JOHN STRANGE WINTER.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 7416, 13 July 1895, Page 6 (Supplement)

JOHN STRANGE WINTER.

There are few people, even in London, who have a gift of drawing about them a circle made up of men and women who have ' done something,' and who, without conspicuous talent in themselves, contrive to harmonize the heterogeneous elements that go to make up a salon where the lions must roar, if they do roar, in amicable chorus, and neither the fur of masculine vanity nor the fine feathers of feminine conceit are rubbed or ruffled the wrong way. There are such houses, however, and at one of them I found myself among a lot of people whose names we all know, whose pictures we love, whose poems ring in our ears, and whose books we read, and sometimes read over again. Women were well represented both in art and literature, but there was one woman who received so much attention, and who accepted it with such a happy mixture of the ease born of good nature and unconsciousness, that she attracted my attention.

' That,' said a friend, in response to my enquiring glance, 'is one of the most popular novelists in England, Mrs Arthur Stannard, better known to you as Jo_n Strange Winter, and tho black-haired, handsome fellow who just brought her a glass of sherry is her husband, whoso name was familiar, when he served with the late General Gordon, in his profession as civil engineer.' Later I had an opportunity of talking to tho author of ' Booties' Baby,' ' Mignon _ Husband,' ' That Imp,' ' Mrs Bob,' ' Houp-la !' and a score of other charmimg stories, which have gone through 1 don't know how many editions and given us such true glimpses of military life. Buskin said : 'We owe to her the most finished and faithful rendering ever yet given of the British soldier'—a tribute worth having, indeed.

Mrs Stannard has a good head, large and well developed, pleasing features, though the chin would be too heavy and determined for a woman were it not for the smiling mouth and eyes above. She has the fine white teeth, the clear voice, and delightful enunciation that seem to be tho birthright of well-bred English women, but her chief attraction lies in the expression, as frank and cordial as her manner is simple and sincere.—Correspondent.