LONDON TABLE TALK.

Evening Star, Issue 9859, 22 November 1895, Page 4

LONDON TABLE TALK.

[From Our Special Correspondent.]

London, September 25,

OSCAR AGAIN. The first chapter of the ‘ Atonement of Oscar Wilde’ was written at tho Bankruptcy Court on Tuesday, when the unhappy convict’s solicitor announced that, partly by a subscription raised amongst friends and partly by royalties obtained from his books and plavs, the creditors would be paid in full. The fallen apostle was brought to Carey street from H.M.’s Prison at Wandsworth to undergo his public examination, but this torture had to be postponed. Those who saw him were much shocked. The whining, cowed, “ whipped dog ” manner which comes from degrading associations and poor food was painfully conspicuous. He humbly implored ihe warders not to let anyone get a glimpscof him, and when (wearing handcuff's) he was smuggled into the prison van hung his head, looking neither to right nor left. Nevertheless, I incline to predict the world has not heard the last of Wilde. Though pale and thin, he is quite well, and this drastic discipline should prove his intellectual salvation. Who will dare to say that the genius which, despite grossness and sensuality, managed to make itself felt in the days of his shameless prosperity may not shine forth presently lambent and purified ? The very magnitude of the task of achieving rehabilitation is not unlikely to lend tho effort attraction in this wayward but brilliant man’s mind.

THE CHRONIG DUMPS OF AGRICULTURE. The Duke of Devonshire’s much-discussed speech to British farmers and agriculturists gives mild voice to a feeling widely prevalent amongst men whose vision and common sense have not been destroyed by political bias. 'Phis is why the chronic groans and irrepressible grumbles of the distressed agriculturists are much louder than they have any right to bo, and that many of their troubles, when inquired into dispassionately, prove due to personal shiftlessness and perfectly remediable. A writer in one of the September magazines, dilates on this subject, showing by means of figures, prices, etc., that the farmer of to-day is not really worse off— when he cares to work —than his predecessor in the flourishing forties. Bub what business would pay well conducted after the manner that the grand old Tory farmer conducts his. Two or three times a week he leaves the farm aud his laborers lo take care of themselves whilst he goes to market. This sometimes means business, but it always signifies a 2 1 0.1 ordinary at the best hotel and three or four goes of whisky, uot to mention a symposium iu the smoking room, with outcries against the Government of the day for not taxing Australian meat and New Zealand butter. The fact is the farmer is thoroughly unpractical and unbusinesslike. When times are bad it is his idea the Government can and ought to mend them. If, like the Duke of Devonshire, a Minister won’t make impossible promises and will tell unpleasant truths, they just turn aud rend him.

