Chapter XXXIV: Last Scene of All 227 (7)

"Following closely upon the heels of Mr. Barnum, Madame Lola Montez,
parenthetically putting forth her more aristocratic title of Countess
of Landsfeld, commenced on Thursday evening [7th April 1859] the first
of a series of lectures at the St. James's Hall. Revisiting this
country, she has first felt her footing as a lecturer in the
provinces, and now venturing upon the ordeal of a London audience, she
has boldly added her name to the list of those who have sought,
single-handed, to engage their attention. If any amongst the full and
fashionable auditory that attended her first appearance fancied, with
a lively recollection of certain scandalous chronicles, that they were
about to behold a formidable-looking woman of Amazonian audacity, and
palpably strong-wristed, as well as strong-minded, their
disappointment must have been grievous; greater if they anticipated
the legendary bull-dog at her side and the traditionary pistols in her
girdle and the horsewhip in her hand. The Lola Montez who made a
graceful and impressive obeisance to those who gave her on Thursday
night so cordial and encouraging a reception, appeared simply as a
good-looking lady in the bloom of womanhood, attired in a plain black
dress, with easy, unrestrained manners, and speaking earnestly and
distinctly, with the slightest touch of a foreign accent that might
belong to any language from Irish to Bavarian. The subject selected by
the fair lecturer was the distinction between the English and the
American character, which she proceeded to demonstrate by a discourse
that must be pronounced decidedly didactic rather than diverting. With
most of the characteristics mentioned as illustrative of each country,
we presume the majority of her hearers had, in the course of their
reading or experience, become already acquainted. That America looked
to the future for her greatness, England to the past; that Americans
believed in the spittoon as a valuable institution, and speed as the
great condition of success in all things--it hardly needed a Lola
Montez to come from the West to inform us. The excitable temperament
of our transatlantic brethren, their readiness to raise idols and to
demolish them, the great liberty of opinion that there prevails, and
the little toleration of its expression, were the leading points of a
lecture lasting an hour and a quarter, blended with a compliment to
the American ladies, a tributary acknowledgment of the virtues of our
own, and a digression into American politics as connected with
everything. There was no attempt to weave into the subject a few
threads of personal interest, no mention of any incident that had
happened to her, and no anecdote that might have enlivened the
dissertation in any way. The lecture might have been a newspaper
article, the first chapter of a book of travels, or the speech of a
long-winded American ambassador at a Mansion House dinner. All was
exceedingly decorous and diplomatic, slightly gilded here and there
with those commonplace laudations that stir a British public into the
utterance of patriotic plaudits. A more inoffensive entertainment
could hardly be imagined; and when the six sections into which the
lady had divided her discourse were exhausted, and her final bow
elicited a renewal of the applause that had accompanied her entrance,
the impression on the departing visitors must have been that of having
spent an hour in company with a well-informed lady who had gone to
America, had seen much to admire there, and, coming back, had had over
the tea-table the talk of the evening to herself. Whatever the future
disquisitions of the Countess of Landsfeld may be, there is little
doubt that many will go to hear them for the sake of the peculiar
celebrity of the lecturer."

XXXIII

THE MAGDALEN

That celebrity was very far from corresponding to the present dispositions and aspirations of the ex-adventuress. While travelling from town to town the transmutation of her emotions into religious fervour had gone on unchecked. The love she had once borne to men found an object in the unseen God; the wondering disgust excited by the memory of her relations with men she had learned to dislike became translated into repentance for sin; latent ambition now leaped up at the thought of a crown to be won beyond the tomb. Christianity offers us new worlds for old, promises new joys to those who have lost all zest for the old, proposes an objective which may be pursued to the brink of the grave, and assures every human being of the tremendous importance of his own destiny. For these reasons religion has always appealed with especial force to women in Lola's situation, who, moreover, being usually deficient in the logical and critical faculties, are the less able to resist its appeal to their emotions.

