ABOUT NOTABILITIES.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVII, Issue 67, 18 March 1916, Page 21

ABOUT NOTABILITIES.

j TTitig George's sister, Queen Maud of J Norway, has many accomplishments. 1 She has maetexed Norwegian perfectly, t writes charming verses, and is an adept at wood-carving. . Mr. Lloyd George admits that he is : always up and at work soon after 6 o'clock; Sir Hiram Maxim goes one better, and rises at 5; Sir Herbert Tree suggests that we should shake off ' slumber at 6 and breakfast at 7, but does not say that he practises what he preaches. Lord Kitchener is tnown in the Army as "Hawkeye," although to the outside world he is usually known as "K. of K." Lord Charles Beresford is "Buck-'em-up," the late General Gatacre was always ! called "Backaeher," General Hutton is "Curly Hutton," -while the late Lord Roberts was not only "Bobs," but was also familiarly called "Little Freddy." Sir John Anderson, G.CJM.G., X.C.8., has been appointed Governor and Com-mander-in-Chief of the island of Ceylon and ite dependencies. He became a firstclass clerk in 1896, and principal clerk the following year, when also he was secretary to the Conference of Colonial Premiers, and again in 1902. He afterwards went with the then Prince of Wales on his colonial tour, and from 1904 to 1911 he -was Governor of the Straits Settlements and High Commissioner of the Malay States. He is fiftyeight years of age. j The correspondent of the "Paris 'Journal" at Valona had an audience of King Peter of Serbia before his departure for Italy. King Peter said: "I am no longer King, but General Toptani, the name which wil! mark my incognito. I give no more orders. It is the Crown Prints who commands. Henceforward I em nothing in the Government. A soldier hag only to obey. My soldiers are falling with hunger and fatigue, and , it is necessary to revictual them with all haste. Then they must have a few weeks' rest, and we shall see afterwards what will happen. ... I must continue to live in order to take part in the My people must triumph, because our cause is just." j The elevation of Mr. W. W. Actor to the peerage is a reminder that George 111. conferred a baronetcy upon an American, William PeppcrelL One of the richest and most influential subjects of New England, Pepperell was loyal to the Old Country on the outbreak of the American Revolution, and lost everything. He went to England, and in 1774 the "Farmer King" created him a haronet. Sir William Pepperell died in 1816, and his title became extinct, but he left daughters, the eldest of whom married the Rev. H. Hutton, one of the old family of Hutton Hall, Penrith. The Key. H. and Mrs. Hutton's eldest daughter became the wife of the Rev. William Walford, of Hatfield Place, Essex, and a son was Mr. Edward Walford, M.A., of Balliol, Oxford, the compiler of that handy work of reference, "Walford's County Families."

Dr. Cuthbert Christy, traveller, explorer, and authority on deeping sickness, has returned to England after tJiree i years epent in the Congo on behalf of the Belgian Government. In a portion of the Ituri he is said to have discovered a small tribe not hitherto known to ■whites. Dr. Christy is the assistant lecturer in the school of tropical medicine at Liverpool. He was a member of the first Commission sent to Uganda in 1902, and 6ince tfhat time has spent yeare in travel and study in various parts of Africa. Among hie well-known booke are "The Epidemology and Etiology of Sleeping Sickness in Equatorial East Africa," and "The African Rubber Industry and Funturnia Hastica." For recreation he turns to shooting, fishing, ornithology, and general field natural history. Lady Nina Ogilvie Grant, who now becomes Counteee of Seafield in her own right, on the death of her father, who hae died of wounds, will only receive £4,000 a year and a residence with her title. Of course, being only a child of nine years, ehe will be with her mother, the widowed Countess, who k a native of New Zealand. The -will of the kite Countess, who inherited all the estates from her son, the eighth earl, ■was devked so as gradually to pay off the mortgages and eventually restore splendour of -rent-roll to the title. By the time the little lady upon whom Iher father's Scotch honours have devolved becomes of age, she will be much better off, ac a good deal, if not all, of the j charges will have been settled, and there I will doubtless he accumulations. Her uncle, Mr. Trevor <3rant, who inherited his brother's English peerage, becomes Lord Strathspey, and takes the seat in the House* of Lords of, the late Earl, who eat only as c baron of Great Britain. Future Earls , ' of Seafield, unless granted another English. Pf etage, will be Scotch peers only. S^ One of the most memorable of the many speeches made by the late Mr. Keir Hardie was perhaps the one which he delivered before the Union in the epring of 1900. At that time the Boer War wae in progress, and it was I thought by many of .the members to be a risky experiment t# invite so outspoken 'a pacifist and Socialist to declare his views in Oxford before an audience of undergraduates. But the president of that term. B. C. & Ensor, of Ballio, was himself a man of advanced political views, and the Union has always maintained » fine tradition of toleration in rte debates. So the firebrand was invited, and came to eupport a resolution in favour of peace. A great crowd gathered, and it is not too much to say that the Onion had one of the greatest surprises in ite long history. Instead of the mere demagogue theyhad imagined, there advanced to the table a fine-fea-tured man with the aspect of a Covenanter. He epoke in the manner of an inspired evangelist, picturing the risks run by working men in their daily toil and urging bis hearer* to remember_that such men were in no need of wars to rouse their courage.

One the last day of 1915 there w*e a coming-of-age wihich, in ordinary circumstances, would have attracted a great deal of attention, foT the Earl of Dalkeith, heir to all the titles and acres of the Dukedom of Buecleuch, wae horn on December 30, 1894. In his veins, saye a writer in the "Sheffield Telegraph," is some of the prondeet blood of Scotland. One marriage brought to tie bouse the Dukedom of Queensberry and th« blood of the Douglas. Another •■with the heiress of the Dnkea of Montagu increased the family possessione enormously, and the connection is recalled in the palace in Whitehall, which » the last of the great riverside family mansions, the rest of which have been turned into Government offices. Society will be interested to ccc what bride the yonng eoldier "will choose. The traditions in tire family are all for aristocratic nnions, and every Ducheae (since the title was created has been daughter of * peer. The present DucJroee was daughter of the late Lord Bradford.