CLIPTOMANIA.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVI, Issue 121, 30 May 1885, Page 5

CLIPTOMANIA.

(SrEciALLY Selected hy Ouk Lomju:-;

CoRRESI'ONDEN'T.)

It is said, I hope with truth, that Lord Tennyson is writing a poem on Goneral Gordon, But is it not about timo that tho poem waß written ? If our Poet Laureate does not mako haste he will bo anticipated in America. Lord Tennyson has a splendid subject, and everybody can understand his anxiety to do justice to it. But ho must not, like the Government, be too late.

Sir Edward Malet's wedding at Westminster Abbey was a very swell affair—the biggest thing of the kind since the Duke of Albany's marriage, The brido, who is the Duke of Bedford's pet daughter, had a dot of £150,000 from papa and about £10,000 worth of tho Russell jewels. The ladies' dresses were of the most superb description, and there was a lloral display tho like of which has not been scon for many years. Someone has exorcised a kindly thoughtfulness for the soldiers who aro fighting for us in the parched and arid deserts of the Soudan, in a way that will open up a means of supplying tbem with creature comforts that would do much to make their lot moro pleasant. It is an anonymous gift of 11,000 cigars ; and as the Admiralty havo not thought fit to balk the generous intentions of the donor, they are to be forwarded this week. Here's a chance for the benevolent, and for a diversion of that energy so lavishly employed in supplying the niggers vvith flannel jackets.

A popular edition of the charming " Lottors " of tho beloved and lamented Princess Alice will shortly be published. It will contain much fresh matter, including a detailed account of tho Princess's late illness, by Miss Maclean, who was thon in constant attendance on hor. Tho correspondence will be prefixed by an entirely now memoir of tho Princess, written by Princess Christian, which was originally intended moroly for privato circulation, but tho Queen has decided to havo it published. There is also an account of tbo Princess's wedding, takon from tho Queen's Journal, and other interesting extracts from Her Majesty's privato records. Tho work has boon edited by J'rmcoss Christian, who has beon assisted throughout by Sir Theodore Martin.—" World."

Amongst the little knot of Wall-street millionaires there stands out the figure of a lady who is in her own fair person a most striking and practical argument in favour of w.omen's rights. Mrs Harriet Green commenced lifo with nino millions of dollars bequeathed to hor by her father. The death of an aunt added four millions to her score, and hor own business capacity has done the rest. She has speculated, and never lost. What sho has gained she has accumulated. She has now a fortune of forty million dollars, or about eight million pounds sterling, and her annual income is over a million dollars, or about two hundredthousand pounds. As sho is only forty years of ago, and spends not more than five thousand dollars a year, thore is a bright prospect for her heirs. Mrs Green is the possessor of a husband, but he is a weak vessel in comparision with his better-half. His speculations havo landed him in debt to tho amount of eight hundred thousand dollars.

Tho Duke of Cambridge draw- annually as Colonel of the Regiment of Grenadier Foot Guards the sum of £2,132—a somewhat liberal scale of pay if, as is generally admitted, tho appointment may bo regarded merely as a comfortable sinecure. In addition to this amount, the yearly allowance of his Royal Highness by virtue of his post as Communder-in Chief of the urmy is £4,500, It cannot bo said that tho tuition shows a niggardly or grudging spirit in rewarding the military services—such as they are—of this royal soldier. He figures further in the official Army List as holding the Colonelcies of the 17th Lancers, Royal Artillery, Koyal Engineers, 00th Regiment Royal Rifles, and of the City of London Rifle Volunteer Brigade. How his Royal Highness manages to dovoto time to these multifarious offices must bo a marvel to anyone outside the Horso Guards.

Tho " British Medical Journal " says : — A curious but important caso in which small-pox infection wus convoyed in a letter is recorded by Mr Karkeok, in his recent roport on the sanitary condition of St. Marychurch. On March 1, last yoar, a caso of small-pox was reported to him in tho person of a domestic servant, who had soon no ono ill or recovering from small-pox, und who hud not been out of tho town for months. Moreover, no caso of the disease had occurred in St. Marychurch or Torquay for years, On inquiry, it was found that tho "infected person had received letters from her sister, an inmate of the West Bromwich Small-pox Hospital, " who had unfortunately sent the gorm of the disease in her letter." This case was at once removed to tho Torquay Sanatorium, and tho only person in the household who becamo ill 'mus the recipient and reader of tho letters.