During her stay in England Lola kept a spiritual diary, some fragments of which have been preserved to us. It is certainly illustrative of the depth and earnestness of her religious convictions, and it would be a cold-blooded act to analyse and to dissect the state of mind it portrays. The sentiments are often morbid in the extreme, as might be expected from one whose ideas of religion were derived from teachers of the extreme evangelical school. She writes:--

"Oh, I dare not think of the past! What have I not been? I lived only
for my own passions; and what is there of good even in the best
natural human being? What would I not give to have my terrible and
fearful experiences given as an awful warning to such natures as my
own! And yet when people generally, even my mother, turned their backs
upon me and knew me not, Jesus knocked at my heart's door. What has
the world ever given to me? (And I have known _all_ that the world has
to give--_all_!) Nothing but shadows, leaving a wound on the heart
hard to heal--a dark discontent.

"Now I can more calmly look back on the stormy passages of my life--an
eventful life indeed--and see onward and upward a haven of rest to the
soul. I used once to think that heaven was a place somewhere beyond
the clouds, and that those who got there were as if they had not been
themselves on the earth. But life has been given to me to know that
heaven begins in the human soul, through the grace of God and His holy
word. Those who cannot feel somewhat of heaven here will never find it
hereafter."

On another page we find:--

"To-morrow (the Lord's day) is the day of peace and happiness. Once it
seemed to me anything but a happy day, but now all is wonderfully
changed in my heart.... What I loved before now I hate. Oh! that in
this coming week, I may, through Thee, overcome all sinful thoughts,
and love every one.

"Thankful I am that I have been permitted to pray this day. Three
years ago I cried aloud in agony to be taken; and yet the great,
All-Wise Creator has spared me, in His mercy, to repent. All that has
passed in New York has not been mere illusion. I feel it is true. The
Lord heard my feeble cry to Him, and I felt what no human tongue can
describe. The world cast me out, and He, the pure, the loving, took me
in.

"To-morrow is Sunday, and I shall go to the poor little humble chapel,
and there will I mingle my prayers with the fervent pastor, and with
the good and true. There is no pomp or ceremony among these. All is
simple. No fine dresses, no worldly display, but the honest Methodist
breathes forth a sincere prayer, and I feel much unity of soul. What
would I give to have daily fellowship with these good people! to teach
in the school, to visit the old, the sick, the poor. But that will be
in the Lord's good time, when self is burned out of me completely."

The following entry is dated Saturday, in London:--

"Since last week my existence is entirely changed. When last I wrote I
was calm and peaceful--away from the world. Now, I must again go
forth. It was cruel, indeed, of Mr. E. to have said what he did; but I
am afraid I was too hasty also. Ought I to have resented what was
said? No, I ought to have said not a word. The world would applaud me;
but, oh! my heart tells me that for His sake I ought to bear the
vilest reproaches, even unmerited.

"Good-bye, all the calm hours of reflection and repose I enjoyed at
Derby! My calm days at the cottage are gone--gone. But I will not look
back. Onward! must be the cry of my heart.

"Lord, have mercy on the weary wanderer, and grant me all I beseech of
Thee! Oh, give me a meek and lowly heart!"

It seems from this final extract that some painful circumstance compelled the writer against her will to go on her travels again. The diary affords proof that she was in England as late as September 1859; and the following year, she was again at New York.

XXXIV

LAST SCENE OF ALL

Lola the saint was no more provident than Lola the sinner. She dissipated the large sums she had amassed in her English tour in the space of a few months, and with a mind tormented by remorse and religious scruples, could turn her thoughts to no system of livelihood. Threatened with poverty, and in a state of deep dejection, she was one day met in the streets of New York by a lady and gentleman who stopped and considered her attentively. Finally, evidently at the man's suggestion, his wife stepped up to Lola, and recalled herself to her recollection as an old school-fellow and playmate of her Montrose days. She was now the wife of Mr. Buchanan, a florist of some standing. Lola was deeply affected by this meeting. This voice from her childhood supplied the human note in her present state of spiritual desolation and exaltation. The friendship begun thirty years before in far-off Scotland was renewed. To the penitent Lola Mrs. Buchanan's recognition of her seemed an act of amazing kindness and condescension. But the florist and his wife were not only religious but good people. They made provision for the ex-adventuress, perhaps by a judicious investment of the little money that remained to her; and Mrs. Buchanan sympathising warmly with her old friend's spiritual regeneration, was able to calm her doubts and scruples, and to divert her piety into practical channels.

