SOUTH AFRICAN PHILISTINES.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue LXVIII, 25 June 1912, Page 2

SOUTH AFRICAN PHILISTINES.

The dust of South Africa has been shaken from the feet of Paderewski, the most famous of living pianists. The great musician went to the Union a few months ago for the purpose of giving a series of recitals, taking with him numerous pianos and a retinue of personal attendants. He had been accustomed for half a lifetime to the plaudits of admiring multitudes, and he seems to have been confident that the people of Soiith Africa would need only the opportunity to bow down before him. But the young Union actually refused to take Paderewski seriously. Many of its citizens were frankly bored by his playing, and they made fun of the mass of long hair that had so often provoked hysterical outbursts of delight among the women of Europe. Some of the stories' that the pianist told on his return to London evidently were expected by him to move the stoniest heart. At Port Elizabeth a man seized him by the lapel of his coat, and, peering into his face, said, "You're Paderewski, aren't you?" Then the daring mortal, who had not the privilege of an introduction, laughed. On another occasion the pianist was travelling on a coastal steamer, and he condescended to play a few selections in the saloon. He was in the middle of a passage when a "person" who had been concerned in a game of poker in the vicinity, .asked him if he would "mind stopping that noise." But the artist's sup of bitterness was filled to the brim by the publication of an open letter addressed to him in a Pretoria newspaper. "What have you done for the world?" the writer asked. "What do you do? You play the pin no. 1 am told that you play the piano better than any living pianist; I am not prepared to dispute that; but, after vr l V^at is tllere in Paying the piano? We had a man here the other day who could not only play the piano, but seventeen other instruments, including the Jew's harp. Nobody made a fuss about him. It only cost 2s to hear him play f»ll his instruments. He didn't want the Mayor to receive him. nor did he charge a guinea for his front seats." Paderewksi says that he was disappointed in South Africa. The Union, ouite unabashed, replies that it was disappointed in Paderewski. One might almost infer from this that there must he even more boors than Boers in South Africa.