TABLE TALK.

Evening Star, Issue 8084, 7 December 1889, Page 1 (Supplement)

TABLE TALK.

LOCIAL, THEATRICAL, AND LITERARY. [From Our Special Correspondent.! London, October 18. The breach between the Duke of Edinburgh and his English relatives concerning tho Princess Louise of Wales's marriage with Lord Fife is the moat serious there has been in the Royal Family for years, and (for the time being at any rate) quite beyond patching up. To be perfectly fair (which the majority of Englishmen are not in con- "| sidnring such matters) there is a good deal to be said for the Duke's side of tho question. Like Prince Consort His Royal Highness feels strongly that English princes and princesses ought not to marry out of the blood royal. Where they have done so (he avers) great inconvenience (occasionally even disaster) has invariably resulted. Take the two so-called mesalliaii'es in the Queen's own family. Princess Beatrice's union witli Prince Henry of Battenberg and Lord Lome's with the Princess Louise can scarcely be said to havo turned out ideally. Royalties don't know the moaning of " all for love and the world well lost." Princess Louise was certainly ready to marry Lord Lome, but she shrunk from taking his rank and name, and recently tho morbid pride begot by her unsatisfactory social position absolutely led her to prevent her husband from accepting a sphere of great usefulness and promise in Victoria. Battenberg is a fool, and probably cares too much for creature comforts to gird seriously at the the ignominious circumstances of his life. Few sclf-reapecting men would, however, from all accounts, be able to tolerate what he does. the charge against lord galloway. It being found impossible to altogether burk the disgraceful charge against Lord Galloway, the Premier's brother-in-law was on Friday last duly charged at Dumfries with improperly assaulting Annie Gibson on tho Lockerbie road, Glenbrae, on the 3rd nit. The Sheriff-Substitute hoard the case, assisted by a local jury, and the accused sat in the dock between two constables. He appeared to be a very Bhaky, eccentric, and frowsy elderly person, and the request of his brother to be allowed to sit bc3ide him was judiciously complied with. Tho prosecution relied chiefly on the evidence of the little victim herself and of her playmates—all young children. This was clear enough, but there seemed to be just a loophole that the Earl was merely committing an imbecile folly and had no evil intent. He certainly, it was allowed, scemrd in no way disconcerted by the arriv.il of strangers nor by their angry comments. On tho contrary, the old man asked the interrupters grandly if tboy knew who he was, and apparently expected them en learning to apologise and leave him. A long day was devoted to the inquiry, and at last the jury found a sort ot "not proven" verdict —viz., that the Earl's conduct might (just conceivably) have been consistent with an innocent intent. musical notes. The attractions of ' D.iria' at the Lyric Theatre are beginning to wane, and it is probable that Mr Leslie's next production, Messrs Stephens and Solomon's ' Red Hussar,' will be forthcoming about Christmas Eve. This, the redoubtable Teddy's friends declare, promises to be a big hit and contains the Ixst melodies he has written since ' Billee Taylor.' Two things arc known about the new Savoy opera, viz., that Hawcs Craven is painting a lovely set of the Place of St. Marks at Venice for the first act, and that a famous costumier has in hand a number of Chinese dresses, How to reconcile these two apparently irreconcileable facts is puzzling the cognoscenti finely. Miss Fanny Leslie gave a guinea for the ' Topical Cookery Book ' song she sings in ' Dick Turpin.' An hour after she had firit warbled it a music publisher offered LSO for the copyrieht. Next morning she could have got LIOO for it, and now twice that amount wouldn't buy out her interests in the lyric. Tho Leeds Festival was a great succees, barring tho illness of Madame Alivinia Valleria, which all but necessitated tho abandonment of Mackenzie's cantata ' The Sword of Argautyr.' The postponement was decided on, and the Committee had even resolved to substitute Sullivan's ' Golden Legend,' when Madame Valleria pluckily announced sho would do her best. The prima donna duly appeared, and the cantata was performed, but she broke down badly, and is now very ill. THE LONDON MUSIC HALLS. Mr M'Dougall, whose reformatory efforts in connection with the London music hallu have called forth such howls of execration from 'Arry and 'Arriet, must not be confused with Mr "Greater Juryman" M'Dougall, of theMaybrick agnation. No two men could possibly be less alike. Mr Greater Juryman M'Dougall is simply a hair-brained fanatic and notoriety-hunter, whereas Mr County Councillor M'Dougall bears the reputation of being a particularly hard-headed, plucky Scotchman. His sin against the public seems chiefly that, having been selected by his brother county undertake certain highly unpleasant duties (duties which should never have come within the Council's province at all), he has fulfilled them with honesty and impartiality. I have heard most of tho songs at the chief London halls the decency of which he questioned, and in every instance I believe his protest to have been justified. Mr M'Dougall has been grossly lampooned and sneered at, but tho practical effect of his (or rather the County Council's) movement will be the banishment of indecency from the variety stage. As a matter of fact, a great change has come over the character of the entertainments at the London music halls during the last few years. In the old days, when Leybourne and Vance, Rickards and Arthur Lloyd were, excellence, the stars of the profession, tho best places at the "Pav.," the Canterbury, and[the " Eyal," in 'Olborn, cost Is Gd apiece, and songs filled the greater portion of each evening's programme. The opening of the Alhambra and the Empire as music halls, and tho reconstruction of the Pavilion and the Royal, altered this. Ballets at the two firstnamed houses, and clever gymnasts and acrobats at the others, took singers' places. Tho best seats went up to 5s apiece, and married men, finding there was only occasional vulgarity in tho programme, began to take their wives (or other fellows' wives) to tho Empire or to "a private box at the Pav." on the sly. One may even now have to endure a good deal of objectionable vulgarity at a London music hali, but between vulgarity and indecency thero is a broad, distinct line (as Mr M'Dougall himself pointed out), and in future the latter will be strictly barred. DRAMATIC notes. For revising 'The Dead Heart' Irving gave Walter Herries Pollock L3OO, or just doublo what poor Watts Phillips received from Webster for the original production. It transpires, by the way, that the once popular dramatist has a son, Gordon Watts Phillips, living in Australia, who is something of a dabbler in literature. The new opera which succeeds ' Paul Jones' at the Prince of Wales Theatre goes into rehearsal this week. Paolo Tosti is understood to be the composer and some new man the librettist. Miss Huntingon ' will be prima donna, and the " mashiDg "

