PERSONAL NOTES FROM LONDON.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVII, Issue 85, 9 April 1906, Page 3

PERSONAL NOTES FROM LONDON.

(From Our Special correspondent.) LONDON, March. 2. vjss Nora Bong, of Wellington, who w been studying singing in. London, first recital on Monday last at Cc&stein Hall, in conjunction with, a forms violinist named Miss Florence Jganunis. It is gratifying to be able +o'record that the -Nest Zealand girl aeatedr a most favourable impression, n"d that; the concert was financially a conspicuous success. Very encouraging' too, were the Press notices which followed the concert, and altogether the -tOUHS Ne"*v Zealander has good reason ia feel satisfied with the success attending her initial effort. Miss Long has . fight dramatic soprano voice of exceptional range, clearness and flexibility,' gad she uses it with sympathy, and intelligence. r A young lady from Australia has just Tfoa'a singing scholarship in London mider novel circumstances. From her colonial home she sent to a. -well-known professor in London a "record" of her voice- with the request that he would test it on a gramophone and inform her -Hiether he thought its qualities sufficiently good to justify her in taking so lons a journey for an examination for a scholarship. The professor listened to the "record."*' wa9 duly impressed ■sfith the possibilities of the voice, and tfrote to say he thought she might try. Encouraged by this report she sailed for Bialand and reached London just- in fine for the examination, and was one of two successful candidates out of one jnmdred and ninety competitors. The Jzdj in question is Miss May Peach, of 1 Sydney, who has carried off one of the tiro open scholarships offered by the Soya! College of Music. Among the -presentations to the "King gt the levee held at Buckingham Palace last Monday was that of Lieutenant P*. 6. Chesney, ot the Royal "Sew Zealand Artillery. The lieutenant's sponsor Tvas H.KJEE- the Duke of Cormaugfet. In-"Ejector-General oi the Forces. Captain Scott Harden, who— spent tome month? in New Zealand last year, liter acting as war correspondent in the Far East, has returned to London. He ias just come from India, where in his capacity as newspaper correspondent he accompanied the Prince and Princess of Wales Throughout the tour. Mr. Neville George, of Auckland, has entered the celebrated Academic Juiien ia Paris, with the intention of remaining a year to study painting in oils and ilaek and white work. He left London for Paris this week. A party of emigrants who left Thirsk (Yorkshire) for New Zealand "in June last have written home in terms of praise of their new surroundings. One eld Thirsk farmer writes back that he is so much in love with the colony that be wishes he had gone there thirty years ago.

Mr. S. Turner, F.R.G.S., the Welsh BOtmtaineer, now on his way back from . Yew Zealand, says in a letter to the ijgfemdon manager of his firm that he re"'gsite the ascent and traversing of Mount Cook as the great achievement of Ms life. He rather hints ,at the possibility of letting it remain as his last mountaineering feat, and of falling back upon the less strenuous excitement of golf.

A young man named Harry Carter, Tic states that he is a New Zealander, and is walking round the world for a wager of £2000, has turned up in iranee. He passed through Dunkirk en Wednesday, and hopes to reach Copenhagen about the end of ApriL People have become somewhat sceptical cj- now about these wagers for round-the-world pedestrianism, but I give his story for what it is worth. Mr. Carter Mt Wellington, New Zealand, on .January 21, 1902. He has visited nearly erery country, with the exception of Belgium, Holland, Germany and Denaiark, and when he has completed his tour he will receive £2000. He mustwalk the whole way, and fe prohibited tram joining any society from which he Sight receive assistance. He can Beither beg, borrow, nor steal. At the start of his pilgrimage he was allowed frepenee, with which he bought four copies of the Wellington " Post," and a s&eket of pins. Having made a costone mth these materials he explained »the people standing by the objects of + and coGecte d sufficient money to buy clothes. He Has frequently ap"?«ared in theatres, and the audiences =are contributed to his expenses. Twice a Paraguay he was shot at, in Mexico ffj 33 laid up with fever, in Russia and larkey he was frequently arrested as a *?y. He walks about "forty miles a %> and has closely examined the eduftwnal systems in the different conntoes. He forwards reports every day g a number of New Zealand journals. ne 13 now wearing his twenty-eighth ?& of boots. He says that the City police and the Royal Irish fn Cotmty Galway are the Sisst-lookrng men he" has seen in the , of his travels.