LONDON TABLE TALK.

Evening Star, Issue 8530, 1 June 1891, Page 4

LONDON TABLE TALK.

[From Or/R Special Correspondent.] London, April 3. A farcical comedy called ' Oar Doctors.' by Sir Randall Roberts and the late Joe Mackay, was produced at Terry's Theatre the other day. It depends for success on one solitary idea, which grows weaker and more attenuated as the play progresses. In order to prosecute a love affair Jack Wentworth, a y3ung artist, pretends to be a medical man. He is called into consultation with real doctors, and endless complications ensue for an hour and a-half. Then the curtain finally descends. When will budding dramatists learn that one idea does not make a play any more than one swallow makes a summer. It cannot be urged that there is no money in 'The Henrietta,' for Mr Bronson Howard s play is all money from end to end. It was produced at the Avenue Theatre on Saturday evening last, and despite much Wall street jargonandmany American jokes, which no one could see the point of, scored an indubitable success. A sketch of the plot of • The Henrietta' will scarcely give a fair idea of the merits of the piece. It is really a very bitter and very telling satire on Stook Exchange gambling, and depends quite as much on wealth of subsidiary incident as on its main story. This narrates a painful experienca in the career of Nicholas Valanstyne, millionaire and financial agent, into whose superb office, with its tapes and telephones, ws are introduced. Mr Valanstyne has a careworn sob who, we learned incidentally, has an embarrassing intrigue, though he is a married man A younger brother, Bertie, is, on the contrary, a vacuous youth with never a soul above his club or the stage door of a burlesque tfeeatre. But he is beloved by a pretty yo ß a 2 protegde of old Valanstyne, Agnes Lockwood by name, and when the apoony young couplfi declare their intention of getting married the soft-hearted financier abuses his idle boy, and presents him with a draft for 500,000d01. In the second act the elder son's victim dies, and sends a packet of letters to his wife ; but they do not reach her hands, for a family physician intercepts them, and hands them to Bertie, who has been made to appear as the culprit by Nicholas, juo. For the sake of his sister-in-law, Bertie acts the part of a hero, and puts the packet in the fire. Nicholas fits is ta bad as his namesake who presides over a certain tropical place, and in the third act he does bis best to ruin his own father, and very nearly succeeds. But a happy accident saves the credit of the firm, and young Nick dies of fceart disease while dreaming of wealth nntold. Eighteen months elapse. Bertie has proved himself a marvellously skilful financier by subjecting his decision on every apec to the gyiations of a coin of the reaim, his moral fams is cleared, his father gair.3 a charming widow, and all ends happily. The close of the third act, when young Valanstyne is killed by the shock of the aews (conveyed to him throygh the telephone) that the Henrietta stock, which h3 had arranged should fall, is rapidly rising, proves highly effective. There no see him lying on the floor of the office, alone and dead, whilst the tape goes on clicking and unwinding its message to his corpse. W. H. Vernon plays the millionaire Valanstyne, and Lewis Waller his wicked son. John L. Shin* is the dude, and Miss Fanny Brough ,a very ; ' Amnrrican" widow, LITERARY NOTES, Neither in Appearance nor contents does Mrs Stannanre so-called new departure, 'Golden Gates,' promise well. Its get-up is common to a degree, whilst for mawkish sentiment of the sickl eat and most unwholesome sort commend me to the editor's storyette 'His Chum's Chum.' The mere idea of healthy lads of eighteen or nineteen ■ehedding gallons of tears over a temporary .separation, and kissing each other like girls or Frenchmen, sends a ehudder down one's back, and will certainly rouse the wrath of virile readers. * Golden Gates' is not likely to have a very long lease of life. The editor of the 'National Observer' is in town, and has been entertaining bis staff at dinner. Whistler was present and in capital form, letting off his verbal fireworks with the ease and dexterity of freqaent practise. It would not be fair to repeat these witticisms, as without the great impressionist's inimitable manner of delivering' them they lose half their point. I imagine, iiowever, some of your readers may know .enough of the writings and peisonality of Mr ' •George Moore to appreciate the delight of; the company when Whistler in his silkiest j tones defined "our English Zola "as "aj hiccough from the Brasserie." Mr George Gissing's * New Grub street' will be published to-morrow, and ' Eight (Mr Riohard Forrest's mutiny story) on the 27th inst.

Mrs Oliphant's memoir of Laurence Oliphant, which promises to be the most interesting work of the Bprjng season, will be published next week by Blackwoods, who also announce a cheap edition of gang's - Life of Lord Iddesleigh. J)r Smiles, whose ' Life of (the first) John Murray' I commended to your notice last mail, is a hale old man of nearly foursoore, bat looking considerably younger. He anight have given himself in ' Self Help,' as an example of the intellect which takes time to mature. Dr Smiles was forty-five when he published his first book ' The Life _>f George Stephenson.' The famous 'Self flelp' he tendered to several publishers fruitlessly. After 'George Stephenson' duoceeded Murray rather doubtfully accepted it. He sold 180,000 copfes in a comparatively short time, and the hook has since heen translated into every known European language. The lady who, under the pseudonym of ««Frank Ddnby," perpetrated 'Dr Phillips' and 'A Babe in Bohemia,' is writing a ««daring" play for ilf Grein's Free and Independent (i.e., easy) Theatre. In ' Her Evil Genius' Mr Frederick Boyle attempts to draw an artist of much the same -elaborately complex character as Mrs Harriaon'aable creation in 'The Wages of Sin.' The plot of ' Her Evil Genius' turns on the old expedient of "ringing-in" an impoßtor on well-meaning folks who are seeking for a long-lost heir. The fourteenth edition of ! Men of the Time,' now called ' Men and Women of the Time,' is greatly enlarged and improvedrr-in fact, to all intents and purposes anew book. A fresh edition has been turned on, and several hundred biographies added. Many colonial celebrities are, however, still wanting. _____________