3 Well, you ask, what did His Grace say ? ; I can’t quote the speech, or even make , extracts. It would take too much space, but the following, briefly summed up, are the plain truths he propounded:—“ The Government have no power, and will not be so foolish as to attempt, to upset the necessary process of economical laws. Landowners cannot afford to let their land, with i all the burdens attached to it, without f receiving a fair rent. If fair rent is not ; forthcoming they must sell their property, 1 or so much of it as they do not choose to , farm for themselves, and the other farmers i must look after their own interests under t new landlords. Most of the land might, ) and should, be worked for more profitably i than it is now, but that is a business - for individual enterprise not for the 3 Government —to attend to. Farmers who i want to thrive must do it by their own , energy, and by cultivating their own wits. : So with the laborers. By all means let - them get as high wages as they can earn, s but they must not look for higher wages than their employers are able to pay them, - and they must make proper use of those : wages if they want to prosper. State i pensions are a good thing to aim at, and the day may come when every working man, • in the factory as well as in the field, will > every week set apart out of his earnings , such a sum that the State, taking charge of it, can turn it into a pension which will : provide for his maintenance in sickness or i old age. But that time is not yet. It 1 must be waited for, and prepared for by ’ alow steps. Meanwhile, let us all, whether i landowners, or farmers, or laborers, take to heart the grand old truth that Providence only helps those who help themselves.” That is the way men of my thinking read the president of the Council’s speech, and we thank him for it, though friends are disappointed and foes angry. “There has,” comments the sensible and widely - read ‘ Referee,’ “ been more than enough illusion and delusion of late as to the functions of the State in its catering for the community. To expect the State to find for its constituents more land, more food, more money, more of any of the neccssariis and luxuries of life than the community in the aggregate possesses or fa 3 means to produce is preposterous and a pe [ nicious Socialistic craze, all the more obnoxious because it obtains some support from the traditions of an effete feudalism, and is zealously fostered by some selfish demagogues for their own advantage. The State, of course, with an honest and strong Government as its pivot or machinist or mouthpiece, can do much for us. It can see that real wrongs are really righted. It can see that no individual, whether great 1 indowner ir great capitalist or reckless speculator, springing from the lowest or from the loftiest ranks, has more than his due share of the common stock of wealth and comfort. It can protect the helpless and assist those able to help themselves. It can, for instance, encourage trade and promote colonisation. The numberless threads of our social activity can be prevented by it from getting into hopeless tangles, and can be woven fnto more or less durable and serviceable fabric. But for that to be done we need a well-ordered State and a Government fit to order it aright. Will the present Government do that for us? Or, rather, seeing that Rome cannot be built in a day, and that the best reforms are those most cautiously and gradually worked out, will it start us on a career of national progress, as a change from the national degradation with which we have been more than threatened for some years past ? If so, we may indeed be grateful to it.” .MANIA OR WICKEDNESS. The verdict in the Coombes case has excited much discussion, the general feeling seeming to be that, mad or sane, it would have benefited the community -to hang the miserable young matricide. Mr Justice Kennedy did not conceal his belief that the boy was mentally sound in the ordinary sense of the term. His Lordship simply thought Robert Coombes innately bad, cruel, and without a scintilla of natural affection. The prison doctor and medical experts, on the other hand, pronounce him a wellmarked case of homicidal mania, declare he was bound to kill someone soon, and predict he will follow the usual course of such cases, and die raving mad in afewyears. The prison doctor, indeed, considered Coombes grew palpably worse whilst awaiting trial, and was not lattered by His Lordship’s insinuation that he clever young blackguard had hoaxed him. Naturally one would prefer to believe the doctor’s rather than the judge’s dictum. The ‘DailyChronicle,’ however,does neither. There is no reliance to be placed in Mr Massingham’s view of things. Oftener than not, owing to the vanity which at all hazards , strains after originality, he comes out with 1 incredibly silly utterances. In this case, for '< instance, we are asked : “ Is it a fit ending 1 that Robert Coombes should go to Broad- ] moor because he was excitable and read 1 penny dreadfuls?” This shows the ex- ' tent to which a certain school of I moralists have the penny dreadful bee ( in their bonnets. Why (as George R, Sims < ■joints out forcibly enough) “ penny dread- t ; uls” don’t deal with that stamp of crime. < From time immemorial the villaiuest villain < that ever villained through five acts has 1 been good to his mother. There was a £ Kilar play some years ago at the East c in which, just as one villain was about r to murder the other, the intended victim | exclaimed “Stay!” “Why?” asked the C muntaain. “Because you had a mother f once 1” Instantly the dagger dropped from 0

the murderer’s hand, and the tears of penitence flowed down tho ruffian’s cheeks. In one of tho . London music-halls, where the gallery is packed nightly with a seething mob of boys and girls of the costermonger and factory-hand class, there is one song which never fails to arouse a storm of whistles and cheers, and that song is ‘A boy’s beat friend is his mother.’ There is another song which is also highly popular with the gallery boys, and that is the song of the coatermonger who stops at the gates of Heaven and informs St. Peter that “ if mother ain’t a-goin’ in—why, this bloke stops outside.” To connect the crime of Robert Goombes with the perusal of penny sensation is absurd. It would be quite as logical to denounce cricket as a demoralising pastime because these wicked boys spent the first day after tire murder at Lord’s.

