musio-hali audience in the Kingdom than stand in Divorce Court I. as witness and petitioner against a cruel and wrong-doing husband. ; "I am airaid your lordship cannot know. muah about music-halls," said Mr Bargrave Deane, ' K.C., who appeared, for Mrs M'Avoy. He went on to explain, that Mrs IvTAvoy, under the professional name oS Vesta. Victoria, nightly delighted hundreds of music-hall frequenters by her songs an;d dances. The Judge nodded sympathetic acquiescence, and after that Mrs M'Avoy was suffered to give an uninterrupted narrative of marital jealousy and cruelty that dated from her wedding, day. Her husband is Mr Frederick Wallace M'Avoy, the acting manager of tie. jjustom Palace of Varieties. He originally ektefcaft. a^4sl eace : but the attempt to bring Him into Court proved. . without avail, <md Mr Bargrayo Deane was accordingly allowed by the Judge to dispense with the common - jpry and treat the case as undefended. PASSION FOB "SCENES." Mr and Mrs M'Avoy — and tSfais is the bur^ den of the wife's story in the witness-box — ■ were married in September, 1897. The only child of the marriage was # born in 1898. From the wedding day forward Mr M'Avoy was possessed with t|ie demon of jealousy. "On my marriage morning," Mrs M'Avoy told a sympathetic Court with tears in her eyes, "he aocused me of misconduct. He told me that it was well known that I had had six children before my marriage." Judging from the evidence, the husband was eaten up with an insatiable passion for making " scenes." But directly he had succeeded by his baseless accusations in anedup-* ing his wife to a condition of hysteria, he would mak© a sudden change of front. Qa his side there was immediate sunshine after storm. So it wa6 on this occasion^ After his outburst of brutal jealousy in the very first days of the honeymoon he turned round and retracted all his accusations, But when, he was- next in a black mood— -ajuj' such: moods recurred frequently— the accusation* ; were repeated. The petitioner was/ at last driven in sheer desperation to obtain med> cal refutation of these cruel charges. / Mrs M'Ayoy, who gave her evidence witJ»' great clearness, naturally found it difficult to go through distressing details ij* a crowded Court. Bufc she went on bravely,' and certainly she had the sympathy of all present, from the Judge downwards. Dr Bantock, who examined her at the time, at once disposed of her husband's shameful insinuations. "Andi what did your husband say to that, madam?" was the next question. "That Dr Bantock did not dare fco say otherwise," was the reply. FLED IN THE NIGHT. In the early days of their marriage,' the petitioner went on, her husband; was the manager of the South London Music Hall, and they lived in South London. Nothing she did at this time to meet and' xefute his unjust suspicions but was tortured and twisted by him into evidences of fresh .guilt. He even accused her of consulting doctors' merely to make opportunities of misconduct. His ill-treatment and brutality ftt last got to euch a point that between three, and four o'clock one morning she had fco go to her mother's house. " I was working at my profession all this time," she added. Mr Justice Bucknill; And you nay that your heaJtb was so* reduced: by this illtreatment that you could 1 not go on witih your w>ork? The witness assented. When! her baby waß born, her husbaftd denied being the father of it. Then his jealousy took a new, turn, He accused her of being a woman of absolutely bad' character. ' ( He said more than once,' k Mrs M'Avoy sobbed, -'that I was unworthy to be near my baby— to breathe the same air. This w«mfc on the whole time/ 1 was with him. He accused me of having misconducted myself with any own coachman.. The result of these accusations was to make me very weak. I had crying fits and becaime often quite hysterical. Very of ten I had, to give up my engagements." While she was on tour she had been visited by friends— Mr and Mrs Lloyd. ' That was sufficient for Mr M'Avoy; He straightway accused her of misconduct with Mr Lloyd. Mrs M'Avoy answered the charge in the only way possible, i She brought the two men face to face arid B*^4 her husband to repeat the charge i» Mr Lloyd's presence. i "And what did he do then?" asked Mr Deane.— "He apologised and laughed ifc off. He said that he -tad wade a mistake and' knew there was nothing in it.'' ■-•',■.-< " His usua} method," Mr j)eane muttexeij drily. •...'"' "A DISEASED MIND." Things came to such a. pass that in 1901 a separation was necessary. Only^fter she was away from her husband, she told the Judge, did she recover her usual health, and spirits, Presently it was found that her husband's name had been mixed = up with two young women, and it was proposed to proceed against him for divorce ' on ' the . cruelty already detailed. Her husband 'had, however, -called. at the office of her solieitojra and asked anost earnestly that the names of these two women should be «.ept out of the petition, and one of them had satisfied the petitioner conclusively that the case againat ]ier could not be established. . ; — ' Mr M'Avoy had, however ? confessed; tospecific acts'vof misconduct with a third woman at an hotel at. Westcliff-on-Sea, and corroborative evidence from the hotel register was produced in court. , In granting a decree nisi to Mrs M'Avoy, Mr Justice BuckniU commented on the " wicked " conduct of the respondent in no lneusured terms. The only explanation, in his mind, of .'these ciniel and basjalesi charges, followed by apologies, wasr that the , husband wa« the victim, gf a diseased mind.