NEWS BY THE MAIL.

Evening Star, Volume VII, Issue 1957, 13 August 1869, Page 3

NEWS BY THE MAIL.

The suit of Nicols v. Nicols anil Davidson, was decided in the Divorce Court, on May 5. The parties were married on the 10th of January, 1863, hut they had never cohabited. The petitioner charged his wife with adultery ; and the respondent, besides denying the charge, pleaded that her husband had been guilty of neglect and conduct conducing to adultery. The petitioner, Robert Arthur Nicols, was the son of the Rev. Bartholomew Nicols of Mill Hill, in the parish of Hendon, tiutate.respond* nt was the daughter of Henry Horwood, the petitioner’s head gardener. In 1862, it seems that young Nicols, then a mere lad of 20, had become violently enamored of Eliza Horwood. His conduct had not given his father

entire satisfaction, and an attempt which he had made to enter the Civil Service had failed through his inability to pa s the examination. That also did not please his father ; and when the \ oung man expn ssed a wish to emigrate, Mr Nicols at once found him means to go. He accordingly proceeded to Australia. Before he left England, however, he married Eliza at New St. Bancras Church, in the presence of his cousin. Aft r the wedding they put the bride into an omnibus and sent her home. In Australia the petitioner met with very little success. He spent a great portion of his time in what was called “gaining colonial experience,” in other words, working without wages at a sheep station. He also taught pupils, but be did not always get paid for them, and he was reduced to breaking stones on the road. During all the time he was out, however, he kept up an affectionate correspondence with his wife ; and when he had money he sent her share of it. In the meantime she lived at home with her father. Her wedding was kept secret for about a year, and on its becoming known she assumed the style and title of Mrs Robert Nicols. Her husband returned on the 31st July, 1867; but when he arrived he found that she had disappeared with a man named Dawson. She was afterwards found living with the co-respondent at Friern Barnet, and she was on the 2nd December delivered of a child, which she registered as Dawson’s. Dr Tristram said he had no real defence, but suggested that the case was one in which the Court might order some provision to be made for the wife. Lord Penzance, in summing up, however, said that that proposal struck him as a somewhat impudent one. The respondent, when she was married to the petitioner, knew that he would be obliged to leave her, and she could not therefore allege that he had neglected her. She had, in the first instance, married with her eyes open ; she had deliberately cast off her husband, and she had no right whatever to ask him to contribute towards her maintenance. The jury having found for the petitioner, the Court made a decree nisi with costs.