PERSONAL

Evening Star, Issue 14516, 7 November 1910, Page 5

PERSONAL

The Right Honora-blo Lewis Harcourt, the member for the Roesoudale division, of Lancashire, who has been appointed Secretary of State for the Colonies in succession to the Earl of Crewe, was bom on February 1, 1863, and was educated at Eton. Long before he entered Parliament he had served a long apprenticeship to poEtice with his eminent father, and acquired a deep insight into the probloms with which British statesmanship is called upon to grapple. Mr Harcourt, who is one of the most popular men. in the Honee of Commons, combines with wide culture a keen and practical sympathy -with democratic ideals. His fiank courtesy and sterling Radicalism have made him a persona grata with the liberal party, and he is one of the few men in Parliament who have a thorough acquaintance with the intricacies of national finance. When the late Sir William Vernon Harcourt was preparing his famous Death Duties Budget, and afterwards when he was piloting it through the House of Commons, the new Colonial Secretary was his father's mainstav and devoted helper, and the warm affection that existed between, the veteran statesman and his talented eon appealed' to men of all parties at Westminster. He was first returned to the House of Commons on March 15, 1904, for Rossendale. On the formation of Sir Henry CampbellBannermnn's Liberal Government in December, 1905, Mr Harcourt, who is known to his friends as "Lulu" Harcourt, was appointed First Commissioner of Works, and in March, 1907, was raised to Cabinet rank. Whilst filling that post his greatest achievement was his successful effort in piloting the Small Holdings Bill through the House of Commons in. 1907. His younger brother, Mr Robert V. Harcourt, has ;*it for Montrose since March, 1908. A Sydney cable states that Mr Hugh J. Ward is retiring as an actor in June, 1911, and entering into partnership with the firm of J. C. Williamson, Ltd. Mr Ward made his first appearance in Dunedin many years ago as a comedian and dancer with Harry Conor's 'Trip to Chinatown' Company. Later ho appeared with Williamson's Comic Opera Company in Australia in 'Florodora,' and then was associated with Willoughby and Geach in a successful comedy enterprise. He will, however, be best remembered in New Zealand as the producer of 'The Girl from Rector's,' over which he had a joust with the clergy in Wellington. Mr Ward is one of tlio most versatile and finished character actors that ever appeared in New Zealand; his most ingenious study was undoubtedly Mr Hopkinson. An Auckland telegram states that Mr William Henry, founder of the Life-saving Society, was welcomed by the mayor at the Council Chambers this morning. Mr Henry leaves for the South on Wednosday evening. I Miss Ivy Edwards, who had been engaged in tho reading department of this journal for a number of years, on leaving the office on Saturday was presented by the emplovees with a set of silver-mounted toilet requisites. Mr J. Caradus made the presentation. The marriago of Frank Jay Gould, a son of the late Jay Gould, the American millionaire, to Edio Kelly, a Gaiety chorus o-irl, is announced. Mr Gould has tented a residence at Abbotsford. He divorced his first wife last year. The death is reported of Mr Lyman Smith, a miilti-millionairo and a typewriter manufacturer, at Syracuse (New York). The Vienna newspapers Javorably notice Miss Leila Doubleday, the Melbourne violinist, who appeared at Slezats's concert. Lord Kitchener has left England for Ecypt By the death at the Bluff on Friday < f ''Dan" Wilson at the age of ninety-two years, the Dominion loses one of its earliest pioneers. Wilson was a FrenchCanadian by birth, having been born at Halifax in" 1818, thus living under six sovereigns—viz , George 111., George IV., William IV.. Victoria, Edward VII., and George V. After serving in a Halifax sailing fleet he joined a French man-of-war, which happened to bo ordered to Australian waters in 1845, but while the vessel was at Ilobart Wilson'deserted, and stowed away in a New Zealand whaler, the Flying Tennet, later transferring to Paddy Gilroy's barque Post Boy at George Sound, and so reached the Bhiff, where he has remained during the intervening sixty-five years, following the callings' of whaliug and fishing. Wilson was one of the few remaining surfacemen who assisted in laying the Bluff-Invervargill railway Hue in the " sixties." His funeral (reports our Invercargill correspondent), which took place on Saturday, was largely attended.