THE PERILS OP PEARY. Lieutenant Peary, the Arctic explorer, has, wo learn from Newfoundland, returned to civilisation and “homo comforts,” after a most trying experience in the winter-gripped lands beyond Independence Bay. The story of his travels, privations, hopes, and fears may excite the mind of readers to admiration of the explorer, but, the tale finuhed, Reason will whisper “ Where is the good of it ? ” The history of Arctic exploration is an almost unbroken sequence of “splendid disasters.” It seems as though, whatever care, money, and forethought are lavished on these trips towards the Polo, the results will ever be meagre, and entirely inadequate to the desperate risks to life and limb which they entail, putting aside the financial question. The commercial value of further exploration in the far north may be confidently put down as 0, and if, as is sometimes insisted upon, tho solution of certain obscure scientific problems is to be found in those dreary wastes of ice and snow, the question may well be put; “ Will the world be one penny tho better for their solution ? ” Science can count its victims in the Arctic regions®y the score, but has the sum total of human happiness been added to by one small fraction by those deaths? Lieutenant Peary failed to achieve anything, though he had paved the way to success in a previous season with caches of provisions. These were, with one exception, obliterated by a heavy fall of snow, and the loss entailed a fresh preparation of stores for the journey. But that invaluablo Arctic food, “pea-soup,” could not be replaced, raw deer’s meat was the only available substitute for pemmican, and coal oil took the place of alcohol. The party, consisting of Peary, Mr Hugh Lee, and a colored servant, Matthew Henson, left Bowden Lodge on April 1 (ominous date), in company with six Eskimos, and sixtythree dogs. For the first hundred miles all went well. Oneciche was discovered, and out of it the explorers made up their deficiency in tinned biscuits. .Six marches more brought them to the vicinity of a pemmican cache, but find it they could uot. At this point the Eskimos turned their faces homeward, taking twenty of the dogs with them. The white?, with their servant, pushed on, and at the en 1 of the second week had negotiated 200 miles aud had reached an altitude of 7,000 ft above the sea. Violent winds were here experienced, and the temperature ranged from 30deg to 45deg below zero. In spite of the weather Peary and his companions tarried not on their journey, and at the end of three weeks had placed five score miles more to their total. Difficulties gathered in the fourth week. Several of the dogs die 1 from privation aud overwork, and the loads on the sledges had to be lightened considerably. But even the reduction of their provisions did not cause the explorers to pause or think of turning back, and at the month’s end their journey length had reached 422 miles. They were now B,oooft above the sea, . and found great difficulty iu breathing. They also bled from the nose, and their dog’s strength was reduced by oue-half. Raw meat frozen solid was the sole food for men and beasts, and the latter were succumbing every day. When the fifth hundred miles was half accomplished one of the sledges broke down, aud could not be repaired, and soon after the total of the dogs was reduced to eleven. These emaciated creatures were almost useless, and the explorers had to pull the sledges themselves. Finally the dogs and provisions were left in a camp in charge of Mr Lee, and Peary aud the faithful black pushed on for the seaboard, which was distant one day’s inarch. They took a small sledge and four days’ rations. Peary hoped to fall in with some musk oxen, but instead encountered a blinding snowstorm, battling with which utterly exhausted both men. Finally they managed to get back to Mr Lee, and the question of return became the absorbing topic. They had only 1001b of walrus flesh left, and after conning the situation carefully decided to push on and take their chance of finding musk oxen. They were reduced to spare rations of walrus flesh, for the dogs needed the meat. At last the longed-for oxen were met with and ten killed. Thus provisioned, the party managed to reach the shore of Independence Bay, completely worn out. Only one gallon of oil was left to them, and finding further progress impossible Peary decided to retreat. The last sledge was broken down, but a small one was rigged up from a pair of skins, and upon this the sixteen days’ rations of oxflesh and raw venison were stowed. After great difficulties aud privations they at last reached Bowden Lodge on June 25, having made twenty-five marches. The last morsel of food, was distributed at the beginning of the last lap, twenty-one m'des from the lodge. Only one dog survived the return journey, and the men were all utterly broken down, They were grievously ill when the steamer Kite took them off on July 31, but recovered slowly under careful treatment. Such is the story of the latest Arctic exploration. Like many of its predecessors, it achieved absolutely nothing, but luckily the cost was limited to money and dogs. Future explorers will do well to mark the provision caches with a long pole, so that the heaviest snowfall cannot entirely obliterate their whereabouts.

