TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 12866, 26 July 1907, Page 6

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

An amusing young Artistic Kissing, woman who writes

in "Pearson's" on "Kisses in Art" reveals some terrible secrets. Who would have imagined the charming poee so admired in "Wedded," and the pretty child-court-ship of "Little Lovers Kissing," were evolved in an atmosphere of hatred, malice, and all uncharitnbleness ? It seems that young models, asked to take such ultra-sentimental attitudes, usually develop a profound dislike for one another, and glower like savages instead of exchanging gentle looks. A Dutch painter working at a rustic scene where two peasant lovers kissed in the moonlight had to engago half a dozen couples one after the other, and then could only make artistic use of their "more lucid moments." Children told to kiss in posing are worse still. With the engaging unconventionality of childhood, "they often fall to screaming and biting instead." Bougereau found his first littlo modols, who suited so nicely as to hands and figures, turned into littlo demons when the lip pose was required; and tho kiss waited through anxious days until he could secure a more amenable young pair. Yet we are assured thnt in art, as on the stage, no more than a semblance is necessary. "The models are merely asked to,go through tho motion of kissing—the painter docs the rest by imagination." That kiss pictures are rare may be a relief to sympathetic minds. The worst time for models, perhaps, was during tho South African war, when domestic pathos required sentimental parting scenes; and, as Shakespeare's Helena instructs us, "strangers and foee do sever and not kiss." But oven then the studios that valued peace at home did as much as possible with the lay figure; brokenhearted farewells being sobbed over its inoffensive form more dramatically than could ever bo counted upon when two actual persons were in tho case. Only mother and child can bo depended upon in a kissing tableau. They make perfect models, fall into the desired situation as by nature, and look delightful in it. Unlike the professionals, doomed to tender attitudes, they never breathe a sigh too much, or find a kiss too long. Mr H. W. Lucy, spendMemories ing the week-end in of' Surrey, motored over Winchester, to Winchester to sec the old college, and sends some entertaining gossip to the "Sydney Morning Herald" about his visit. Eton and Harrow ore young compared to Wincht-ster, which goes back 500 years, and some of the arrangements for Wykehamists are as severely simple as they were in its earliest days. For dinner the long oak tables have no cloth, and for every boy is set a wooden platter for his bread, and a mug. At tho foot of the table stands a liig iron-bound oaken chost. After every meal, tho remains from

the dishes are thrown into this, and afterwards distributed to tho poor of the town. But some roughnesses have been smoothed away. An Oxford don with the party, who had been to Winchester sixty years before, gave an amusing account of the meagre bathing facilities in his day. There were ten boys in a room, three of whom were fags, and only one toe-pan, as the footbath was called. The fags had to prepare a hot foot-bath every morning, each senior having one "bath" per week. Consequently the fags had to go without a bath, or use the scarcely pellucid contents of their masters' toepans. This weekly washing of feet was tho only form of bathing which stately Winchester authorised or provided for its young gentleni'en. In the summer the boys bathed in the river, but from October to May neither masters nor boys had a bath. The reputation of the English for "tubbing" must be quite modern. But the toe-pan had other uses. Plum-puddings were made in it at dead of night. One night a master paid a surprise visit, and tho cheery bubbling of tho water was not drowned by the sudden and loud chorus of snores. The master ordered the oldest boy to bring "that thing" down to the courtyard, and loft the room. At tho cost of scalded hands the boys immediately got the pudding out of its cloth, and put in its place soaked handkerchiefs and stockings. When they took the "pudding" down to the courtyard they were ordered to throw it down. The bundle came down with such a forco that tho fastenings were undone, and tho contents displayed. "Go to bed," said the master, and went off to his own. It wes Mr Gladstone, if we Chinese remember rightly, who Traite. said that the colonies feared the Chinaman more for hie virtues than his vices. The Liberal louder no doubt had a wonderful capacity for work in hie mind as the principal virtue. But if the Shanghai correspondent of the New York "Evening Post" is to be believed, this industry is not a natural trait, hut ie forced upon tho Chinaman by the hovero struggle for existence in his native land. Tho Chinaman ie naturally kzy, and if it were not for this necessity to work hard for what he eats, he would bo indolent and shiftloss. So soon as ho makes enough to koep him for tho rest of hie life, ho is content to stop work at once. Should a father become rich he lets his sone como home and live with him in idleness The Chinese who am see.i working day and night in foreign lands, fl.ro merely scraping up enough to go back to China and livo a lazy life for the rest ot their diye. But the correspondent hae much to say in praise of the Chinaman. His stolidity, which ia constantly remarked on, is simply duo to self-control; beneath the mask lies a very emotional nature. He is scrupulously honest, loves his family bettor than himeelf, and is extremely loyal to hie friends. "Hie literature, if it were but known, teems with tho highest 6ort ol poetic ideals and feelings." It is rather significant that for centuries there were no policemen in China. Tho policeman has come of recent years, with the advent of "civilisation." The correspondent ha%eomo hard words to cay about the conduct of foreigners towards the Chinese in Chine. "Shanghai belongs to the Powers by right of treaty, it ie an international city, but the stranger is at once struck with the fact that the overy-day foreigners hero are overbearing in their treatment of tho nativee. They eeem to forget that Shanghai is an integral part of China after all, and that the Chinese have some rights. A Chinese, perhaps a wealthy, respectable one, will bo loitering along a narrow sidewalk, totally inattentive to his surroundings, a poetic theme perhaps running through hie brain, when along comes a foreigner with a don't-disturb-me, l-am-of-the-favoured-races air, and abruptly pushes the Chinese off the walk without c word. The Chinese does not say a word, but he looks, and maybe another recruit is added to one of the many 'antiforeign' societies. Such occurrences may be noted dozens of times a day on Shanghai's streets." Nothing would be loet by a little courtesy.