The prices of admission to Loudon theatres have rison cuusidorably of lato years. In the days of Footo and Carrick the critics frequented tho pit at a modest expenditure of a couple of shilling-, or at tbo most half -.-crown. Tho pit has now all but disappeared, to mako room for tho stalls, So long as the leading actors and actresses consider themselves ill-requited if their professional incomo be boloiv the official salary of n Cabinet Minister, there will probably bo no abatement in tho scale of charges at the most popular theatres. Strangers from the provinces and foreigners on a short visit to the capital may not object once in a way to the entrance "prieos, but Londoners find high rutos of udmission a heavy tax on their pursos. Tho performances havo altered in as marked a degree as the charges, Tho time-honoured ono-act farce—so productive of merriment—is unknown to tho present genoration of playgoors. Yet how tho broad humour of " Lend Me Five Shillings or Did you ever send your Wifo to Camberwell':" delighted tho frequenters of the old-fashioned theatres forty years ago.

Professor Simon Newoomb maintains in the new number of the " Illustrated Science Monthly " that Miss Lulu Hurst, tho famous " magnetic girl," whose marvellous lours de fitee have created such a sensation in America, is only a woman who possesses great muscular power. So far from the " rosy country girl" moving heavy objects by merely touching them with her fingertips, he declares that, though she began to touch the object on which she performed with her fingers only, she used the strong palms of her hands to bring about the desired result. Of course, if this is true, the magnetic wondor ceases ; but tho muscular wonder is more marvellous still. A girl who can with one hand lift a chair on which one person sits while tour others hold it down may well draw full houses, if only as a supreme example of the strength that is sometimes possessed by the weakor sox.— " Pall Mall Gazette."

While recapitulating the incidents of the recent ascent of Ben Nevis, tho " Standard " describes the nature of the winter life in the observatory which is situate at the summit of tho mountain. It remarks that " tho mnn who takes by choice to a life above the clouds finds company enough in his own thoughts, and in tho beauties and wonders around him. Ho is an Arctic winterer within an hour or two of heme, an oxile, with the telegraph to put him in touch with the brother men whom for a time he has forsworn. To tho meteorologist in his mountain homo, the wind and the weather, the stars and the moon, the sunlight and aurora, tho tlowers anil the birds, the mist from tho valloy, and the wild scones round which it circles, are companions enough. And by-and-by, when the exilos return to the land of streets and linen shirts, they will, if their minds are cast in the usual mould, feel that there is no soiitudo so appalling, no loneliness so unbearable, as tho solitude of a stranger in a great city." The " coat of mail" which Captain Garstin, of the Oth Bengal Cavalry, from a spear thrust which might have been fatal, makes, a pretty story. We read that he picked up a few strips of chainwork, by chance, in a native shop before leaving India, It occurred to him that they might be useful, and his wifo sewed them here and there in the lining of his jacket. We imagine that tbe idea was not quite so c,,sual as is suggested by a guileless correspondent. Captain Garstin, it may safely be declared, has not gained his rank without hearing a thousand times the arguments and the iliu:.. tratious in favour of chain mail whir,1.-, tire discussed in every Indian barrack, and are heard often enough at an English mess. Pamphlets have been written to urge one application or another of the principal. If we are not mistaken, Colonel Luck, who now comraauda the 15th Hussars, is an enthusiast upon this subject, the more especially siuce he escaped a /earful wound ut Takt-i-pul by the protection of a strip of mail upon tho shoulder. Most officers in India heard of that practical demonstration, and all the wises who heard ponilerc-1 it. Wo would undertake to say that the ma- i joriry of married officers belonging to the I native cavalry are guarded more 0r..-., in vital parts by chainwork stitched in their ■ clothes by loving hands. Very many of the i sowar.-: arc thus defended also, and native -ilicors, commissioned or non-commissioticd, wear an epaulet which the keenest tulwar' will not dama v.'c.

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