Liberty - Saturday, April 20, 1895

I find in one of the leading Paris newspapers ("Le Journal," April 5) a report in the proceedings of the libel case of Oscar Wilde against the Marquis of Queensberry which contains startling revelations that for some strange reason have not appeared in any American or English newspaper within my knowledge. The report states that Mr. Carson, counsel for the marquis, read in court a letter by the marquis to his father-in-law in which this phrase occurs: Oscar Wilde a montré qu’il était un lâche et le dernier de ces misérable du type de Lord Rosebery. This, of course, is the Paris journal’s French rendering of the passage. I regret that I do not know the original English phrase, and so can give only a retranslation of the French, as follows: "Oscar Wilde has shown himself a coward, and the last of those wretches of the type of Lord Rosebery." It is further stated that this letter caused a great sensation in court, which was then intensified by the reading of a second letter in which Lord Rosebery’s name is mentioned in a similar connection. Now, the only meaning which under the circumstances can be drawn from the passage quoted is that the Marquis of Queensberry charges the prime minister of England with an offence like that with which he charges Oscar Wilde. At once several questions arise. Why has this most sensational feature of the court proceedings been suppressed in the American newspapers? It is scarcely conceivable that a paper like the New York "World" would not have made the most of such a piece of news. Is it possible that the British government, of which Lord Rosebery is the head, supervised the cable dispatches, and the newspaper got its report by letter? It would seem so; and yet there has now been ample time for a letter to reach this country also. I see no adequate explanation of this mystery. Again: what does not Lord Rosebery bring suit against the Marquis of Queensberry, as Oscar Wilde did? The acquittal of the marquis in the libel case brought by Wilde lends additional strength to any similar charge which he may make against others. Why does not the prime minister clear himself from suspicion? And, if he declines to do so, why is he not lodged in jail with Oscar Wilde? It is this last consideration which prompts me to print this paragraph. The private habits of Lord Rosebery and Oscar Wilde are properly no concern of mine or of the public. Their alleged offences are not of an invasive character, and therefore are not rightly punishable by the courts. But when one man charged with this offence occupies a prison cell and another similarly charged occupies the highest official place in England, it is proper that attention should be called to the abominable anomaly. Small wonder that Lord Rosebery has been suffering from serious insomnia lately, if he has been living in fear of this exposure.