I saw John Mullaly the other day passin’ down Broadway, faultlessly dressed as usual, looking as if he had come out of a bandbox. I remember on one occasion how Mullaly had his shirt front completely spoiled by a woman, and yet through no fault of his own–a victim to a mistake. That eccentric woman, Lola Montez, features in the story, which is a rather interestin’ one.
Lola had, as usual, got herself into trouble. She was always in in hot water, and had, this time, gone to law about the matter. The papers had been laid before a referee, and Lola had gone to the referee’s office about the case.
That queer duck of a chap, Wemyss Jobson, was somehow or other mixed up in the affair, and altogether there was quite a tempest in a teapot about it. Seeley, a lawyer, was also concerned in the case, partly representin’ Lola’s interests in the matter.
Well, Lola, Jobson and Seeley were all gathered together in the referee’s office, and John Mullaly happened to be in the referee’s office at the time, although he had nothin’ whatever to do with this particular case in any manner, shape or form. During the course of the interview at the referee’s office, Lola got very much excited, gesticulated violently and talked loud, woman-like. Jobson also got a little more “unhinged” than usual, and the referee had all he could do to keep ‘em quiet. At last, Seeley, the lawyer, got into the fuss and was pretty nearly as mad as the other two.
Pretty soon Seeley said somethin’ that Jobson thought was meant as an insult to him. Jobson, at this, completely lost his temper, and went for Seeley with a big cane he was carryin’. If Jobson had been able to carry out his original intention of hittin’ Seeley on the head with this cane, the farce would have turned into a tragedy, and there would have been a dead lawyer. But Seeley caught the cane before it descended on him, turned it aside, and kicked at Jobson.
Of course there was a scene of confusion, and of course Lola was bound to take part in it. She, of course, took the part of her lawyer, Seeley, and seein’ him fightin’ with Jobson, came to his rescue with the only thing that was handy for her–a big inkstand.
Seizin’ the inkstand, full of ink, she hurled it, with all her force, at Jobson’s head. If it had hit Jobson on the head it would have done as much harm to him probably as Jobson’s cane would have done Seeley. But just as Jobson’s cane missed Seeley, so Lola’s inkstand missed Jobson altogether, and whizzin’ past him hit poor John Mullaly right on his brand-new shirt front.
The shock of the inkstand nearly floored Mullaly, and the ink in it completely soaked into and spoiled his shirt-front. He was mad enough to have pitched in and licked all three, especially Lola–which he could have done, I guess, as he is pretty “solid”–but bein’ always a gentleman, he restrained himself, cleaned up as quick as possible, and went home and put on a fresh shirt. The referee was as mad almost as Mullaly was, but he had a better chance to get even with the three fighters than Mullaly had. He reprimanded Lola very severely, and made her apologize. Then he had Seeley and Jobson both punished with two days’ imprisonment for contempt of court.
Jobson swore it was all Seeley’s fault, and Seeley swore it was all Jobson’s fault. So to make a sure thing of it, and to show no partiality, the referee punished ‘em both.
Seeley had quite a nice two days of it in jail. Lola called to see him every day, and brought him flowers, which he didn’t much care for, and a bottle of wine, to which he took more kindly. But poor Jobson was very lonely, and had no visitors, no flowers, no wine, no cards, nothin’ at all.
Lola Montez was a most eccentric and peculiar woman. But there was another adventuress and actress who used to flourish around New York, who was just as peculiar and much more attractive. I mean Adah Isaacs Menken, who was once called “Everybody’s Wife.” She herself didn’t object to the title.
Menken, when in New York, knew almost every actor, and rounder, and sport, and newspaper man in town. Among others she used to be quite intimate with James Connor, an actor, who had somethin’ to do with the old Melodeon. This place was formally kept by Frank Rivers, who made a good deal of money out of it, and spent it all. It was first the old Chinese Assembly Rooms, and wound up by bein’ Tony Pastor’s Theatre.
At this time Menken only claimed havin’ had three husbands, Dr. Menken and Kneass, (the author of the music of Thos. Dunn’s English popular song, “Ben Bolt,”) bein’ two of ‘em. She was a little “under a cloud” at the time, and lived in a little room way up in the sky parlor of a buildin’ corner of Spring street and Broadway. Here she was visited day and night by lots of Bohemians.
