BREACH OF PROMISE OP MARRIAGE.

West Coast Times, Issue 2239, 3 December 1872, Page 4

BREACH OF PROMISE OP MARRIAGE.

(From the Home News.) Courtenay v. Stirrup was an action tried at Gloucester for a breach of promise of marriage bronght by ■> Ldy residing in Ireland agaimt a gentleman of considerable property in Staffordshire. The plain - tift, Miss Frances Hugh Courtenay, was the daughter of a gentleman living in Cork, in good circumstances, and a provision merehnnt. and the Rev Mr Walker, vicar of Dilborne, in Staffordshire, was the uncle of the pl»intiff ; and the defen- \ dant, Mr Stirrup, who was about forty years old, was the principal landowner of the place. At the end of 1868 the plaintiff went to Stafford to visit her uncle, and there the defendant fell i i love with this lively, bright-eyed [rish girl. They parted in January, 1869, with protestations of mutual feeling, and from that time until the beginning of the present year they corresponded, and at last he wrote a letter to !er, after all these protestations, and after gaining her affections, breaking off the engagement. The learned counsel then proceeded to read numerous Utters which had passed between the parties. First he read letters which showed the circumstances in which he lived. He now had £1000 a-year, kept five hunters, and gave large parties, lie was also a large landowner, and had a share in some potteries. He read a letter written in January, 1869. The lady addressed the defendant in this letter as " My dear John," " I. have lots of beaus. but tlie one I care for I have not ;" and offered to send him her carte in her riding hat>it if he would like to have one. The letter finished " With dear love, your own dear Lizzie." In another letter she said, "My he irt is quite as much yours as yours is mine." "I often look at your own dear self, and think of the happy rides we have had together;" concluding by subsedbing herself, "Your loving Lizzie." Mr iluddleston said he had gone through the letter?, and they were the most pro-aic be had ever read. Mr Hill, on the contrary, expressed an opinion that they were the cheerust, the pleas-antest he ever read. lie proceeded to quote extracts. Avhich contained expressions of devoted love on the part of the plaintiff, and of more moderate affection by the defendant. His lordship, interposing, said there was ample evidence in the letters of a promise. He did not suppose that was contested. The next question would he as to the breach. At about' Feb. 7, Miss Courtenny wrote asking him to answer her one question, " D'd he ]ove her still ?" aud in terms of endearment promised to do every! bin;; to make him happy if she became his wife. The letter concluded : " Will you accept one kiss from one who loves you dearly ?" Mr Courtenay having received no letter in reply to another appeal, went over to the defendant's residence at Dilborne, in Staffordshire, to have an interview with him. On the way to the defendant's house he calkd at Mr Walker's and took him with him. Mr Courtovaj' said he was come to fix a day for his daughter's marriage. Mr Sti'-rup replied, " I can't fix any time," on Avhich Mr Courtenny pressed, "If it was only in one or two years." Mr Stirrup said, " That's a very pointed question," to which Mr Courtenay added that he meant it to be so. The defendant then positively refused to fix any time, said that he would not marry to be unhappy, and that he would never marry any one. The learned counsel concluded an address of nearly two liours with an impassioned appeal to the jury to show by their verdict their sense of such conduct. Their verdict was the only decision to which the lady could appeal. She might say that the day was gone by when the defendant would be required by her brother to stand at the muzzle of a duelling pistol. The time was gone by when the cowhide would be laid over his shoulders by the lady's indignant relatives. There were demonstrations of applause in the court at the te- initiation of the learned Queen's counsel's speech, in which he characterised the conduct of the defendant as a cool, heartless, calculating, and deliberate insult. The plaintiff then entered the witness-box. She is a lady of rather small stature, and of rather an Irish cast of countenance. She kept her eyes on the floor during the ten minutes that Mr Huddleston was consulting with his client, who is much her senior. A consultation then took place between the counsel on both sides, at the end of which Mr Ilnddleston said he feared the result would be a disappointment to some persons that they would not be able to revel in the details of the love passages between this lady and gentleman. He felt it dne to Miss Courtenay, nfter the long time that Mr Stirrup had been engaged to her, to say on his part that he desired that not the slightest reflection should be cast on that lady, and certainly his lcirncd friend Mr Hill misinterpreted the feelings of Mr Stirrup if he imagined that any suggestion came from that gentleman to ask any question which would inflict pain on the plaintiff. Mr Stirrup felt after what had passed that some pecuniary compensation was due to Miss Courtenay. His learned friend had mentioned a sum, and on behalf of Mr Stirrup lie accepted it, and the verdict would be entered for that sum. As to two letters which Mr Hill had not read, he wished it to be understood that there was nothing in them which might not pass between two persons of the same sex ; and Mr Stirrup desired, for the affection which he had long borne to the lady from whom he now separated, that it should not be imagined that he wished to cast any reflection on her. Mr Hill, Q,C. : My lord, we take a verdict for the plaintiff— damages, £1000. Thus ended a case which had been looked for daily as the great case of the assize. As an instance of the Emperor Williams economy, a late visitor at the Babelsberg Chateau mentions that, from a high desk, placed near a side window, the strings of parcels, which the Fmperor opens himself, are seen hanging. These ends are saved for the purpose of re-use. It is sad, at Berlin, that the King even returns to the various departments the envelopes of the documents submitted for his signature. The "International" Jiasco at the Hague seems to have terminated with a lot of bad language. The delegates have returned whence they came. The secessionists are to set about the construction of a rival society. It is said that the final break-up of the International was in part at least due to the passing of a resolution that in future the Society should have a politick character. There was sufficient wisdom in the delegates from France, Belgium, Switzerland, Spain, and Holland to make them repudiate their resolution and that fact did not help to beal the wounds which had been caused by other dissensions. A darkee says : " All men are made ob clay, and, like meerschaum pipes, are more valable when (ley are highly colored."