PERSONAL AND GENERAL NOTES FROM LONDON.

Evening Star, Issue 11675, 6 February 1902, Page 2

PERSONAL AND GENERAL NOTES FROM LONDON.

[From; Opb Special Corbksponbent.]

December 27,

Mr Wiiliaaxvßooth, Mr W. H. Booth, and Miss Booth (Wairauapa), who arrived a fortnight ago by the Gothic, are staying at 70 Lancaster Gate. Miss Booth is to be married on 7th January to Mr W. G. Hutchison, the eldest son of Mr G. Hutchison, of Johannesburg, ex-M.H.R. for Patea. The Messrs Booth will travel on the Continent, and eventually, after a year's ab-

sence, return to the oolonyvia America. Mr C. S. Dunningham (Wellington), who was also a passenger by the Gotluc, is visiting relations at Lambonra. in Berks, and making arrangements to turn his patented invention for a self-fitting brooch-pin to commercial account.

The Earl of Onslow is on a visit to Sir Francis Greniell, the Governor of Malta, at the island citadel. Lord Onslow does not believe in "shop" when he is holidaymaking, and intimated gojjretty plainly to the elected member* of the Council of Government who -wanted to interview him on their grievances. Mr A. F. Roberts was one of the AngloScots who drubbed the South of Scotlaud handsomely a cotaple of days ago by 16 points to nil. The baptism of the infant daughter of Lieutenttnt A. B. Aimitage, second in command of the Discovery, was celebrated on the 18th December at St. John's Church. Richmond, the ceremony baing performed bv the Bishop of London. Dr Ingram, \vbo conducted the consecration service on board the Discovery before she sailed Southward Ho! to discover—(? leaks). The child was named Cicely Markham, the latter in compliment to her godfather. Sir Clements Markham, president of the Royal Geographical Society. The presents were numerous, the most, characteristic being a gold chain and medallion in enamel of a penguin, tfce crest of the Discovery, presented by Mr Longstaff, who also stood godfather, and who is largely interested in 'he Antarctic expedition. Mrs Lees, of Bedford, and Miss Agnes Badly, of Glastonbury, cumpletied the quartet of sponsors. 'Hie Antarctic expedition to set out from Scotland next year will be peculiarly a national one. the whole of the money subscribed towards it has been given by Scotsmen, and the scientific staff and ship's officers and crew are of the same race. True, the sthip is a Norwegian whaler, but she is being "brought to the Clyde to be repaired and fitted out, so she will be stamped with a Scottish character, and, let us hope, rliere will be no "discovery" of Welsh emblsms about her when she is on the high seas. The Hecla, as the ship is in he christened, will be ready about the beginning of August, and will go for a trial trip in the Atlantic to test gear and instruments. Mr W. S. Bruce, who has !i:ni experience in both Polar regions, is !:e leader of the expedition. Its goal is bv Weddell Sea, aaxl it will co-operate in complete .scheme of exploration with the Ti-iman expedition on one side and the Swedish on the other.

A New Zealander soldiering on the fronicr of Zululand writes to 'Truth' in refer.'thc to a statement in an English paper li;ii :i .soldier's field ration of bread is Muz, or 3oz above tie average daily consumption of an Englishman. He says that 16oz is much nearer the average that he lias seen than 240z. He continues that " during the whole time he has been in ■Minth Africa he has never seen a single ssue of rations without one or more items being short: and for a week or more prior to the date of his letter no sugar had been obtainable. No vegetables had been issued, if I understand him aright, during ihe time he had been in Zululand, but he remarks philosophically that as his unit had only been there about seven months it may bo tliat the authorities had not had time to discover their whereabouts. From lh'_" general tone of this colonist's remarks mi our military administration I infer that ho will not have a very pleasant report (o m:ike on the management of the war when he returns t<> New Zealand." Two Court announcements of interest have been made this week. The first :s that the King,, accompanied by the V'teeti and other members of the Royal family, will open Parliament in person ou 16th January. The other announcement is that the King and Queen will, during the coming season, in the evenings, in lieu of drawing rooms, hold a series of Courts at Buckingham Palace, at which presentations of ladies will be made. Attendance and presentation will be by invitation only through the Lord Chamberlain, and ladies can only receive occasional invitations. Ladies! already presented desirous of being invited are to send their names to the Lord Chamberlain's office, together with those of the ladies whom they wish to present. A lady who makes a presentation to tlnar Majesties must bo personally acquainted with and responsible lor the lady she presentg. She must herself attend the Court, and cannot present more than one lady in addition to her daughters or daughters-in-law. Gentlemen may, under exceptional circumstances, accompany the ladies of their family. The dress regulations for the Courts will be identical with those hitherto in force for the drawing rooms. Evening Courts for the purpose of receiving presentations will be historically quite an innovation, but the ladies to be presented will doubtless consider (he ceremony attended with much more eclat and brilliancy at night than was the somewhat cold-blooded presentation in the afternoon.