She was the jolliest kind of a good-hearted woman, and was a splendid talker, not only in respect to quantity of words–all women are splendid that way–but in respect to quality. She put more soul into an average hundred words than most women put into a thousand.
One time there was a young married man who got completely “mashed” on Menken, just like dozens of others, married and single, bachelors and widowers. Menken, for a wonder, didn’t encourage him, but the man kept on with his mash, nevertheless; like a good many other men, he encouraged himself.
One afternoon the young married man called on Menken in her room on Spring street, and while he was there a young lady called to see if she couldn’t engage a room on the upper floor of the buildin’ for herself for a few days. The janitress of the buildin’ said she had just the very room to suit her, and let the young lady upstairs to look at it.
But, instead of lookin’ at the room shown her, the young lady listened to some voices talkin’ in an adjoinin’ room, and, before the janitress could interfere, the young lady had opened the door of that adjoinin’ room and there discovered her husband with his arm around Menken’s waist, who was smokin’ a cigarette and listening to the usual quantity of mush and gush.
It only took about half a minute for the young wife to grab about a handful of Menken’s hair, and it only took about half a minute more for Menken to retaliate in kind. Each woman tugged with all her might at the other woman’s head; and if they had only, as most women have, lots of false hair, each would have got all that the other had to spare. But Menken had fine hair of her own–so had the young wife–and all they could do was to tug at each other’s wool with all their souls and spite in their fingers, while the young married man did what he could to part ‘em, which was just nothin’ at all, and the janitress rushed downstairs dazed, yellin’ out such cheerful and quietin’ words as” “Murder! Fire! Police!”
These words soon got a crowd together, and a policeman rushed to the buildin’. The janitress led him upstairs, where by this time the young husband, who was the cause of all this row, had locked the room door so as to keep out any outsiders, while he vainly tried to restore peace inside. But he might as well have tried to stop a case of the jim-jams with soothing syrup, for the more he begged his wife to “keep cool,” “be calm,” “listen to reason,” “be sensible,” and all that, with which most husbands are totally familiar, the more she would tug at Menken’s hair and the more Menken would tug back at hers.
In the midst of this tug-tuggin’ the policeman rapped at the door, but the woman kept on tuggin’ and the man kept tryin’ to quiet ‘em. Then the policeman burst the door open and took the whole party to the Fourteenth Ward station house, where old John Williamson was captain.
Even after bein’ arrested the two women didn’t stop fightin’. Going downstairs the wife got a chance at Menken’s back hair, and availed herself of it, and Menken, whose mad was now up, nearly scratched the other woman’s eyes out on the stairs.
By the time the party had got to the station house, however, they had got a little cool down, and both women bein’ quite good-lookin’ and Menken being very well known, the matter was made up, after a fashion, only the young married man never got any more chance to call on strange ladies in the afternoons. His wife always called at the office about four o’clock and took him home with her.
With all her little faults and big follies, Menken was a real clever and generous woman. In some points she was the most brilliant woman that has ever flashed through New York, and there is this one thing that can be said about Menken, all the big men she met took a fancy to her. Bulwer, Dickens, Dumas and men of that stamp made the world of her. It was only the New York Bohemian that borrowed her money and then abused her in the papers.
[Editor’s notes: John Mullaly (1835-1915) was a newspaperman, who began his career with Horace Greeley’s New York Tribune, then moved on to the New York Evening Post and New York Herald. An Irish Catholic, Mullaly was against the Union Army Draft during the Civil War, instigating New York’s Draft Riots (for racist reasons). A Tammany Hall Democrat, Mullaly was responsible for developing a park system for the Bronx after much of the borough was annexed by New York City.
David Wemyss-Jobson was definitely a “queer duck.” He was a historian, dentist and physician of dubious credentials who traveled frequently. Upon arrival in a locale, Wemyss-Jobson usual sought out the highest authorities, either with a complaint demanding remedy; or an offer to volunteer his talents. He died in 1876, with a characteristic note from the Buffalo Weekly Courier:]
