MEMORY'S PARADE

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXIII, Issue 11829, 10 January 1933, Page 3

MEMORY'S PARADE

JOURNALIST’S SCOOPS AND

STORIES

It is fiff engaging book of personal anecdote which Mr. Wallis Myers has written. The tilic 'Memory’s Parade’, pel'll alls, is father too proccssibilill alld i'orlhal for the contents. Vet, after all, light infantry may parade as well as heavy dragoons, twites J. B. Firth, .in tlie London Daily Telegraph. "Only occasionally does the author generalise tho philosophise on the scenes which ]io conjures up out of a past that is still quite recent. Indeed tho book opeius with a chapter entitled ‘A Great Queen Passes,’ which was only a single generation ago. Mr. Wallis Myers is at his best when Jio is plying his old craft, that is to say, as a journalist."He has the /lair lor news. When ho was a junior member on the stall of tho now defunct Westminster Gazette ho was exceptionally fortunate in some of Jiis chance adventures. For example, lie secured on his own initiative the fust news both oi the date fixed for King Edward s coronation, and of its sensational postponement in the very week when it was to take place.

The date, June 20, 1902, he happened to notice on an unfinished medal, innocently and proudly shown him by tliq silversmiths. He had culled at their shop in Regent direct about some engraving of Iris own, when tho fact of tjm Royal order in executing his. The much greater “scoop” of the coronation’s postponement in the summer of 1902 came about in this way : “On the Monday of tho great week, iulfilling a roving commission, I had gone down to tho Board of Green Cloth at Buckingham Palace. Courteous officials mere interrogated about the details oi a strenuous Royal programme. My car must have cocked a liLtlo when, inquiring about the ambassadors’ reception, fixed for that afternoon, I mas told that this iuipoitant event might possibly he omitted. No reason was given ; every official wore a dignified calm. Tot one could almost sense impending disaster.

“Id die Alai I 1 encountered Sir Arthur Ellis at the door of the Lord Chamberlain’s office. He was the acme, of discretion where Court affairs wore concerned. Vet 1 could see by his face that something ,was amiss: the suspicion was confirmed when a distinguished Civil servant came up to Sir Arthur and said excitedly. ‘What a calamity this is” ! ’J then drew a bow at a venture. ‘Has tho coronation been postponed, Sir Arthur?’ 1 asked. A denial mould hare enjoined caution; his nqn-com-niittal answer led to my hailing a hansom, wiib a beating heart.’ 5 The editor, oil hearing his story, took Jiis hat and went out to seen confirmation of sucli stupendous news. The news editor pressed hard for immediate publication. Eventually resort was had to the compromise of a istop press statement that “change might nave to be made in tlie coronation programme.” Official confirmation came half an hour later, following a telephone message which had summoned a Press Association representative to Buckingham Palace, and thus London' knew that the coronation iwas “off - .”

Mr. Myers has another good a lory of “Tlie Claimant’s’’ funeral at Paddington Cemetery in 1898, when five thousand people swarmed through the gates and behaved as though taking part in a carnival. Tbe imposter hau maintained his imposture to tho end, and the real baronet had allowed the undertaker, who applied to him, to use the mime of Tichborne on Orton’s cofiinplato, but he threatened to protest if the name were inscribed on the tombstone.

On this point I went to see Orton’s wife, then lodging in a small room at tjio back of an umbrella isliop near Baker street. “Is Airs. Orton staying here?” I remember asking at the door. Tho answer came in a decisive negative. “Not known in this street.’’ “Ah! then, Lady Tichborne,” I said, recognising any mistake. “Her ladvship” when s]io came, down was indignant that the undertaker had communicated with her husband’s “rival”. lie had done so without her authority. ’She declared that “Bir Ro gor” would certainly appear on the tombstone since his coffin had borne the “true title.”