Lord Salisbury has the reputation of being singularly detached from the world of men and affairs—in short, "an absentminded beggar." A very good story of his absent-mindedness is going the round just now. Lord Salisbury, the Bishop of I/Ondon, and many others happened to be in the room with the King. The King said to the bishop: "Do you know what Lord Salisbury has just said about \ou? Ho pointed you out and a-sked :

' Who is that young-looking cleric?'" And then, to save embarrassment of the bishop, His Majesty, with that invariable geniality which is all his own, added: " But you need not mind that. I just showed him the latest photograph of myself, and, after looking at it some momeuts in silence, he said sympathetically : ' Poor old Buller.'" Eighty-two 2'rominent men, friends of Lord Koberts, have jnst presented the Commander-in-Chief with a portrait in oils of bis by Mr Julian Story, and an album, containing a finely-finished miniature in ivory of Lord Roberta and the following address:—"This album, together with a portrait of Frederick Hugh Sherston Roberts, who died from wounds received when attempting a splendid deed of gallantry, for which he was awarded the Victoria Cross, was presented to Field-marshal Earl Koberts, etc., by his friends and admirers as a token of sympathy with him in the grievous loss of his son, and in recognition of the unparalleled services rendered by him to his conirtry." An iilusteation of the way in which

•' Bobs" has gained the affection of tbe nation was given the other day by the Hon. J. C.M.G., to a meeting of Gordon Highlanders. There was ■i private in the Gordons serving under Lord Roberts in India who had beiredsome property in New South Wales, and who in consequence obtained his discharge. When he got as far as Calcutta he heard that trouble had broken out in Afghanistan, when he asked to be allowed 'to join the colors again. The request was granted, aud he served all through that :ampaign, going at its close to his property in New South Wales. On General Koberts's return to England he was feted and made the hero of the hour, in the manner in which Great Britain know* howto honor her generals; yet amid all the rejoicings and the claims upon his attention Lord Roberts found time to write to him (Colonel Napier) and ask if he would let him know this man's address, as be wished to communicate with him personal lv, to mark his appreciation of his conduct and of that of the Gordon Highlanders.

Mr Cecil Rhodes has purchased for himstlf a pied-a-terre in England, where he may entertain his friends and enjoy a little shooting His row property, for which he is said to have paid something over £IOO,OOO, is the Dalham Hall Estate, near Newmarket, which comprises 3,475 acres, including one village and part of another and nina farms, and whose annual income

