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    ITALIAN NECBOr.OGY. (From a Corresponden...

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    Mus. Norton's Appeal For Divorce. Tiieuk...

    undertaken by Mr . Nowros ; to pay }™ J &> but it resulted from the trial that ' ^ creditors cannot sue the ' non-existent ^ med woman ; the husband cannot contract with a « non-existent' married wot » an , and the ' non-existent' married woman cannot be compelled to pay if she refuses to discharge S ebt ' Mr ! Norton sent her letters her to meet

    signed " Greenacbe , " inviting him in an empty house ; and when she declined to return to him , he advertised her m the papers as having left liim , her family and home . Her husband has stopped 150 OJ . oi tier year ' income , and she cannot raise ^ it . < No one would lend money to a married eroman ; she can give no security . " But it is impossible to follow this amazing case into ill the details of its injustice .

    " I declare , " says the injured wife , summing up her own case , " upon the holy sacraments of God , that I was not Lori Melbburne ' s mistress ; and , what is more , I do not believe ( and nothing shall ever make me believe ) that Mr . Norton ever thought that I was . In that miserable fact is the root of all my bitterness , and of all his inconsistency ! He never had a real conviction ( not even an unjust one ) , to make him consistent . He wavered , because he and t

    was doing , not what he thought necessary jus , but what he imagined would " ansicer : " and sometimes one thing appeared likely to answer , and sometimes another . He thought the course he took , respecting me and my children , in 1836 , would answer ; and so far it did answer , that he is two thousand a yea * r the richer . He thought his defence to the tradesman ' s action , in 1853 , would answer ; and so far it did answer , that he is five hundred a year the

    richer . But he never believed the on which he has twice founded his gainful measures of expediency . He acknowledged he did not believe them , to others who have published his

    acknowledg-. "It ought not to be possfWe that any man , by mock invocations to justice , should serve a mere purpose of interest or vengeance ; it oug ht not to be possible that any man should make ' the law' his minister , in seeking not that which is just , but that which may ' . ' answer . '" Ought this to be ? That question is the gist of Mrs . Norton ' s letter to the Queen . She establishes her case by reference to the testimony of Sir John * Ba . yi < : et , Lord

    WwFoiro , and many other persons who are engaged , some of them on Mr . Norton ' s own side . She is quite right when she says , that if she had committed the offence charged against her , she would have attained freedom from her husband , and an independent existence before the law . Nay , if her husband had been more successful , and had succeeded , however falsely , in establishing the charge against her , she would hnve been free . More than one story shows what may be done by breaking tlie law instead of obeying it .

    There is a case before the House of Jjords thia week — Sumneb ' b divorce . In 1849 , PENEiiOPB Rubina Mauta VaTjSamachi was married to Mohton Cohtsttsh Sumneu , only son of Mr . Richard Sumnetc , of Putenham Priory , in . Surrey : and in 1855 Morton seeks a divorce from liis wife . The whole story has happened in the interval . In 1849 , soon after their marriage at Corfu , Penelope writes to her husband ' s parents , telling them that Morton has been severely ill under an attack of brain fever . She speaks lei nelly of him , and evidently sho devoted herself to protect his shattered health . Somo few

    months afterwards a fajj | ,-brought ; on n . premature confinement , and she gave birth to a child . The couple returned to tho Ionian Islands , they travelled in Germany , they came to England ; niul here , in 1850 , Mrs . Morton meets her hhsband ' s parents . By this time she had conceived a repugnance to her husband , whom she declares to have boon in such a state of health that , in point of fact , he had never boon a husband to her . How then could aho have given birth to a child ? It is his father that asks tho question . It must be remembered that tho child was born within five months and one week

    of the marriage . To the father ' s inquiry she answers that Mr . Sttmner was not the father of that child , and that she would swear to it . She leaves her husband ; is lost to his view for some time ; writes that she has . procured a divorce in America , and in Corfu again marries a certain Nicholas Kallegari , with whom she is now , apparently , at Galatz or Bucharest . The summons to appear before the House of

    Lords pursues her to Turkey ; and , throwing her arms around her second husband , she hopes that in any new marriage which Morton may contract , he may be as happy as she is now . The story is told before the House of "Lords this week , and on the deposition of their own messenger , the Lords have no doubt as to the adultery , since Mrs . Morton Sttmner has married a second time . Sometimes we call this bisramv : to the House of

    Lords , viewing it technically , pro liac vice , it is adultery ^ , and the Lord Chancellor " moves that Sumner ' s Divorce Bill be read a second time . Morton is free , and so is Penelope . Mrs . Norton might attain her object , if her husband were more unscrupulous than she paints him . Another story has already been told in print , although it does not stand very consp icuously before the public . A gentleman of property is married to a lady of

    good connexions , and of some attractions , but his desire for an heir is not gratified . He appears to be an attached husband , and certainly the lady is an attached wife . She is attentive to the household and watches over his interests as carefully as if he were 'not himself captious and niggardly . Suddenly , however , he brings forward a story that she is too familiar with one of the grooms ; that she has proceeded to the last familiarities , and has even made

    herself notorious in the stable-yard ! Thia Statement , accompanied by very circumstantial details , is told to her father , and is believed ! The lady indignantly denies the calumny . Other servants are set to watch or to persecute her ; the butler taking advantage of her position to become a suitor on his own account . The husband , told this fact , does not appear to disbelieve it , but does not remove the butler . Perhaps if tho butler had succeeded , it would have been as useful

