LONDON TABLE TALK.

Evening Star, Issue 8808, 25 April 1892, Page 4

LONDON TABLE TALK.

(From Our Special Correspondent.]

London, February 26, OSCAR WILDE'S PLAY.

Society ia exacting in dealing with its adventurers, and if Mr Oaoar Wilde had been merely the popturing piece of affectation he seemed during the aesthetic craze of ten yean back he would long ago havo been suppressed aud ignored. But Mr Wilde has as select a circle of acquaintances to-day as he had then. This, too, though he is married, aud has grown fat and fl*bby. The truth is Oacar understands his world and how to humtfr it. As a conversationalist be has perhaps half a dozen rivals (including his Mtc noire Whistler) in London. He can talk lightly, brightly, seriously, or brilliantly, with equal ease, and his presence at a small dinner party of ten or twelve ensures its sucoesa. Of course Oscar has moods. It would never do to bo too reliable. Hia hostess always feels uncertain whether her gue3t will come looking fat, heavy, and dyspeptic, and bit mumchance through the night, or whether his mots will make her evening talked of far and wide.

Oscar's play, produoed at the St. James's last Saturday, ia principally remarkable for its sparkling and for some da ing I caricatures of "the very best peqple." There is scarcely an untitled individual in the cast, and the argot of smart society has been accurately reproduced. Verbally 4 Lady Windermere's Fan' outrivals even Pineio'a * The Times.' I wish I could remember half the good things in it. The plot, however, can only be described as conventional. Lord and Lady Windermere are a happy young couple untill Lord Windermere evinces a sudden and surprising partiality for tho company of a smart adventuiess, Mrs Erlynne, whom he Deems inexplicably anxious to introduce amongst tho very best people Margaret (Lady Windermere) is annoyed by the gosbip of her frieuda concerning this woman, and disgusted to find from her huaband'a bank book that he is giving her I large Bums of money. Instead, however, of j being confuaed when she taxes him with hia perfidy, Lord Windermere smiles, and insists on Mra Erlynne being invited to their coming ball. Liidy Windermere refuses this outrageous request, threatening, if she comes, to strike the woman in the face with her feather fau. Mrs Erlynne, looking, as ona of the guests sayp, like "an edition de luxe of Bomo wicked French novel," duly appears at tho Windermere ball, and shocks everyono by her behaviour, driving pcor Margaret distraught with jealousy. In a paroxysm of temper the latter seeks tho rooms aud the protection of an ex-lover, Lord Darlingtor. Mrs Erlynne discovers this al.nost immediately, and we then have the explanation of Lord Windermere's scandalous conduct. Mr-? Erlynne is Margaret's mother, whem the believes a Baint in Heaven. Really, Mra E, ran away from Margaret'd father, wa3 divorced, remarried, aod widowed, and ia now struggling back to her original social atatut. Lord Windermere has promised to help her in society, but only ou condition she respects his wife's cherished ideals. On discovering Margaret's flight, Mrs Erlynne, horrified, follows her to Lord Darlington's room*, and, after an exciting scene, manages to rescue her before the peer diecovira her arrival. Unfortunately, she is trapped herEelf, and, to her horror, Lady Windermere's fun lies on the table. From behind a screen Mrs Erlynne sees a party of bocn i onmpanions, including Winderm< re, arrive. Her resolve ia taken. She reveals heraelf, and claims the fan which she says she brought away from Windermere House by mhtako. Of course tho widow promptly loses Windermere's respect aud help, but she saves Margaret. Tne last act deals with the reconciliation of Margaret and Mrs Eilynne, and the dismay of Lord Windermere thereat, He dreads the latter revealicg herself, but the adventures! koep3 the secret, and goes abroad, ttking with her as a memento of her indiscreet child Lady Windermere's fan. The play abounds with witty eayings, bright epigrams, and quaint phrases. Many of these are really clever. Excellent, for instance, is the suggestion that "a cynic is a man who knows the price of everything and ho valuo of nothing." The statements fiat "expsrience is the name men give to their mistakes" (surely this ought to hive been Baid before); that " tho devotion of a married woman is a thing of which no married man knows anything"; and that "life contains two tragedies—the one getting what you want, the other not getting it," are very characteristic of Mr Wilde'a dialogue. Mrs Erylynne ("the lady with a past, several pasts, I ehould s>y,' remarks the Duchess of Berwick) baa many giod things to say, " I am twenty-nine," site remark.", frankly, " where they use pink lamp shades; on other occasions I conf cbs to thirty "; while later on she exclaims: "Repentance in a woman means recourse to a seoond-olass milliner." The pbilanthropio Duchess of Borwiok refers to some girl friends as "dear creatures, very plain, but so good. They make flannel petticoats, and all sorts of ugly things—for the poor, don't you know ?"