BURIED ALIVE. By way of a cheering and appropriate contribution to the literature of the dead season, the ‘ Daily Chronicle ’ has been carrying on an edifying discussion in correspondence anent the possibilities of being buried alive. From it we learn that the chances of this indescribably appalling catastrophe befalling any of us are by no means so remote as we like to believe. Professor Froup tells us that “in 1829 arrangements were made at the cemetery in New York so as to bury the corpses in such a way as not to prevent them communicating with the outside world in case any should have awakened to life, and among 1,200 persons buried six came to life again.” This would make it i per cent, of the whole number. Further, it is alleged in other similar experiments more than this percentage gave indications of coming to life. The “Cremation Company” and “ Patent Earth to Earth Coffins Syndicate ” naturally support these alarming statements with vigor; medical men, on the other band, resolutely pooh-poohing the suspicion that they ever give a certificate without satisfying themselves they have finally ended their patient. In this connection, however, an awkward piece of evidence has been resurrected. It consists of a paper read before the Medical Society of London by Sir Benjamin Richardson on ‘ The Absolute Signs and Proofs of Death,’ and giving authenticated instances of cases where death has simulated life and vice versa. The affair which started the inquiry was precisely similar to the horrific incident which led to and, I think, justifies the present talk. A Jewish child, laid out for dead, startled its relatives by reviving just before the funeral. Dr Riehardson, amongst others, then stated that persons constantly refused to believe theif friends dead till it was scientifically proved. In his paper, therefore, he starts with a consideration of the common circumstances under which the question is demanded. The first he considers is change of color from paleness or darkness to bright red of the face or* some other part of the surface of the body. Three times Sir Benjamin has been called upon to observe this phenomenon after death, in one ease while the body was in the must rigid rigor mortis. In another case “the face assumed a red color in the centre of the cheeks, and the rest of the surface took on a really living fleshlike character.” The explanation is simply that Blood highly charged with carbonio gas is okidised under fevering conditions. But there are other circumstances under which death simulates

life. Thus, in cases of sudden death from the arrest of the circulation in the cerebral centres warmth : is often, retained for a long time after dissolution. Nor do muscular movements always mean that life is still present, for reflex muscular movements after death are not nticommon in oases of Asiatic cholera. The retention of lifelike expression is not uncommon in the case of children, while ihe prolonged preservation of the dead body from putrefaction may be the result of cold weather, a wasting disease, or copious doses of alcohol previous to death. But Dr Richardson has had experience of living men presenting all the appearances of death as the result of prolonged narcotism or cataleptic trance. As an example of the former he says he was called in to see

A medical man found dead, as it was presumed, from an excessive dose of chloral. To all common observation this gentleman was dead. There was no sign of respiration; it was very difficult for an ear so long trained as my own to detect tho sounds of the heart; there was no pulse at the wrist, and the temperature of the body had fallen to 97deg Fahr. In this condition the man had lain for some hours before my arrival; and yet, under (the simple acts of raising the warmth of the room to 84deg Fahr. and injecting warm milk and water into the stomach, he rallied slowly out of the sleep and made a perfect recovery, More remarkable is the case of a man struck by lightning, details of, which Sir Benjamin received, in 1869, from Dr Jackson, of Somerby, Leicestershire,

The patient reached his home in a state of extreme prostration, in which he lay for a time, and then rank into such complete catalepsy that he was pronounced to bo dead, was laid out as one dead, and heard the sound of his own passing bell from the neighboring church; by a desperate attempt at movement of his thumbs be attracted the attention of the women engaged about him, and being treated as one still alive, recovered, and lived for several years afterwards, retaining in his memory the foots, and relating them with the most consistent accuracy. ' Jt is therefore quite plear that the diagnosis of life or death is by no means so easy. What proofs, therefore, has the doctor of absolute death? The proofs of absolute death, says Sir Benjamin, are eleven iu number, and he enumerates them as follow (1) Respiratory failure, including absence of visible movements of the chest, absence of the respiratory murmur, absence of evidence of transpiration of water vapor from tho lungs by the breath. (2) Cardiac failure, including absence of arterial pulsation, of cardiac motion, and of cardiac sounds, (3) Absence of turgescence or filling of the veins on making pressure between them and tho heart, (4) Reduction of the temperature of tho body below the natural standard. (5) Rigor mortis and muscular collapse. (6) Coagulation of the blood. (7) Putrefactive decomposition. (8) Absence of red color in semi-transparent parts under the influence of a powerful stream of light. (9) Absence of muscular contraction -under the stimulus of galvanisar, of heat, and of puncture. (lOj Absence of red blush of the skin after subcutaneous injection of ammonia (Montiverdi’s test 1 . (11) Absence of signs of rust or oxidation of a bright steel blade after plunging it deep into the tissues (the needle test of Cloquet and Labords). Sir Benjamin sums up as follows ; If all these signs point to death ; if there be no indications of respiratory function ; if there be no signs of movement of the pulse or heart and no sounds of the heart; if the veins of the band do not enlarge on the distal side of the fillet; if the blood in the veins contains a coagulum; if the galvanic stimulus fails to produce muscular contraction ; if the injection of ammonia causes a dirty brown blotch, the evidence may be considered conclusive that death is absolute. If these signs leave any doubt, or even if they leave no doubt, one further point of practice should be cairled out. 'ihe body should be kept in a room, the temperature of which has been raised to a heat of 84deg Fahrenheit, with moisture diffused through tho air ; and iu this warm and moist atmosphere it should remain until distinct indications of putrefactive decomposition have sot in. AN INSURANCE ROMANCE.