tenor handsome "Tottio" Coffin, joins the company as first malo singer. Both Miss Wadman and Phyllis Broughtou will of course have good parts. Tosti has just returned from his honeymoon, having three weeks ago unexpectedly espoused the mature Madame Baldi. Tunr TALK. The "talent" (as backers sarcastically style themselves) had a bad meeting at Newmarket last week. The little races wont almost without exception to outsiders, and for tho Cesarewitch tho majority stood Ingram. Signorina's Middle Park Plate and a Nursery or two on Thursday and Friday were the sole saving clauses. It is lucky for the owners of Surufoot and Heanino tint Chevalier Gunstrclli's filly is not in the Derby. Sho has, however, engagements in tho One Thousand, Oaks, and Grand Priz '. of Paris, and unless Semolina grows or Riviera improves vastly, looks like carrying oil tho two first, anyhow. Ayrshire and Minting both wound up their turf careers with a defeat in'the Cham pion Stakes. The Duke of Portland would not have run the former last Thursday had ho conceived such a catastrophe possible ; but with Antibes, a non-stayer, and Gold, a rogue of the worst class, there did not seem much danger. By way of an experiment Gold was ridden by tho stable lad who looks after him in his training gallops and ran unexpectedly generously. Being wide of Antibu3 at the finish, it looked to many as if the filly had won, but the judge gave Gold the race by a head. THE RINGMASTER SCANDAL. Unless Mr J. E. Savill moderatos his extreme cleverness it is not improbable that before long he will find himself in collision with the Jockey Club authorities. There were loud murmurings after Pangmaster's runaway victory in the Cambridgeshire Trial Plate at Newmarket last week, and it was openly stated that had the horse's owner been one of tho much-abused professional backers he would have then and there been " carpeted." The cause of the growling was the incompatibility of Ringmaster's form at Newmarket with his form at Nottingham the previous week. At_ the latter meeting, in the Autumn Handicap, though nicely weighted, and tipped for tho event by nearly every newspaper in the three kingdoms, the horse ran extraordinarily badly. The public backed it, but the stable seemed apathetic, and the general impression was that Ringmaster had probably gone off. Great, therefore, was the surprise at Newmarket a week later when no sooner had the numbers gono up for the Cambridgeshire Trial than Mr _ Savill's horse was rushod to the position of favorite, and the market skinned of every available farthing by the stable connections. So thoroughly was this done that long before the start most of the Ring had closed their volumes and refused to lay the favorite at any price. Mr Savill put his own stable lad Turner up, and very badly he rode. Nevertheless, in the Abingdon dip Ringmaster had everything beaten and won in a cantor by thrco lengths. In addition to the money got on at Newmarket, a large starting-price commission was successfully worked in London and Manchester, the gains of the stable amounting to nearly L 12.000. Numerous good judges are now of opinion that had Ringmaster been saved after his first two races for tho Cesarewitch Mr Savill's horse would have got in at 7st and won as easily as Primrose Day did. LITERARY NOTES. Bentlcy's annual programme of now works of general interest to be published during October and November is not as attractive as usual. 'Sala's Autobiography,' advertised "nearly ready " three yours ago in the same list, is still conspicuous by absence; but we are promised an additional and final volume of tho veteran Thomas Adolphus Trollope'd Recollections, which were so successful two winters ago, and a somewhat belated memoir of Edward Askew Sothern (" Lord Dundreary "), by T. Edgar Pembcrton. This last ought to give us some of the famous good stories of poor Sothern, who was one of the most brilliant talkers, as well as one of tho most incorrigible practical jokers of his time. Amongst tho more serious of Bentloy's works may be mentioned ' The Correspondence of Princess Lieven and Earl Grey,' translated by Guy LeStrangc, and Mrs Julian Marshall's 'Life and Letters of Mary Shelluy,' and amongst promising books of travel Mr W. 11. Mallock's 'ln an Enchanted Isle,' an account of a visit to Cyprus in 18S9, Miss Betham Edwards's ' The Roof of France,'and another of Mr Hissey's ' Diaries of Coaching Expeditions in England,' this time through the Eastern Counties. Bentley also announces new editions of ' Lord Dundonald's Autobiography,' and 'Gustave Freytag's Reminiscences,' and cheap reissues of George M'Donald's version of the gloomy ' Letters from Hell' and of Henry Enroll's highly successful story 'An Ugly Duckling,' which ran through no fewer than six editions in the three-volume form.