    as if the story about the groom had been true . Let the reader picture to himself a lady living in a country-house in Ireland , and subjected to treatment of this kind—her husband calumniating her , her own friends believing him , her servants conspiring against her , the butler insolently and alarmingly invading her very bedroom at night . The lady actually goes mad ; and being mad , confesses that lier husband ' s story is true . The

    untruth of the tale is proved by tho circumstantial statement of one servant , and by a number of facts collected elsewhere , which are incompatible with the story . A judgment of the Ecclesiastical Court , however , has pronounced a divorce a mensd et thoro ; and the husband ' s way to a bill in Parliament appears to bo clear . Such is the story told in a pamphlet by Mr . John Paoiot , the barrister acting on behalf of tho lady in the case of " Tftlbotv . Tiilbot . "

    If tho husband had succeeded , Mrs . Taleot would at all events liave been free . Penelope Valsamaoiii actually became so , and is a happy woman . No matrimonial offence-lias beon proved against Mra . NoiwoN ; she ia " non-exiatent" in law—in a condition worso than the slave ' s , for she is bond yot unprotected .

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    THE Ii E ADEB , [ No . 277 , Saturday ,

    Italian Necbor.Ogy. (From A Corresponden...

    ITALIAN NECBOr . OGY . ( From a Correspondent . ) Italy ia losing her eminent men—indeed her most eminent . Lnst year Pmixico , Gnosar , Rossktti ,

    Rubiki , and Visconti passed away ; and this year , in the course of a few months only , the world has lost Paci . o Toschi , the celebrated engraver ; Giovanni Rosini , the historian of Italian painting ; Cablo Marenco , the powerful dramatic writer ; and last , the greatest o all , the philosopher Antonio Rosmini Lbrbarti . To the national mourning of the Italian people let us join our voice , for we feel deeply sorrowful that men so learned , so laborious , so faithfully devoted to the great traditions of their country , should not have secured a better fate for the nation to which they belonged .

    Giordani , the most acute and severely aestlietical critic , of whom also Italy has been deprived within the last few years , said , that " as to Raphael alone was granted the power to unite boldness to sweetness , pride to modesty , vigour to grace , and strength to gentleness , so to Toscm only was conceded the power to imitate these qualities with the burin . " AH the frescoes oi Correggio in Parma , and four of Parmigiano , with the Spasimo di Sicilia of Raphael , engraved by him , are the finest works the art of intaglio lias ever pi * odueed .

    The Storia della Pittura Italiana , by Gio . vaum Rosini , Professor of Eloquence to the University of Pisa , has long been familiar to the English amateurs of Italian art , many of whom have used it as a manual to enable them , when travelling in Italy , to distinguish mediocrity from talent , anil talent from genius ; in fact , Rosint ' s impartial criticism and refined taste have often caused him to be referred to by our own tourists . His loss , sensibly felt throughout the -vyhole peninsula , but

    more especially at Pisa , will bSflfeainful even to his English admirers . Rosini has also rendered great service to Italian literature by his typographical labours with regard to the corrections and variations of the classics . His edition of Tasso , of which only 250 copies were printed , is held in high estimation by literary men in Italy and abroad ; while his three historical romances , La 3 fonaca di Monza , Luis a Strozzt , and Ugolino , with a great number of comedies , essays , and poems , prove the versatility of his genius and the activity of his

    mind . Marekco largely contributed to the formation of a . National Italian Drama , tbc subjects of which all tend to illustrate the History of Italy . Among the more celebrated of his long list of tragedies we may mention liuoyidelmoiite e gli Amcdci , Adelisa , and Pia . His full , energetic , ami passionate style , though wanting in the harmony that , distinguishes Nicolini , hns not the occasional harshness of Alfieri . His life was tranquil , lie was respected by all , and his death is deeply regretted .

    To close this painful enumeration , Rosmixi * loss may be considered as tho gravest for philosophical science , since from the present system of superficial acquirements and light studies ho cannot easily be replaced . Rosmini ' s mind was one of the strongest even among philosophers ; nml to thia power of thought was added a fund of erudition , which he hns copiously infused into all his works . The antagonism of Giobcrti ,

    who in three heavy volumes , entitled Hrrnri

    unjustly suffered Rohmini ' s contributions to niu science of thought to remain unnoticed , as they would oiler a fair criterion of tho actual state ot this branch of learning in the country of Vieo , of Galileo , and of Mucchiavolli . The works oi this author arc very voluminous ( about sixteen vols in royal 4 to . ) , and are tho result of forty years of study . Prominently among these , he-ides tho one nlreiuly mentioned , arc La Filoso / ht < h llu Politica l the rrinn ' pi della Sclvuza Morale , and

    t ; h < 5 Filoso / in del Diritto . Mncnuiay says , that during the gloomy and disastrous centuries which followed the tlowiiliil oi the Roman Kmpiro , Ttaly had preserved , in a iUr greater degree than any other part of WretiM-u Europe , the traces of ancient civilisation . " Tins night which descended on her was tho night of an Arctic Bummer . " Under tlio present unfavourable circumstances , it is remarkable that Italy not only does notshroud herself in tho darkness of nig h ' ,

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), July 14, 1855, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_14071855/page/12/