Court lady

“ The cynical Court lady, whose beauty bewitched a great King, and whose ruthless sarcasm made Duchesses quail, is here drawn for us in vivid fashion by her own hand, and while concerned with depicting other figures she really portrays her own. ”

“ Therefore the course of conduct that I wish my Court Lady to pursue in love talk, will be to refuse always to believe that whoever pays court to her for that reason loves her: and if the gentleman shall be as pert as many are, and speak to her with small respect, she will give him such answer that he may clearly understand he is causing her annoyance. ”

“ And since words that carry no meaning of importance are vain and puerile, the Court Lady must have not only the good sense to discern the quality of him with whom she is speaking, 178but knowledge of many things, in order to entertain him graciously; and in her talk she should know how to choose those things that are adapted to the quality of him with whom she is speaking, and should be cautious lest occasionally, without intending it, she utter words that may offend him. ”

“ He went rather more into company at Court after the King had taken him to ride with him in his carriage, thinking it then his duty to shew himself among the courtiers.
Madame called me, one day, into her closet, where the King was walking up and down in a very serious mood. "You must," said she, "pass some days in a house in the Avenue de St. Cloud, whither I shall send you. You will there find a young lady about to lie in." The King said nothing, and I was mute from astonishment. "You will be mistress of the house, and preside, like one of the fabulous goddesses, at the accouchement. ”

“ Does not nature revolt at this barbarity, this secret unfeeling conduct of the queen? What mother could know a similar case, and not afford all the generous tenderness of sympathy to mitigate the losses this orphan had sustained, not only of fortune, but of the fostering care of both his parents?
The complicated wickedness of the court seemed now nearly approaching its climax. Deception had been added to deception, until, to complete the delusion, another victim must necessarily be added, in the person of the Princess Caroline of Brunswick! ”

“ The lady died.
"See what the Court is; all is corruption there, from the highest to the lowest," said I to Madame, one day, when she was speaking to me of some facts that had come to my knowledge. "I could tell you many others," replied Madame; "but the little chamber, where you often remain, must furnish you with a sufficient number." This was a little nook, from whence I could hear a great part of what passed in Madame's apartment. The Lieutenant of Police sometimes came secretly to this apartment, and waited there. ”

“ The lady of rank,—even of the highest,—might have an illegitimate offspring, and secretly hide her shame by consigning it to an asylum; but the poor woman, who had strayed from the path of virtue, through poverty, must be confronted with the moralizing, austere, brow-beating, clerical magistrate, reproached for her unfortunate lapse from rectitude, and be committed to the treadmill! Such an unequal administration of justice, we repeat, has been ”

“ But, seeing the progress this lady made in the feelings of the Queen’s enemies, it became my duty, from the situation I held, to caution Her Majesty against the risks she ran in making her favourites friends; for it was very soon apparent how highly the Court disapproved of this intimacy and partiality: and the same feeling soon found its way to the many-headed monster, the people, who only saw the favourite without considering the charge she held. ”

“ Let every unbiassed individual read this, and then judge of the monstrous and unnatural verdict returned by the jury! Some further statements were given to us by a gentleman who received the communication, a few years back, from Mrs. Sellis herself:
"The heart-broken widow said, that she had been brought up from a child in the service of the Princess Augusta, and that he had been many years in that of the Duke of Cumberland. ”

“ This shameless mistress stood as the fountain of emolument and preferment, and she took every advantage of that situation to promote the aggrandizement of her family. The indulgent country, however, would hardly have found fault with this second, Mrs. Clarke, had not, in some instances, the very laws of the constitution been infringed, and the domestic policy of the country become endangered, by the effects of her improper influence, which, as it was secret, was fraught with the greater injury. ”

“ The first thing the ordinary woman hastens to do if she be summoned to appear in a court of justice is not, as might be expected, to think over her testimony or try to recall facts obliterated or confused by time, but to buy a new hat; and precisely the same thing is true of the female defendant called to the bar of justice, whether it be for stealing a pair of gloves or poisoning her lover. ”

“ The fees that a married woman receives for her services as an attorney are just as much her earnings as the dollar that a sewing-woman receives for her day's work, and are just as much protected by the Act of 1869. Is it for the court to say, in advance, that it will not admit a married woman? Should she be admitted, and fail to perform her duty, or to comply with all her contracts as an attorney, could not the court, upon application, strike her name from the roll, or inflict more summary punishment? ”

“ Gentlemen:—Thanking you for the politeness, the courtesy, the chivalry even, that has been shown me to-day, allow me to make of you the following request: Please sit down at your earliest leisure, and endeavor to realize in imagination how you would feel if you were sued by a woman, and the case was brought before a court composed entirely of women; the judge a woman; every member of the jury a woman; women to read the oath to you, and hold the Bible, and every lawyer a woman. ”

“ Whether, on the other hand, to engage in the hot strifes of the bar, in the presence of the public, and with momentous verdicts the prizes of the struggle, would not tend to destroy the deference and delicacy with which it is the pride of our ruder sex to treat her, is a matter certainly worthy of her consideration. But the important question is, what effect the presence of women as barristers in our courts would have upon the administration of justice, and the question can be satisfactorily answered only in the light of experience.” (Supreme Court Reports of Illinois, vol. lv. p. 535.) ”

“ The difficulty of determining, even in one's office, the true character of a plausible woman is enhanced tenfold in the court-room, where the lawyer is generally compelled to proceed upon the assumption that the witness is a person of irreproachable life and antecedents. Almost any young woman may create a favorable impression, provided her taste in dress be not too crude, and, even when it is so, the jury are not apt to distinguish carefully between that which cries to Heaven and that which is merely "elegant." ”