It all came about through his having read Joseph Hatton’s ‘John Needham’s Double,’ He was in financial difficulties, so deposited his clothes by the sad sea Waves and skipped to California, where the busy little bee made bis fortune. Meanwhile the clothes and somebody else’s corpse had been picked up snd duly identified as his and buried by the sorrowing relatives, whose sorrow, however, was chastened by the discovery that an insurance policy covered the inconsiderable cost of the burial and left a not inconsiderable balance. Then he came back, and, being possessed of considerable wealth, found no one desirous of disputing his identity. This is the gist of a story emanating from one of the big Liverpool insurance offices. The company issued a policy upon the life of a mercantile clerk belonging to the “good old town” for a moderate sum, and the premiums were duly paid. About a year ago the clerk’s clothes were found on the Leasowe shore, near Liverpool, under conditions which pointed to another bathing fatality. Subsequently a body was picked up near the spot. Its condition was such that only a cursory examination could be made, but the relatives of the missing man, including his mother, agreed to accept the corpse as that of their lost one, and duly interred the remains. They also drew his club—l mean his insurance—money. Last week the officials of the company received a bad shock, for on a morning the reputed twelvemonths’ corpse walked gaily into the office and made a “clean breast” of the matter. He had found himself pressed for money, and, to escape unfortunate creditors, had perpetrated the time-honored disappearing trick, leaving his clothes to afford the regulation clue for the police. The other body was simply a fortunate coincidence. From Liverpool he had shipped to California, and travelled thence to Colorado, where, becoming connected with a prosperous bee and poultry farm, he became passably rich. He determined to return Home to clear up his affairs, and did so—much to the surprise of his creditors. Having wiped the slate clean he searched for his mother, but she had left Liverpool, and her present whereabouts is unknown. Evidently there is a disappearing taint in the family.

LITERARY NOTES. Mr W. E. Tirebuck has selected the period of the great coal strike as background for his new Labor novel, the title of which, ‘ Miss Grace of All Souls,’ scarcely suggests a story of that description. We learn, however, that this novel “will be a serious attempt to indicate the relationship of the modern man and woman towards the labor question. To this end Mr Tirebuek has taken three generations in one household—grandfather, who believes only in the past; a sou who holds strong views as to the present; and a grandson who tries to balance the scales betwixt capital and labor. Miss Grace, who stands for the modern woman, is a vicar’s daughter, and, by way of conti’ast, several working types are introduced. By way of a practical protest against the three-volume system Mudies have declined to circulate Miss Braddou’s story ‘ Sons of Fire,’ for which Simpken, Marshall are demanding the old-fashioned price of a guinea and a-half. Miss Braddon, being wealthy, can afford to defy Messrs Mudie, but with a beginner their action would simply mean the financial failure of the book. One can, however, scarcely wonder thereat. The one-volume departure enabled Mudies to make such substantial savings last year that their dividend was materially increased instead of continuing to decrease. Amongst the old gang of lady novelists to whom I referred when speaking of Mrs Hungerford last week I can think of no one more uncertain than “Rita.” Moat of her stories are slight, not -to say trumpery, to a degree, but occasionally she seems to cast off the slough of triviality and produce something almost good. ‘ A Woman In It* (published by Hutchinson) answers to the latter description. It is the same character of story as ‘ln a Looking Glass,’ the heroine, though a loose fish, being much better than she makes herself out in her diaries. I think, too, “Rita’s” Mrs Noel Gray, alias Nina Garbett, is altogether a more sympathetic person than Mr Phillips’s delinquent. Anyhow, her cynical, self-told story makes amusing reading for a dull hour, though it is too highly priced. “ Rita’s” effort should have formed one of the Zeit-Geist series.

