LITRARY GOSSIP

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22551, 5 November 1938, Page 20

LITRARY GOSSIP

Mr Hector BolithVs -story, told" in his new book, of Queeri-Victoria singing "Dear Little Buttercup" (from "Pinafore") at the age of 65 is very unexpected, says the "At Random" columnist of the "Observer," for Her Majesty did not care for Gilbert, and his humour was hardly of the type to appeal to her. She did not like fun to be made of her Ministers (including Mr W. H. Smith) or her Court, or her institutions. In her mind she probably classed him.with Mr Chamberlain as a wicked Republican. It is not without significance that while Sullivan was knighted in 1883, Gilbert had to wait for another 24 years.

The search for John Bunyan's silver tankard is over. A letter from the "Saturday Review '_ of'" Literature": '■-,"••■•" :. •. ": The Banyan Tankard Sir:-»-The whereabouts of this relic of the "Dreamer of Bedford" is now 1 established, and I have photographs of I would like to thank you and all who have helped me to locate the Tankard. Frank Mott Harrison. Hove, England. * A friend wrote to ask George Santayana which of his books a lady who greatly admired him should read.. He answered with a postcard: If the lady is hard-minded: "Some Turns of Thought in Modern Philosophy," "The Genteel Tradition at v%l» °L "Scepticism- and Animal M /..Put. *if she be -wtffaaindeor? ,£ la , on i sm : and -the Spiritual Life," •Dialogues -in Limbo," in England,-"'or;'/Poems.** '.' •"•-;: ■..*:*■■■%" He:~ added that even■<'when, these. fountains run dry she need not despair, for by that time he would have written something more..

Great difficulties will beset-' anj| future biographer of R. D. Black* more, the author of "Lorna'Doone"; for his diaries are to be burned. For years they were guarded by bis niece, Mrs Adalgisa Pinto-Leite, who lived in the house the author built at Teddington. She died in February; and destruction of the diarie* is ordered in'her will. i Mrs Augustus Pinto-Leite, her. sister-in-law, said recently: "Adal* gisa and her elder sister, Eva, were: like daughters to Richard Blackmore. They lived with him all their lives,, and we have the desk he used when writing •Lorna Doone.' Eva, who died many years ago, was the heroine of The Maid of Sker,' which was Richard Blackmore's favourite among all the books he wrote." Mrs Adalgisa Pinto-Leite left £ 13,712. She gave to Exeter College, Oxford, the manuscript of "Cripp* the Carrier." To the British Museum she* left all manuscripts of other books by Richard Blackmore, witfc the exception of "Lorna Doone," which was sold for a large sum of money in America. A hundred pounds is left on trust for the upkeep of Blackmore's grave at Teddington Cemetery.

Mrs Kipling, widow of Rudyard Kipling, has presented to the parish church of Burwash an altar frontal made by the Warham Guild from some of the hangings with which Westminster Abbey was draped last year for the Coronation of the King and Queen. The-librarian of the Canterbury Public Library reports that several excellent novels have been received during the last week. These include "Spella Ho," by H. E. Bates, and B. G. Hutchinson's "Testament,** Mazo de la Roche's of a Man" should' also «be noted. '"* ,«an-fiction accessions include fc My Crjcketwig Days." by Don Bradman, a ■ new- edition of Hitler's "My Struggle,' John Eglington's 'lrish Literary Portraits," and G. G. Coultons "Inquisition and Liberty."