OUR PARIS LETTER

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 19, 23 January 1926, Page 13

OUR PARIS LETTER

ROMAN PRELATES

CARDINAL MERCIER'S VISIT

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

'PA BIS, 2nd December.

Not for a long time have there been so many Eoman prelates in Paris as have assembled this week to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of the Catholic Institute. There are four cardinals; Lucon representing the Pope, Mercier, head of the Catho-,! lie Church in Belgium, Dubois, archbishop of Paris, and Touchet, bishop of Orleans. Ther- are at least forty bishops, and a host of delegates from Oxford, Cambridge, Louvain, Salamanca, Eoine, Cracow, and forty other universities. Cardinal Mercier arrived at the Garo dv Nord shortly after noon yesterday, accompanied by the Bector of Louvain University, and was received by Monsignor EolandGosselirt outside the station. A large' crowd enthusiastically welcomed the aged prelate, who uncovered his acknowledgment of their greetings, although it was raining heavily. WOMEN AND POLITICAL SCIENCE. In these days of feminine emancipation the arid study of political science has mariy female devotees, even among Frenchwomen. No less than thirty have enrolled for the new term at the great Paris school, which prepares diplomats, consuls, counsellors of State, inspectors of finances, colonial administrators, and marine commissioners. Throughout last year there were only fifteen in the school. In 1917 there were five, and iv 1915 two. Before the war the woman student was unknown within its portals. In reply to a query as to what careers his thirty new women students intended to follow, M. d'Eichthal, principal of the school, explained that half of them were foreigners, who hoped to servo their respective countries as ministers, consuls, or ambassador's attachees. The Frenchwomen were preparing themselves for big administrative positions. All of them were ex-' cellent pupils. WOMEN'S NATIONALITY. So many cases of hardship have occurred, both during and after the war. in consequence of the rule that a woman must acquire her husband's nationality, that considerable interest attaches to the debate iiiitho Senate on a Bill which provides that a Frenchwoman marrying a foreigner may still remain French. Tho first condition is that, if she wishes to retain her nationality, she must make a declaration to that effect at the time of the marriage. .Another condition is that such retention is not contrary to the law of her husband's country. A corresponding provision is that a woman of foreign origin marrying a Frenchman may remain under her own flag unless the law of her own country lays it down that a woman must be of the same nationality as her husband. "WHY DON'T WOMEN CRY?" Lytiiane Bernhardt, granddaughter of the famous'tragedienne, contributes to yesterday's " Intransigeant," a curious article in which she asks why women no longer cry at the theatre. She remarks that when her grandmother played Marguerite Gautier, it was quite common to see women spectators with tears streaming down their faces, while men made those grimaces by which the male sex strives to conceal its emotions. Nowadays such signs of sentiment are very rare. One reason may be that women find it dis-, agreeable to go to supper after the theatre with red' noses and swollen eyes. A second reason is that women in general are trying to don the armour of self-control as a protection against life's difficulties by the least sign of weakness, because thoy no longer desire to be protected by, man. The war, while giving them more independence, disclosed a possibility of equality which has made many women impossible. The writer condemns this now feminine fashion of outward indifference and declares that emotion is good for her sex.. i > EXHIBITION LEGACIES. Like tho Universal Exhibition of 1878, which left the Trocadero, and that of 1900, which left the Pont Alexandra 111., the "Decorative Arts" which is now in the throes of dismemberment, haa made a handsome bequest to the metropolis. Besides the floating aquarium attached to the Quai d'Orsay, which is open to the public every afternoon, Monday oxcepted, Parisians; are offered several mementoes of the year's beautiful show. An appeal is being made to the Italian colony to subscribe the funds necessary to erect tho Italian, pavilion of honour elsewhere in the capital, a purchaser is being sought for the pretty Japanese house, and it is hoped to preserve the Indo-Chinc building. A temporary legacy may be the footbridge which flanks the Pont de la Concorde, which is said to be good for the next ten years. . TAXI-DRIVING NOBLEMEN. Of late years the ranks of Paris taxi-drivers have been reinforced considerably by impoverished foreign nobility and intelligentsia. At least two scions of a princely family related to a royal house, and several former Russian noblemen now ply for hire daily in the streets of the capital, and there are also many students who have been obliged to take the wheel to pay their expenses, and who read hard for a degree while waiting for a "fare." The other day an exceedingly busy man was driven about five'miles instead of one. He expostulated with the driver, who apologised for his ignorance of the city, and would not accept more than half the sum registered by his meter. One of the noblemen recruits, without a.doubt. CHANGING A WHEEL. "Come and see my new movable wheel," said the proud owner of a car to a friend,. whom he met at a cafe. "Quite the latest thing. If you have a puncture, you can take your wheel off in a 'jiffy,' and put a now one on directly. The whole thing takes only 90 seconds.'" So saying, he led tho way to the place where he had left his car chained by the wheel to a tree. Tho car was no longer there. Some unscrupulous person, who was also acquainted with the beauties of the now system, had taken; off the chained wheel, fitted the spare one— probably in even less than 90 seconds —and driven off, chuckling in his

sleeve, leaving the original wheel still attached to the tree by the chain. DIE-HARD HATPINS. A Paris newspaper declares that now that women are wearing hats which they pull down over their ears, the notices in tramway 4cars of the city urging them to carry protectors on their hatpins is superannuated. Unfortunately hatpins are not obsolete. They -are still to be seen in Paris every day in tramway oars and out of them, most of them securing hats that were fashionable two decades ago to the grey hairs of stately dames.