TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 13098, 24 April 1908, Page 6

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

The latest lightning calColoured culator is a pretty Greek Figures, girl from the lonian

Islands, who has been- astonishing Paris savants. She combines with tho ability to calculate with great rapidity, an astonishing memory. Tbe two gifts often go together. Gladstone, whoso memory was prodigious, oould add up four columns of figures simultaneously. This girl does not hoar numbers sounding in her ear, as another calculator does, but possesses tho strange faculty of seeing numbers coloured. Every figure and every letter of the alphabet suggest a certain colour to her. Sho told the Paris correspondent of the 'Pall MaU Gazette" that his name suggested smoked grey to her, because the first letter was D, and 1> always suggested that colour to her, the name taking its colour from that of its first letter. In the mind of this extrasordinary young person, A is glasswhite, B is tho colour of a cigar, C ia biscuit colour, and so on for every letter. Tho sign ois white, 1 is black, 2 bright yellow, 3 old strawberry, 4 dark chestnut, o old blue, 6 yellow, but darker than 2, 7 marine blue, 8 pearl grey, and 9 soot colour. Here is a ray of hope for these unfortunato people who cannot do mathematics. To such people mathematics are distinctly drab all over, and if tho faculty could be developed of seeing problems thiough a haze of bright colours, how much more pleasant examinations would be! As an instance of the girl's memory, the correspondent describes her facilo handling of the following square of figures:—

6 8 9 10 4 3 2 15 754 S 9 16 7 4 2 327 8 3 After looking intently at them for half a minute, the girl was able to repeat their sequence "in every direction, in vertical or parallel columns, as a "hollow square," or diagonally. Sho was also able, at will, to chase one square from her mind, memorise anothor, and then revert to the first. Her remarkable gifts aro also possessed by her mother, and her brothers and sisters.

Tlie dramatisation of novels Plays is one of tho most ourious and aspects of the modern EngNovols. lish stage. With all the

infinite variety of real life around dramatists and managers, what reason is there, asks one critic, for the presentation on the stage of a novel like "Krcnstadt," by Mjxx Pemborton ? Tbe tendency is more and more to go to the novel for material, in apito of failures! The accomplished critic of tlie "Westminster Gazette" finds that in the first two months of 1908 there were thirteen new productions at West End theatres, and of these six were adaptations from books, and of the six failures four wero versions of novels. One can understand Mr Pemberton dramatising his own novel, but why should Mr R. C. Carton, who has done excellent original work—including tho clever "Mr Hopkinson," played here—stoop to adapt Mr J. C. Snaith's novel "Lady Barbarity"? It is voted a capital play of its class, but that so capable a dramatist should stepfather it is ominous. There is a strong temptation to adapt. A large mass of readymade advertisement exists! and the dramatist is saved the trouble of thinking out plot and character development. But th© "Westminsters" critic points out that the proportion of failures in adaptations is higher than in original works. The methods of the dramatist and the novelist are quite different. The adaptor generally assumes—witness the adaptation of "The Virginian"—that the general public is well acquainted with the novel, and that they will fill in what ho leaves out. Masses of explanations have to be jettisoned, characters drawn by hundreds of fine touches, have to be pourtrayod on tlie sta©o by a few (bold strokes, other characters havo to disappear altogether. It may bo permissible to leave out much in adapting a bad novel, but tho trouble is that what is left out in the case of a good novel is precisely what distinguishes it from the bad. "The atmosphere vanishes; secondary charactors, often the most pleasing, have to be eliminated or rendered shadowy; thrilling incidents must be cut for want of space, and what is left is almost inevitably the bare bones of the book, which never, however, really constitute anything like a complete skeleton." In short, there is hardly a case in which the play has not borne to the novel the relation of a crude black-and-white copy to a picture.

The education of th© Paris Mind policeman is causing some and amusement. The proMatter, gressive Prefect of Police

is determined that not only shall his men be handsome and of splendid physique, but that they shall also speak three languages besides their own, English, German, and Spanish—th© third for South Americans who come to Paris with overflowing purses. Th© teaching of English is in the hands, or head, of a slim Irish girl, Miss Whitley. Any of her pupils could carry her away with one hand, but they stand in tremendous awe of her. She treats these big, awkward men just like schoolboys, and has them in terrified subjection. They get on well with her, but they feel iihey must be as good as gold, or "Heaven knows what will happen." "No. 3, pay attention," raps out the teacher, and No. 3, who was dozing, starts up guiltily, ''his pinK bland face a picture of agony." "I hear whispering over there," says Mit-s Whitley sternly, ■ailenco! You are to work, not play," and a man at tho end of th© row sits bolt upright, and tho silenoo becomes profound. No. 14 will insist on addressing the teacher as "thou." "No one ever uses the second person singular in English." she retorts severely, 'except in poetry and saying prayers—stand up, plea.se —so you, No. 14, need not trouble, as you will never write poetry or pray with the passers-by. Sit down.'' And No. 14 sits down with burning cheeks. It is an interesting instance of the complete triumph of jirind over matter. It was expected that in a few weeks the men would be abl© to understand tho British tourist if h©

asked his way slowly and clearly. But when they havo learned theee languages, the Prefect will have to improve their knowledge of their own, for some amusing specimens of French as she is written by Paris policemen aro preserved at th© Prefecture of Polioe. They occur in reports drawn up by «.alous constables wittf a taste for eocpressive language. One asserted that tbo body of a man who had suffered severely in a fight was certified by the doctor as covered with "esquimaux," by which ho would no doubt mean "occhyinoses," or bruises. A third, in reporting an automobile accident, stated: "The injured man, having both feet crushed, cannot write." One of tho most remarkable statements was to the effect that a man rushed at the Belfort Lion (a well-known monument), '•which was quite drunk." When they learn to avoid those mistakes, they wiil be paragons indeed.