LITBRARV NOTES. It is seldom the same month produces two volume 3 of short stories of such exceptional merit aB Mr Morley Roberta's' King Billy of Ballarat' and Mr Ambrose Bierce's 'ln the Midjsb of Life.' Of the former, whioh I warmly commended to your readers' notice laßt mail, no more need be said now than that some of the ablest reviewers confirm my judgment. The price and get up of the volume are against it, but nevertheless the •Bookman's' City correspondent gives 'King Billy* as one of the fictions he is Belling best. 'ln the Midst of Life' consists of a lot of tiles of battle, murder, and sudden death by an American. They are mostly laid during the Civil War, and ghastly is a feeble word to describe the majority by, For example, the first story —' The Horseman in the Sky '—relates the manner in whioh a young soldier fighting on the Federal side finds himself fined by duty to Bhoot his own father, a Confederate scout. The lai is lying in ambush guarding a secret pass, when the Federal scout on horseback appears, and in another moment will discover the Confederate's all-important secret. His father's parting words, " Whatever happens boy, do your duty," rang in his ears. He fires, but at the ''horse, not the man." The beast, whioh stands poised on the edge of a preoipioe, leaps into space. " At that moment," says the author, "a Federal officer many thousands of feet below looked up the gigantic face of the rook and saw;an astonishing eight— a man on horseback riding down into the valley through air. Straight upright sat the rider, a strong clutch on the reins to hold his oharger from too impetuous a plunge, From

his bare head hie long hair streamed upward, waving like a plume. The horse's motions were those of a wild gallop, bat even as the offioer looked they ceased; with all the legs thrown sharply forward as in the act of alighting from a leap. Bat this was a flight. Filled with amazement and terror, the offioet's legs failed him. Almost at the same instant he heard a crashing sound in the trees—a sound that died without an echo, and all was Btill." 'An Ooourrenoe at Owl Creek Bridge' desoribes the sensations of Peyton Farqubar during the few seoonda preceding his being hanged as a spy and his body dropped into the Alabama at Owl Greek Bridge. If you can reoall the sensations of a man killed by a shell in Tolstoi's 'Sebastopol' you will understand the sort of experienoe this story details,

The 'Coup de Grace' describes how Captain Madwell, oroasing a recent battlefield at night amidst the dead, comes upon the still breathing body of his friend Caffal Halorow. The latter, besides being badly wounded, has been disembowelled by the swine which are rooting about and mutilating the corpses. Cuffal signs to Madwell to kill him. What is the latter to do ? Help there seems none within hail, and if Madwell stirs from the spot to try and get some, the pigs will—well, finish their work. Madwell works himself up to putting a revolver in his chum's ear and—pulling the trigger. It snaps. "Captain Madwell rose to his feet and drew his sword from the scabbard. He passed his Sogers along the edge from hilt to point. He held it out straight before him as if to test his nerve. There was no visible tremor of the blade ; the ray of bleak skylight it reflected was steady and true. He stooped and with his left hand tore away the dying man's shirt, and rose and placed the point of the sword over the heart. This time he did not withdraw his eyes. Grasping the hilt with both hands he thrust downward with all his strength and weight, The blade sank into the man's body; through his body into the earth. Captain Madwell oame near falling forward on his work. The dying man drew up his knees, and at tho same time threw his right arm acroßs his breast and grasped the steel so tightly that tho knuckles of the hand visibly whitened, At the same moment three men stepped silently forward from behind the clump of young trees which had concealed their approaoh. Two were hoapital attendants, and oarried a stretcher. The third was the dead man's brother and Mad well's bitterest enemy, Major Creede Halcrow." He had (the reader assumes, but is not definitely told) witnessed Madwell's act, and would use it against him. The three tales I have mentioned are very fair specimens of Mr Bierce's grisly fiotion, 'la the Midst of Death' is published by Chattos at 4s 6d, and got up (not unintentionally) like Kipling's ' Life's Handicap.' Sir Charle'a Dilke's and Mr Spencer Wilkinson's ' Imperial Defence' is really no more than a pamphlet containing " copy " to the expense of perhaps three or four short magazine articles. Smith Elder announce a six-shilling edition of Couan Doyle's 'White Company' (which somo reviewers dubbed " a second " * Ivanhoe,'but which I considered very washy stuff'), and two-Bhilling reprints of Gissing'a •Thyrza' and ' New Grub Street' (both, as you know, admirable works), and ' The Rajah's Heir' and • Eight Days.' The seoret of the authorship of ' The Rajah's Heir' has been unusually well kept. It should sell well at 2s.

Heinemarm's Bpring announcements include Mr Charles Lowe's (Berlin correspondent of 'The Times') 'Life of Prince Bismarck,' Mr Joaeph Pennell'a ' The Jew at Home,' a library edition of ' Heine' in six vo'umes (translated by Charles G. Leland), Buchanan's ' Come Live with Me and Bo My Love,' and Maarten Maarten's 1 Question of Taste' in the Crown series.