SOCIAL GOSSIP

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 32, 8 February 1915, Page 9

SOCIAL GOSSIP

FIFTY YEARS AGO. A "fashionable wedding" is much the same in one generation as in another. The modern reader may recognise familiar notes in the following report, headed " Marriage in High Life," in tho Evening Post of 2nd October. 1865 :— "This morning, at St. Paul's Church, Thorndon, by the Right Reverend Lord Bishop, James Alexander Robertson Menzies, Esq., M.D., late Superintendent of Southland, was married to Letitia Ann, second daughter of his Honour Isaac Earl Featherston, Superintendent of Wellington. The church was decorated with flowers and evergreens for the occasion, and long before the hour appointed for the ceremony it was thronged with ladies and gentlemen, the former predominating,- while outside the church a great many people had assembled. The bridal party arrived at half-past 11, and children dressed in white preceded them from the door to the altar, scattering flowers as they went. The bridesmaids were Miss Bathgate, Miss Johnson, Miss Riddiford, and the Misses Feathersfron. W. H. Levin, Esq., was groomsman. The bride was dressed in white glace silk, trimmed with swansdown. She wore a lighti wreath of orange blossoms, with a tulle fall extending to the ground, and a j bouquet composed of orange blossoms and jessamine. The Misses Featherston were dressed in white tarletan, trimmed with violet ruche. Each one had orange blossoms in her hair, and a bow of tulle extending to the skirt, and used bouquets of violet flowers. The materials of the other ladies' dresses were the same, but instead of violet they were trimmed with peagreen ruche, which formed a pretty contrast. The groomsman was dressed in gray trOwsers, with black coat and waistcoat. When the ceremony ended the people spread themselves down the avenue leading from the church and along the street to pay their respects io Mrs. Menzies, many of whom will long remember the kindness, courtesy, and attention shown them by Miss L. A. Featherston. The vessels in the harbour were covered with bunting in honour of the event, and from all parts of the city evidences of the great respect and esteem in which Dr. Featherston and his family are held were seen. It is said that Dr. and Mrs. Menzies will leave for Southland by the Ahuriri this evening. They will take with them the best wishes of thousands, and the prayer that Mrs. Menzies s new home may be a* happy as the one she is now leaving." A STRIKE OF BACHELORS. "A Marseilles paper states that no less than 6000 men, from the ages of twenty to forty, had met in the space of ground called the Belle de Mai, and there and then took a solemn oath to abjure matrimony till a new order of things is inaugurated— that is, a radical change takes place in the habits and customs of young ladies. They demand the complete abolition of showy and extravagant toilettes; also that expensive idleness should no longer exist. On the contrary, they require an immediate return to habits of economy and of housekeeping ; in fact they insist on an education which will train true mothers and quietly-conducted wives. — Evening Post, 10th October, 1865. MUSIC AND DRAMA. "The Choral Society's conceit was well attended last night and gave great satisfaction ; the proficiency of the members showed that they must have paid great attention to their studies, and, on the whole, the concert was a wellmerited success. The overture by the band was beautifully executed, and a solo on the violin by one of the members of the band was played exquisitely, and with such fineness of expression, that the talented performer was vociferously encored. There can be no doubt but' that the members of the society have greatly improved since their last performance, and have gained more confidence in themselves."— Evening Post, 28th April, 1865. "The members of the 'New Zealand Civil Service Dramatic Club ' announce their first performance for Friday, sth May, under the patronage of the Hon. Mr. Mantell, W. Gisborne and Alfred Domett, Eeqs. The club will, wo have no doubt, be most liberally patronised, as they have generously come forward in aid of a fund for the relief of destitute persons in Wellington. The comic drama of ' The Wonderful Woman ' will be fol. lowed by the laughable farce of ' Your Life's in Danger.' " — Evening Post, 29th April, 1865. HALF-TOWN, HALF- VILLAGE. An Aucklander, who visited Wellington in 1865. made this comment: — "My first impressions of Wellington are on the whole pleasant. Stretching along the shore- of the lake-like harbour, it has. a Clean and healthy though not metropolis.

tan, look about it — more like some of the I half-town, half-fishing villages we find in the Home country than the capital of New Zealand. After the bustle and business of Auckland, it seems to wear a sleepy-hollow air about it ; even in the principal business street, everything i goes on in a jog-trot way, and the shops, with a very few exceptions, have a quiet old-fashioned look about them, more suggestive of slow and sure dealing, on a email scale, than of energy and enterI ptise."