ia about £4,000 a. year. The Hall itself 1 is in the Georgian style, and was erected in 1704 by the" Bishop of Ely. It stands in a well-timbered park of between two and three hundred aires, nnd Iras some fine plantations round it. There is stabling for fourteen horses, raid a range of buildings for brood wares. House, outbuildings, and ground* occupy about twentyseven acres, and include a small Dutch garden, with a variety of curiously-clipped yew trees. The agricultural properties comprise a newly-erected stud farm, whereon stands a quaint house with Elizabethan gables, known as Dovill's Hall. The Affeck Arms, in the village of Daflunn, the village mill (capable of being driven by wind or steam), a- model laundry, a smithy, and dozens of cottages and allotments form part of the domain, to say nothing of the lordship of three separate manors. The sporting right over the estate has for some years past fetched £7OO a year, for there is an abundance of partridges and pheasants iu the coverts, A singular and somewhat incomprehensible union was dissolved by I*>rd Kyllachy in the Court of Session in Edinburgh last Friday. In 1888 Kate Stuart, a girl of twentv-three, made the acquaintance in Belfast of Lieutenant Haldane, of the Gordon Highlanders, who has since become captain, and who was severely wounded at Elandslaagte, and escaped with Lieutenant Le Mesurier from Pretoria. They were married by declaration before the sheriff at Greenock, and tlif inarriago was kept secret, as Lieutenant Haldano did not wish his family and brother officers to know. Mrs Haldano until 1892 retained her maiden name of Stuart Although she and her husband met in Glasgow, Belfast, and Dnb« lin. they never lived together as man and wife. Bv 1893 Mrs Haldane had become tired of this method of existence, and in an interview with her husband at Garoberley, whither he had gone for instruction, taxed him with having got tired of her, and asked him to provide her with a home. This he said he could not do, but he promised her more money. He sent her £4 by letter, and this was the last communication she had had from him. For the last eight years she has been living in Markinch, Ftfe, and has been in receipt of about £6O a year from Captain Haldane and his relatives. Repeated letters to him while he was in India with his regiment elicited no response. She complained to the War Office that her husband had practically deserted her, and they offered her a passage in a troopship to her husband in South Africa. After hearing Mr* Haldane's story Lord Kyllachy pronounced a decree of divorce on the ground of desertion. Captain Haldane offered no opposition. M. Cochefert, the head of the Paris police, received an agreeable Christmas card, in the form of a telegram from Demarara, which informed him that the swindler Altmayer. who escaped from Now Caledonia three months ago. has been retaken. Alt-mu-yer belonged to a good family, and is an exceedingly good-looking man. At eighteen he stole a cheque book of his father? and forged his signature for sums totalling up to several thousand pounds. He was found out, and made to enlist in a dragoon regiment, where he stole some valuable jewellery in his captain's quarters, and was imprisoned in the Cherche Midi Prison. He escaped in a sack of waste paper, in which he was carried to the dust heap. In 1886 he came back to Paris, begged for pardon, and by ;.is father's influence got a position offered him in a business firm. One dav he stole £1,689. He was not found out for some months, when he was arrested and sent to Mazas Prison. -He escaped from it by stealing a stamped letterhead from the desk of the magistrate who t'x;a>iii'(l him, : md writing tin order on it for bis own immediate deliverance. This lie presented to the gate-keeper, and passsd nut of Ma/as calmly. Altmayer has since been travelling under all sorts of aliases, i,nd was arrested at Havre in 1858. He e-chped from Isovr Caledonia on board an English ship, which he left at Demurara. Tha-e ho has been arrested, but he is unlikely to remain in safe keeping very long. Si'veuty out of the seventy-live members iiud associates of the Royal Academy have completed a unique accession present to King Edward and Queen Alexandra, Each of the seventy has painted a water color, uniform in size, lor the purpose, and the collection has been brought, together at Burlington House in order that the R.A-s and A.R.A.s may view and criticise one another's works.

A very prominent member of the insurance world has just passed away, in the person of 'Mr 1!. L. Johnson, of Lloyd's. He has, on behalf of underwriters, had the examination and assessment of damage of nearly all the colonial hares, rabbits, and poultry which have been subject to average, and liis general fairness and firmness of character gained him the respect of all tho.-:e with whom he was brought into business contract.