Mr. Myers contributes an anecdote of Mr. Lloyd George that I have not seen before: —<

Mr, Lloyd George was a keen admirer of Abraliam Lincoln. I remember, when he was spending a week or two at Deauville in the autumn after the Armistice, going out to his villa, connected by telephone with all t]ie capitals of Europe,- and finding him studying a death mask of the American statesman which an artist, knowing his interest, had just presented to jam. Lincoln’s lips wore tightly compressed, and Mr. Lloyd George had asked his visitor whether this was characteristic. “No,” was the reply, “but it was often cold in America, and Lincoln cultivated the habit of keeping liis mouth shut. ’ This gibe took the fancy of the Prime Minister. When Tittoni, the Italian Prime Minister came into the room lie was shown the mask anti asked if he could explain why the lips wore so rigidly clenched. Other distinguished callers were asked to express their opinion j it was a humorous interlude in a busy day. It is on lawn tennis however, that Mr. Wallis writes 'best, as the columns of the Daily Telegraph have borne witness for many years. That is the theme which ho has made peculiarly his own, and lawn tennis has taken him far afield—to the R-ivieia, to South Africa, to India, and the United States. ' As for Wimbledon, he recollects every game almost that has been .played at every big meeting since the war, and writes of the tennis celebrities as one familiar with every point of their' game. Hero . is a considered judgment that will ( be read 'with interest in tennis circles •- .. if' one had to classify all the •champions in the present century, 1 think I should bracket H. L. Doherty and Tilden, voting, the English-

man’s style superior, yet doubting whether tho greater physical reserves of the American and his pugnacious service . mould not liavo discounted, and at times outnveighed, that advantage. Next, I should place, in the order named, considering them only at their , best, It. F. Doherty, Coclict, Johnston, Brookes, Lacoste, Wilding, Borotra Patterson and Gore. Of course, if one went fortlicr hack along the post-Rensliaw line, Josliua Pi in, of Ireland, would have to he ranked high; ho had the divine spark. For Wilding, killed by a German shell in the war, (lie author had great admiration. 11 lie first time Mi. Balfour played with Wilding he had not been initiated into the mysteries of tho American service, so Wilding put him wise. “When I varied the. deliveries, first giving him an outbreak and then an olf-break—both services having a. tendency 7 to break in a contrary direction to that of their swerve—Mr. Balfour was perplexed, ond would slop and meditate for minutes at a time He said the spin at lawn tennis was different from every otjier kind of spin he had experienced in hall games. But these thoughtful pauses boro fruit, and we had not been playing long before he knew as much about what the service ;\vas going to do as I did.'’

The Jute Lord Birkenhead was another lawn tennis enthusiast, and Mr. Myers gives a life-like portrait of him in his leisure hours at Charlton :—•

“Ho liked nothing better thau to summon the Oxford lawn tennis team of old internationals and old blues, and himself lead them into battle, llis enthusiasm became compollingly infectious, eso that every match was exuberantly gay from start to finish; and whether lie struck the hall in the middle of the racket or on its handle, as lie often did, he was the hardest worker on the court.

“Xot infrequently lie would gently pull the legs of Ids guests. “Now let the two cracks perform,” he once said, when a set was finished and another had to bo made up. Two champions, the best players in the party, rose from their scats and began removing their coats. “Oh, 1 did not mean you,’’ was his dry comment. “Still, -Major Cartwright and myself will be delighted to take you on. What shall we say, plus fifteen and a pound a set.” Naturally, a whole chapter is devoted to Suzanne. The author is nonly steadfast in his loyalties. He was an ardent Lcnglenite from the nrsl. ana so remains. “As a champion,” lie says, ’“she was supreme. As a personality her faults were in the eyes of her friends, concealed by her virtues."’ That is gallantly spoken. Jit. Myers still feels acutely the distressing circumstances’ of her last visit to Wimbledon, when she “The story, which circulated freely afterwards, that she deliberately kept the Queen waiting may he dismissed. She was never happy at the Jubilee meeting. Defeat in the first round of the ladies’ doubles with a new partner may have undermined her confidence; at Cannes she had discovered that .her physique had limitations. A lucrative offer to become a professional had already been placed before her. Her father’s economic position was a factor; she iwas in two minds about accepting it. In the mental conditions created, irritating incidents, common at all championship meetings, assumed alarming proportions, a minor disagreement over the order of play was enlarged into a grievance. On that unhappy day, she was quite incapable of playing.

Suclx are the generous excuses of a champion doing his best to convince others before lie is wholly convinced himself.