Mr E. B. Kennedy, author of 'Four Years in Queensland,' has turned his experiences of tho "Never Never Land" to account in an exciting story book (suitable alike for boys and juvenile grown-ups) called ' Blacks and Bushrangers,' which is effectively illUßtrated by Stanley Berkeloy, and published in a smart cover by Sampson Low at 53.

The new issues of Low's standard novels at 2s (or in red cloth at 2s Cd) include Blackmore's 'Clara Vaughan' (not ono of this author's best books), Oliver Wendell Holmcs'a littlo known 'Guardian Angel' (a sequel to ' Elsie Venncr'), and a volume of short tales from tho Magazines, by Mrs Walford, called ' Her Great Idea.' Since that unsophisticated child of Nature Amelio Rives started the school of torrid sensualism in America there has been quite a run on works of the same suggestive sort as * The Quick and the Dead.' One of the last of these is a startling production called ' And After Dsath,' by E. H. Cahil!, which is Eelling enormously in New York just now. Roughly, it is tho story of a young and lovely girl, tho daughter of an habitual gambler and an immoral actress, who is courted and won by a man to whom she devotes every emotion of her existence helplessly and willingly. Haviug satiated his passion for her, the lover tires of his mistress and marries another innocent girl, to whom he grows genuinely attached. This naturally does not suit heroine number one, and sho resolves by hook or by crook to bring her lover back to his allegiance. How by tho most persistent and malignant determination the unhappy girl achieves this end, and how her triumph is clouded and spoiled by the fumes of the drug by which sho has tried to deaden her despair, is told in tho most approved Amelie Rives fashion. The book has a cleverness of an unwholesome hot-houso sort, but 'its general effect can scarcely be aught but deletciious.

'Stepuiak.' tho Russian Nihilist whose works on ' Underground Russia' and ' The Russian Storm Cloud' are well-known, is just about producing a novel called 'The Career of a Nihilist,' which will be published next week at 255, by Walter Scott. The initial volume of the now 'Contemporary Sciencs Saries' will be 'The Evolution of Sex,' by Patrick Geddes and J. Arthur Thomson.

Amongst rising litterateurs of tho "goodygoody" school must be mentioned Mr Frederick Langbridgo (brother of the late Mr Langbridge, of Auckland), whose ballads of the 'Sent Back by the Angels' sort run " Dagonet's" more robust compositions very close with "popular reciters." Mr Langbridge is now editing a new series, storicß with a moral, called theO.U.R. books. Odo of the first will bo by Grant Allen, and is called «The Jaws of Death.' It deals with life in tho Wild West of America. Mr Allen has also a volume of stray papers collected from the magazines on the stocks. Messrs M'Clure (the American Tillotsons) havo offered to provide Rider Haggard with LI ,000 travelling expenses in order that he may thoroughly explore the scene of the semi-biblical story on the subject of ' Queen Esther,' which he has undertaken to write for their syndicate in 1892. They hope by advertising and whatnot to make Haggard's 'Esther' as big a "boom" as Wallace's 'Ben-Hur,' which has the largest and steadiest sale of any book in the States. Max O'Rell's next work—if his brochures can be dignified by such a title—will be a continuation of 'Drat the Boys,' called ' John Bull, Junior.' Percy Fitzgerald is writing the thrilling history of that great, erudite, and never-to-be- understood work 'Bradshaw's Guide.' It ought to prove a rich treat. An illustrated daily paper (with process

illustrations well up to date) will be issued from the offices of the 'Graphic' early next year. The staff has already been provisionally ougaged.