A curious and rather incredil.de story about the Royal tour comes from Portsmouth. When tho Ophir, with the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall on board, was nearing St. Helena the signal was made to the attendant cruisers St. George and Juno: '" Can you steam another knot?" The Juno replied: "Yes, four if you please." This answer was regarded as impertinent, and when the vessels reached Portsmouth as a mild form of punishment the Juno was ordered to lie up the harbor, while the more respectful St. George came alongside the dockyard. The Juno is lying at her moorings still. Probably 'tis an idle tale, but, as I daresay you are aware, funnier things have happened in tho navy. I once heard a story to the effect that a certain cruiser, which had steamed six houre from Sydney, was ordered back by the commander to fetch new sets of films for his hand camera. Just twenty-four hours late, the Cnzco arrived at I'lymoutn on day, r.!- | ter a verv wvpJcasant experience, from Gibraltar, which was left last Friday night. Off Cape St. Vincent the Cuzco fell in with I a fierce g.de from the north-west, with tremendous seas and hurricane squalls. The ship rolled heavily: a quantity of her rail was swept away, whilst a similar fa-te overtook one* of the awnings. In the vicinity of Cape Finisterre the wind veered to the south-west, and raged with redoubled vigor. A huge wave broke on board, and four cf the sailors were hurled into the scuppers. A seaman named Bryan had his thigh fractured, whilst Calder, the boatswain's mate, had his foot badly sprained. The other men were bruised about the ribs and back. Next day Walter Stirrup, of Bolton, a third class nassenger, had his shoulder dislocated through being thrown to the deck, whilst one of the stewards, named Widnev, Ml from tiie bridge and was picked up in an unconscious condition. So not only the ; Cit v men, whose, mail was late, but passengers and crew as well, constituted a Cuss-co of their own. It looks as if we should have to revise the saying that the first thing the Englishman does in a new country is to have a game of cricket. The new version will substitute "ping-pong" for cricket. The cnize is. J *ee from my letters, in full swing at tho Antipodes. Here the game has been raised to tho level of an established spirt by the formation of a regular ping-pong association oi All England, which is to frame rules for the rigor of the game. A public ping-pong tournament at the Aquarium was such a huge success that Mr Newman is following imit in the Queen's Hall. It is said that a well-known singer who is an ardent ping-ponger earned thunders of applause from an audience of ping-pongers J-y, in a tit of abstraction, beginning the ' Yeoman's wedding' song " Ping-pong ! Ping-pong ! Ping-pong as I gallop along." and that- a new corps of yeomanry is to be raised to be called the King's Own Pingpongers. The game, by the way, may be new, but the name is ancient, and the pingpomr was well known to Scottish ladies in the old days. In Chambers's 'Traditions of Edinburgh,' 1825, in an account of the eld Scotch ladies' costume, is this passage : M A f)ing-pong —a jewel fixed to a wire with a ong pin at the end, worn in front oi the cap, and which shook as the wearer mo¥edIt was generally stuck in the cushion over which the bair was tnrned in front. Several were frequently worn at once. It wna sometimes pom-poon." Anyone who has been struck in the-eye by a ping-

pong ball will see the force of calling it sometimes a pom-pom. Another of the iron links of empire—railroads, to wit—has Mat been completed. On August 5, 1896. plate-laying began on 'ha steel track of &72 miles that is to connect the Indian Ocean with the great plateau of the Central African, lakes, more than 3,000 feet above sea lev?!. Lust week the laying of the rails was completed, the railroad baying reached the shore of Lake Victoria Nyanza. The task has been a colossal one, and lias cost about five millions. Ranges of 6,000 feet had to be crossed, the road had to be hewn out of the rock or cut through dense forests, bridges had to le built over streams subject to the sudden rise of tropical rains, and the workmen were exposed to the attacks of wild beasts in the jungle and virulent malarial fever in the lowlands. And the Britoa having twropk antly surmounted .'ill these difficulties, we shall probably find American locomotives drawing waggon loads of German goods-along the track. Ingratitude, thy name is Germany! A case of some importance to municipal bodies was decided by the Judicial Committee on Saturday last, when their Lordships reversed a finding of the Supreme Court of Western Australia. Mrs Annois, of Fremantle, sued the Town Council ftr £I,OOO damages, because, in the exercise of their jurisdiction, they reduced a gradient in Sewell street, where the lady had a house, in such a way as to leave her domicile with a drop of 6ft to Bft to the road. The jurv gave a verdict for the defendants, and this decision—reversed on appeal—is now restored. Lord Macnaghten, in giving judgment, laid down the law clearly:— " The law had been settled for the last 100 years. If persona in the position of the appellants, acting in the execution of a public trust, and for the public benefit, did an a'-t which they were authorised by law to ,10, and did it in a proper manner, though the act so done worked a special injury to a particular individual, tlie individual could not maintain an action. He was without remedy, unless a remedy was provided by the statute."

The composer of' John Peel' (Mr William Metcalfe) has just retired from the post of bass soloist of Carlisle Cathedral, which he has filled for half a century. The Dean and Chapter made him a gift of £3O, and have granted him a pension of £IOO a year.