The wayward, troubled soul of Lola Montez at last tasted peace--thanks, perhaps, as much to the consolations of true friendship as to those of religion. She abandoned the Methodist connection, and embraced the possibly less gloomy tenets of the Episcopal Church of America. She passed much of her time in deep retirement, reading and studying the Bible. One who knew her at this time says that her bearing was calm, graceful, and modest; of her beauty there remained no trace except her deep, lustrous Spanish eyes. A conviction that she was soon to die of consumption possessed her, and she spent the rest of the year 1860 in preparation for her end.

"So far as outward actions could show," says her spiritual adviser,
Dr. F. L. Hawks, "with her 'old things had passed away, and all things
had become new.' With a heart full of sympathy for the poor outcasts
of her own sex, she devoted the last few months of her life to
visiting them at the Magdalen Asylum, near New York, warning them and
instructing them with a spirit which yearned over them, that they,
too, might be brought into the fold. She strove to impress upon them
not only the awful guilt of breaking the divine law, but the
inevitable earthly sorrow which those who persisted with thoughtless
desperation in sinful courses were treasuring up for themselves. Her
effort was thus to redeem the time as far as she could; and the result
of her labours can only be known on that day when she will meet her
erring sisters at the impartial tribunal of the Eternal Judge."

Lola's premonition was verified. In December 1860 she was suddenly struck down--not by consumption, but by partial paralysis. She was conveyed to the Asteria Sanatorium, where Mrs. Buchanan took charge of her. She lingered in great pain, patiently borne, for several weeks, and it was seen that there was no hope of her recovery. Dr. Hawks visited her frequently. To him, her chosen confidant at this final stage of her chequered life, and the most fitted to sympathise with the ideas that then dominated her, may be left the description of her last hours.

"In the course of a long experience as a Christian minister, I do not
think I ever saw deeper penitence and humility, more real contrition
of soul and more of bitter self-reproach than in this poor woman.
Anxious to probe her heart to the bottom, I questioned her in various
forms; spoke as plainly as I could of the qualities of a genuine
repentance; set forth the necessity of the operations of the Holy
Spirit really to convert from sin to holiness, and presented Christ as
all in all--the only Saviour. For myself I am quite satisfied that God
the Holy Ghost had renewed her sinful soul into holiness.

"There was no confident boasting, however. I never saw a more humble
penitent. When I prayed with her, nothing could exceed the fervour of
her devotion; and never had I a more watchful and attentive hearer
than when I read the Scriptures. She read the blessed volume for
herself, also, when I was not present. It was always within reach of
her hand; and, on my first visit, when I took up her Bible from the
table, the fact struck me that it opened of its own accord to the
touching story of Christ's forgiveness of the Magdalene in the house
of Simon.

"If ever a repentant soul loathed past sin, I believe hers did.

"She was a woman of genius, highly accomplished, of more than usual
attainments, and of great natural eloquence. I listened to her
sometimes with admiration, as with the tears streaming from her eyes,
her right hand uplifted, and her regularly expressive features (her
keen blue eyes especially) speaking almost as plainly as her tongue,
she would dwell upon Christ, and the almost incredible truth that He
could show mercy to such a vile sinner as she felt herself to have
been, until I would feel that she was the preacher and not I.

"When she was near her end, and could not speak, I asked her to let me
know by a sign whether her soul was at peace, and she still felt that
Christ would save her. She fixed her eyes on mine, and nodded her head
affirmatively."

