The Evening Journal - Saturday, May 18, 1895
This report was originally published in English. Machine translations may be available in other languages.
Echoes from London.
[BY OXONIAN.]
London, April 12.
The most dramatic trial of the past twenty years ended, as all the world knows, by the arrest of the principal figure. On the third morning of the Queensberry trial Mr. Oscar Wilde's nerve broke down. He reached the Old Bailey in the morning just as Mr. Carson was opening the speech for the defence. The counsel was commencing a catalogue of miserable things done long ago and ill done. Sir Edward Clarke asked leave to confer with him, and in less than a minute the bubble of bravado, aphorism, and impudence had burst. Mr. Oscar Wilde, through the medium of his counsel, was willing that a verdict should be given in favour of Lord Queensberry. The Judge very properly insisted that this could only be arrived at by the Jury being directed to find that the publication of the libel was not only true in substance and in fact, but that it was also for the public benefit. Amid the cheers of an excited audience, cheers of which the Judge took no notice, Lord Queensberry left the dock and rejoined his friends. Mr. Wilde, after his hurried consultation with Sir Edward Clarke, spent some hours in conference with "friends." He then proceeded to his Bank and drew out a large sum of money. He was evidently about to leave the country. A warrant was applied for in the afternoon, and in the evening he was arrested and taken to Bow-street. He is now remanded in custody, and will no doubt take his trial at the Central Criminal Court in a few weeks time. He has two plays running at the present time - "An Ideal Husband" and "The Importance of Being Earnest." The Manager of the St. James's announced that he was not going to withdraw the play, but that the name of its author would no longer appear on the bills or the programmes. Why on earth this should be I cannot understand, and every one must admire Mr. Sydney Grundy for putting into words what every sensible and unprejudiced person must be thinking of this farcical business. "I wonder," says he, "on what principle of law, or justice, or common sense, or good manners, or Christian charity an author's name is blotted from his work? If a man is not to be credited with what he has done well, by what right is he to be punished for what he has done ill?"
The most dramatic trial of the past twenty years ended, as all the world knows, by the arrest of the principal figure. On the third morning of the Queensberry trial Mr. Oscar Wilde's nerve broke down. He reached the Old Bailey in the morning just as Mr. Carson was opening the speech for the defence. The counsel was commencing a catalogue of miserable things done long ago and ill done. Sir Edward Clarke asked leave to confer with him, and in less than a minute the bubble of bravado, aphorism, and impudence had burst. Mr. Oscar Wilde, through the medium of his counsel, was willing that a verdict should be given in favour of Lord Queensberry. The Judge very properly insisted that this could only be arrived at by the Jury being directed to find that the publication of the libel was not only true in substance and in fact, but that it was also for the public benefit. Amid the cheers of an exalted audience, cheers of which the Judge took no notice, Lord Queensberry left the dock and rejoined his friends. Mr. Wilde, after his hurried consultation with Sir Edward Clarke, spent some hours in conference with "friends." He then proceeded to his Bank and drew out a large sum of money. He was evidently about to leave the country. A warrant was applied for in the afternoon, and in the evening he was arrested and taken to Bow-street. He is now remanded in custody, and will no doubt take his trial at the Central Criminal Court in a few weeks time. He has two plays running at the present time — "An Ideal Husband" and "The Importance of Being Earnest." The Manager of the St. James's announced that he was not going to withdraw the play, but that the name of its author would no longer appear on the bills or the programmes. Why on earth this should be I cannot understand, and every one must admire Mr. Sydney Grundy for putting into words what every sensible and unprejudiced person must be thinking of this farcical busiuess. "I wonder," says he, "on what principle of law or justice, or common sense, or good manners, or Christian charity an author's name is blotted from his work? If a man is not to be credited with what he has done well, by what right is he to be punished for what he has done ill?"