Miss Mary Angela Dickens, the granddaughter of the great novelist, and the only member of the family to inherit his literary gift, has just completed what she hopes may be her chef d’mvre. It is foiled ‘ Prisoners of Silence,’ and will he published by Osgoods here and Harpers in America; If it excels the young ‘Mere Cypher the novel; must be good; indeed. '

Of ‘The Woman Who Wouldn’t,’ by Luoas Cleave, it Is only necessary to say .that the author appears to be the original of 0. E- Raimond’s lady novelist George Msndevil|e. Every pretentious inexpert line sets one’s teeth on edge. Mr W. T. Stead, whose capacity for mingling business and holiness amounts at times to positive genius, hhs managed to get a first-rate advertisement for his ‘Penny Poets ’ out of the discussion anent “ penny dreadfuls.” Amongst other things, he points out that the consumption of ‘ Deadwood Jack’ and ‘ Sixteen-string Jim’ is not due so much to an absence of wholesome literature as .to the inability of society to sersuade ignorant lads to like the latter, ’here are any amount of cheap and good stories obtainable nowadays. As Mr Stead says

There is nothing in the literature of crime which can compare with the penny literature of the S.P.O.K. Their penny pocket library of pure literature supplies 128 pages of closely printed double-column matter of the sest quality. Their catalogue contains six of the beslrnovels by Fenitnore Cooper, live of W. H. G. King ton, four by Captain Marryat, three by Walter Scott, three by Captain Mayne Reid. ' Robinson Crusoe ’ can also be had for a penny, and Southey’s * Life of Nelson.’ For the sum of 2s la any purchaser can procure a library of .twenty-five complete works, occupying 3,000 pages of close double-column print, 'i he World, the Flesh, and the Devil combined may be defied to beat this enterprise of the S.Jt'.O.R. Of these penny books a million and a-half have been sold. About seven tons of these were sold in three months. The success of the ‘ Fenny Poets ’ has been almost as remarkable. In four months about two million copies of the best poems in the language have been issued to the public, nor {s there any indication of a falling off in the demand.

Tho ■ Penny Sfcory,’ issued by Horner, the Religious Tract Society, and the 5.P.0.K., is a very successful rival of the penny dreadful. Of the ‘ Penny Library of Fiction,’ issued by the 5.P.0.K., a million and a-half copies were issued in fljo first thrpe years of their existence. Of thp ‘Pepny Stories ’ and ‘lllustrated Penny Tales for the ‘People,’ the Religious Tract Society has issued between ten and eleven millions. Of Horner’s stories—those curious compounds of love, blood, and Evangelical religion—it would be difficult to say how many millions have been issued, The penny magazine or miscellany must not be overlooked. The Religious Tract Society issue the ‘ Boy’s Own Paper ’ and the * Girl’s Own Paper,’ each of which commands a circulation of J50,C0) tb 200; 000 a week. Oassels have published ‘ Chums,’ and there are, among others, ‘ Young England,’ ‘Harper’s,’ St. Nicholas,’ and other excellent magazines for young people, Mr Stead also offers the astounding proposition that it is better for our lads and lasses to read dime novels full of fustian and murder and violence than not to read at all. Great heavens! what next? And where! oh where, is the good man’s Nonconformist conscience ? When rediscovered, perhaps, he will explain why a dirty book or a bad book is better than no book at all. Most people would prefer hunger' to a diet of poison.

The Central Council of the Auckland Labor and Liberal organisations last evening received from the Workers’Political Reform League a communication submitting the name of John Fawcus as a candidate for Parliament at the General Election. It was decided that it was advisable to defer a selection till all the candidates were in the field.