Thus, on 17th January 1861, in the odour of sanctity, died Lola Montez, Countess of Landsfeld, Baroness Rosenthal, Canoness of the Order of St. Theresa, sometime ruler of the kingdom of Bavaria, in the forty-third year of her age. She, whose fame had filled three continents, was committed to the custody of Mother Earth in Greenwood Cemetery, two days later, with the rites and ceremonial of the Episcopal Church. Her grave was marked by a tablet, bearing the inscription: "Mrs. Eliza Gilbert, born 1818, died 1861." The men who had risked crowns and fortune for her love would have hardly recognised her in her last part or under her last homely description.

* * * * *

At the bar of God Lola Montez pleaded guilty. I, as her advocate in the court of Humanity, may enter another plea.

For half a century the world has taken this woman at her own last valuation, and dismissed her as a criminal and a sinner. The orthodox Christian reproaches her with unchastity, exaggerating, as is his wont, the gravity of this particular transgression of his code. He would have had her waste her glorious beauty, made to gladden the hearts of men, and refuse the _role_ of woman which nature had assigned her--because, forsooth! a petty English tribunal would not set her free from a tie it should never have allowed her to contract. The law was made for man; the claims and instincts of womanhood must override the decrees of any Consistory Court. Lola Montez was pre-eminently and essentially a woman--specially fitted and charged, therefore, to bring the great happiness of love to men. This which was her glory the sexless moralist makes her reproach. For him the perfect woman is the most unhuman; he admires the woolless sheep and the scentless flower.

Hers was a capacity for immense passion, happiness, and power. She longed not only to charm men but to rule them. By the happiness she procured them, she enslaved them. She exploited their passions, it will be said; and since when have we ceased to exploit the weakness of woman? In the pursuit of power we use the instruments easiest to our hands, we attack our opponents' most vulnerable points. This Lola did; this did every strong man of whom history has any record. Her qualities of mind, as evinced in the administration of Bavaria, were of a high order, and in a man would have commanded success; but men were dazzled by her beauty, and cried out to be influenced by that alone. We esteem in our own sex the faculties by which we are helped, led, and ruled; in the other, we prate of chastity, and value only that which ministers to our vanity, comfort, and sensuality. Women must be human in just so far as may conform to our individual needs. When we prize intellectual worth in women as highly as physical beauty, it will be time to protest against the methods of Lola Montez.

She subdued men by their passions, but she ruled them well. She challenged history to adduce a case where a woman had wielded so much power so wisely and so disinterestedly. She was no Pompadour or Du Barry to whom the scurrile De Mirecourt compared her. Guilty at moments, as we all are, of derelictions from her principles, she was throughout life a lover of liberty in thought, word, and deed. When Europe lay under the feet of Metternich and the Ultramontanes, she, almost single-handed, struck a blow for freedom. The wiles of the cleverest intriguers in Europe proved powerless against her bold policy. At scheming she was no adept, trusting, as the strong will ever trust, to her force and personality to defeat the manoeuvres of her foes. Had Louis of Bavaria not bowed before the storm, she and his kingdom would have played a great part in European history. As it was, to her intervention Switzerland partly owes the freedom of her institutions from clerical control. The terms in which she speaks of that country and of the United States, though purposely exaggerated, display her profound sympathy with the principles of democracy. Setting aside the qualities of the woman, let us gratefully acknowledge that Lola Montez, on a small stage and for a brief period, proved herself an able and humane administratrix and a staunch friend to liberty. In her we have another of the many instances of capacity for government as the concomitant of an intensely feminine temperament.

She was valiant as an antique worthy. She was never at an end of her resources, never unnerved by catastrophe. Disaster after disaster left unexhausted her marvellous powers of recuperation. She could adapt herself to all men and all circumstances. She was at home in the courts of emperors and kings, in the _salons_ of the learned, in the backwoods of California, in the mining camps of Australia, in the conventicles of New York. To the life of a recluse in a primeval wilderness she adapted herself as readily as to a London drawing-room. She was eloquent in many tongues, witty and light-hearted, adding to the world's gaiety. She was kindly and compassionate, cherishing dogs, and all four-footed things, visiting the sick and the afflicted, saying a kind word for the despised coolies of India. Her money she showered with reckless generosity on all who stood in need. Her excellences were her own; her faults lie at the door of society.