“ It is written in the law of every State in this Union that a person in the courts shall have a jury of his peers, yet so long as the word "male" stands as it does in the Constitutions of the United States and the States no woman in any State of this Union can have a jury of her peers, I protest in the name of justice against going into the court-room and being compelled to run the gauntlet of the gutter and of the saloon—yes, even of the police court and of the jail—as we are compelled to do to select a male jury to try the interests of women, whether relating to life, property, or reputation. ”

“ The district-attorney: “The prisoner had better understand once for all that her sex isn’t going to protect her in this prosecution. The law is no respecter of sex. As for her refined and sensitive instincts, if she has any, I advise her to put them into her pocket. This jury has too much good sense to be affected by any exhibition that she may make for their benefit. I submit the matter to the Court’s good judgment.”
The recorder: “Madam, you will turn your chair toward the jury, and keep your face uncovered.” ”

“ In certain intimate matters it is a woman’s task to question girls. Contrast the picture of an open court-room: the judge on the bench, the jury, if there is one, composed of men, the room filled with men of all descriptions, and the frightened, trembling child, with this private room with the young offender telling her story alone to an experienced woman. Which offers the best chance for saving the girl from a ruined life? ”

“ The world in general is not ignorant of the complexion of most courts; though ambition, interest, and vanity, are always willing to leap over their information, or to fancy they can counteract it: but I have no occasion to probe that delusion, nor to gainsay your random opinion, that a court life may be eligible for women. Yes, for the idle ones you specify, perhaps so;-for respectable women I think much less than even for men. ”

“ Any woman without a dollar in the world can walk into the domestic relations court, tell her troubles to the clerk of the court, and then if her case is a worthy one, she is within a few minutes placed on the witness stand, where she can repeat the recital to the judge. The whole proceeding of bringing her husband to the bar of justice and getting the court to forcing him to provide for her is speedy and absolutely without cost. ”

“ I will thank you to make it known to those ladies who have been summoned on the juries, that they will be received, protected, and treated with all the respect and courtesy due, and ever paid, by true American gentlemen to true American ladies, and that the Court, in all the power of government, will secure to them all that deference, security from insult, or anything which ought to offend the most refined woman, which is accorded in any walks of life in which the good and true women of our country have heretofore been accustomed to move. ”

“ And the Englishwoman—whose fame, happiness, and future, are at stake on the accusation on -which such an action must be based; and who is nevertheless told that "legally" she can make no defence—that she is no party to the suit—that she may not have counsel in court—that she is not permitted to state either the circumstances of her separation from her husband, or his previous treatment of her—stands in a position which would be farcical, if misery did not Invest it with a bitter solemnity! ”

“ In his charge to another grand jury later, Chief Justice Greene said : "Twelve terms of court, ladies and gentlemen, I have now held, in which women have served as grand and petit jurors, and it is certainly a fact beyond dispute that no other twelve terms so salutary for restraint of crime have ever been held in this Territory. ”

“ Some excellent women in the United States are now practicing at the bar, acceptably received before courts and juries; and when they have conducted their cases to a successful issue or an unsuccessful one in any court below, why should the United States courts to which an appeal may be taken and where their adversaries of the male sex may follow the case up, why should these courts be closed to these women? ”

“ But, with all our dainty notions of female proprieties, women are, by common consent, dragged into court as witnesses, and subjected to the most scrutinizing and often indelicate examinations and questions, if either party imagines he can gain a sixpence, or dull the edge of a criminal prosecution, by her testimony. The interest, convenience, and prejudices of men, and not any true regard for the delicacy of the sex, seem to be the standard by which woman's rights and duties are to be measured. ”

“ As to the first, it is fairly safe to say that a woman is much more likely to win a verdict in a civil court or to persuade the jury that the prisoner is guilty in a criminal case than a man would be in precisely similar circumstances. ”

“ The fiat of the court is the closing knell to a woman; and although she may know the judge in private life to be a fallible or—more incongruous still—a jovial man, his presence here is overpowering. Of the jury she feels vaguely, dread. Of the judge, awe.
The mother of the prisoner sat near him. Her sad, pale, refined face troubled the young prosecutor sorely and he tugged at his conscience and spurred on his resolution after each glance at her. ”

“ It is a curious fact that the most amusing cases in the County Court are usually those in which members of the fair sex are engaged. Ladies, as a rule, seem unable to appreciate the laws of evidence, and when in the witness-box often take the opportunity to indulge in family reminiscences, and to pile satirical obloquy on their opponents. ”

“ And who would choose to be represented in a court of law by an advocate who, though to-day in clear possession of all of her capacities, may to-morrow cease to be “responsible” before the law? For any woman, though not yet married, is always subject to that liability! ”

“ Suppose a man accused of an offense against the law should be accused by a woman, arrested by a woman, held in jail by a woman, tried in a court-room filled with women, before a jury composed only of women, and sentenced by a woman judge. Would such a man feel that he was getting impartial justice given him by his peers? ”

“ For example, the Customs of the City of London declare that: “Where a woman coverte de baron follows any craft within the said city by herself apart, with which the husband in no way intermeddles, such woman shall be bound as a single woman in all that concerns her said craft. And if the wife shall plead as a single woman in a Court of Record, she shall have her law and other advantages by way of plea just as a single woman. ”

“ Bailey said, "and while women are physically capable of perform- ing that service there are reasons, natural, moral and domestic, which render them -wholly unfit for it. ... We go to the court house for stern, unyielding justice. Will women help our courts to better administer justice ? They will not. Nobody is qualified to decide any case until they have heard all the testimony on both sides but the average woman would make up her mind before the plaintiff had concluded his testimony." ”