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

_The files of the following newspapers_: Times, Morning Herald, Era, Illustrated London News; Le Constitutionnel, Le Figaro, Le Journal des Debats; New York Tribune; Sydney Morning Herald, Melbourne Argus.

_"Autobiography and Lectures of Lola Montez" (by C. Chauncy Burr); "An Englishman in Paris" (Vandam); "Letters from Up-Country" (Hon. Emily Eden); "You have heard of them?" (Q). "History of the 44th Regiment" (Carter); "Revelations of Russia" (Henningsen); "Life and Adventures" (George A. Sala); "Bygone Years" (Leveson Gower); "Fraser's Magazine," 1848; "Players of a Century" (Phelps); "New York Stage" (Ireland); "Story of a Penitent" (Hawks); "Dictionary of National Biography."_

_"Les Contemporains" (De Mirecourt); "Mes Souvenirs" (Claudin); "Souvenirs" (Theodore de Banville); "Histoire de l'Art Dramatique en France" (Theophile Gautier); "Dictionnaire Larousse."_

_"Ein Vormarzliches Tanzidyll" (Fuchs); "Ludwig Augustus" (Sepp); "Ludwig I." (Heigel); "Unter den vier ersten Koenigen Bayerns" (Kobell); "Lola Montez und die Jesuiten" (Erdmann); "Bayern's Erhebung"; "Franz Liszt als Mensch ung Kuenstler" (Ramann); Metternich's Memoirs: Bernstorff Papers; etc., etc._

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Historical Record of the 44th, or East Essex Regiment (1864), by Thomas Carter, of the Adjutant-General's Office.

[2] Dodwell and Miles, Indian Army List, 1760-1834.

[3] "You have Heard of Them," New York, 1854.

[4] _Morning Herald_, 8th June 1843.

[5] "An Englishman in Paris," 1892. The author of this book was A. D. Vandam, who could not have had this from Lola personally, seeing that he was born in 1842.

[6] Vandam, "An Englishman in Paris."

[7] De Mirecourt (_Contemporains_) fixes the date of this episode in 1843, and bases it in reports in the _Constitutionnel_, which I have been unable to trace.

[8] All the statements made concerning Lola in "An Englishman in Paris" must be received with caution, as they can only be taken at the best as hearsay evidence transcribed by Vandam.

[9] The foregoing section may seem more in the style of a novel than a biography, but, the dialogue not excepted, it is an exact _resume_ of the evidence given at the subsequent trial.

[10] It is imitated by Heine in some ironical verse, condoling with Frederick William of Prussia on Lola's preference for Louis.

[11] _Morning Herald_, 3rd March 1868.

[12] "Unter den vier ersten Koenigen Bayerns," 1894.

[13] "Ein Vormaerzliches Tanzidyll." Berlin.

[14] I have used and slightly abridged the translation given in the _Morning Herald_.

[15] Frau Von Kobell calls her Countess of Landsberg, a place to be found on the map, which Landsfeld is not.

[16] This was the house built by Metzger, now number 19 Barerstrasse.

[17] Fuchs, "Ein Vormaerzliches Tanzidyll."

[18] Times, 4th March 1868.

[19] So says Mr. Boase in the "Dictionary of National Biography," but quotes no authority.

[20] "Bygone Years," 1905.

[21] "Life and Adventures of G. A. Sala," 1896.

[22] _Times_, 7th August 1849.

[23] _Les Contemporains_, Paris, 1857. No sources of information are indicated. De Mirecourt's real name was Jacquot.

[24] _New York Tribune_, 6th December 1851.

[25] By way of digression I cannot refrain from instancing the absurd practice obtaining in some newspapers of printing the title Mrs., when applied to a woman not legally married, in inverted commas, in spite of the dictum of English law which says that any one can call themselves by any description they please.

[26] _New York Tribune_, 10th August 1853.

[27] _Era_, 6th January 1856.

[28] _Morning Herald_, 7th May, 1856.

[29] De Mirecourt.

[30] Phelps, "Players of a Century."