Afternoon Tea Gossip

Free Lance, Volume II, Issue 99, 24 May 1902, Page 7

Afternoon Tea Gossip

By Little Miss Muffitt.

Ping-pong has caught on in Sydney all light A tournament for the championship of- Austialia started on Monday last. I see that the camel which was used in the drama of 'Ben Hur," gets the blame for letting the plague loo^e in the S\dney Zoo Naturally, the camel has got the 'hump." * • • The Hon. Alfred Deakin, the silrertongued orator and Attorney-General of the Commonwealth, ought to be able to carry out the task of holding the reins of State during Premier Barton's absence His father was a well-known coaoh proprietor in the early days of the State and was accustomed to holding the leins himself. ♦ * * Nelson has a female Jehu who has made herself unpopular by annexing lots of business fiom mere male "cabhies " Just like the horrid men to ' peach" on hei because she had not got a license. However, she has one now, and the shoes of her horse are never rust\ Wouldn't lady charioteers "catch on" in Wellington. » ♦ • Holland's King Dick is one Dr. Kuvper, but he is, in proportion to our unci owned monarch, as the penny whistle is. to the brass band. He has founded a university, built up a newspaper, established a church, held a professorship, edited an Encyclopaedia, lectured m twenty-five American cities, wutten an opera, and given to the world moie than a hundred publications ♦ » * Miss Belle Ray w'lo was singing quite lately at Dixs Gaiety hero, and is now on toui with his travelling company, turns out. to be an old Well inert on performer under a new name. She was better known to us some years aeo as Madame Burfoot, whose deen contralto voico was pretty frenuentlv heard at local concerts I beilieve she played a part at one of the Wellington Amateur Opera Club's seasons She left us rather suddenly and many of us have wondered what had become of her. • * * Everybody who is anybody recosrnises that the prospects of peace have been brightening ever since King Dick left for South Africa Why? Melbourne ''Punch" suggests the reason thuslv The w ar is almost over now, The Boers w ill gladly stop the fray As soon as they have heard the news That Maori Dick is on the way. His fame has come within their reach And toinbh they dread — a speech l • • • Society is laughing just now over a most unsophisticated remark made at afternoon tea the other day. A young married lady thought it awfully silly that the young man who stands in the Bank of New Zealand, behind the brass lattice, should be called a "teller Asked why, she said, with a giggle, ' because hesimph won't tell at all. Just out of curiosity, I went in one day and asked how much ray husband had on deposit there, and he only laughed at me Fancy calling him a teller " • * * Tom Durkin is dead. As a black-and-white artist, lus humorous cartoons were familiar to the colonial public bv means of the Bulletin," and other papers to which he contributed. He was a native of Williamstown, Melbourne, and the artistic instinct was innate for he was entirely self-taught in the art by which he made his name and earned his bread and butter. He drew much for wood before the era 01 process work set-m His age was only forty-nine. Death was the result ot a mahgnant-giowth on the liver * • * Theie are two Japanese men-o'-war at Melbourne, and the great Austiahan public have bean celebrating the alliance by shouting for the Japs whenever they found some of them at large. One of the little brown sailors entered a Sw anston-street bar for a refresher, and tw o or three young men rushed forwaid to stand treat. "You have a dhnk 2 " said one. The Jap looked puzzled. "Dlinkum? Savee — dlmkum°" The young man went through the pantomime of drinking. The Jap understood that, and nodded brightly. "What you dlinkee, John?" the young man asked, as the barmaid came up smiling "I will take dry gin and soda, please." said the Jap, m purest English and the shouter collapsed.

The Mam is aie keen on titles. A Rotoiua chief has just confeired a dukedom on his infant son He calls him Tt> Tuika Hori Ngata,i (the Duko Geoige Ngatai), as he \us bom on the day uiien the groat little white Duke w as at Rotoiua ■*- — - Ping-pona, has taken root m Auckland, and is flounshing like the gieen bay tree Aheadv there aie thiee clubs established —the Auckland, Parniell, and Remuera, and a tournament has been arranged to stait on Monda\ n eck « • ■» Loid Hopetoun is not the oulv piomment figure in the Australian Commonwealth who says he cinnot remain m office for the monw. Sir George Turner the Federal Treasurer, also talks of retiring for financial and other reasons. And in addition to his Ministerial salary he is drawing £400 a year a& the pay of a Federal member. * * * One of the prettiest and mo.st original of the raanv farewell floral offerings Mrs Brough received at her farewell m Melbourne, the other day, was a beautiful design in the form of a large star entirely of red carnations, on the top of which rested a wreath of golden laurel, attached to which was a dove with floating ribbons bearing the date of her first and last season tlhere. * • • They are talking, over on the "other side," about a remarkable cure of cancer bv means of the X rays. Mr. Tieloar, demonstrator in X ra.vs to the Ballarat Hospital, designed a special foim of vacuum tube for treating cancer, ulcer, lupus, and kindred diseases. He tiearted a> cancer patient, arrested the growth after four applications of the rays, and, at the twentv-nfth annlication there was a complete cure + +- •* It pays in these days to be a human monstrosity. Annie Jones, the bearded lady of Barnum and Bailey's big show, 19 worth £125,000, having drawn a salary of £120 a week for many years. Charley Tripp the armless w onder, and "William Doss, the human telescope, are demi-millionaires. Both of them get £b0 a week, and as they aie never out of work, the money piles up. Their children are in college and their homes in America are simply lovely * * ♦ Have you ever noticed that if theie are any ' plums" about a stranger generally steps in and engulfs them ? Nobody could be fouiid m New Zealand to w rite the country up. The standard of education is probably too low , so Mr. C W. McMurran, commercial traveller and journalist from New York, is getting £800 from the Government to tell us what he thinks of us in book form. I cannot vouch for the £800, but ° wellinformed paper says that is the figuie * • * The dangers of railw a^ travelling ' A look, "weighing several pounds," crashed through a railway carriage near Ponrua, and hit a man a severe blow on the back. The papers say it did not hurt him. I remember a case in which a pebble weighing two ounces, falling down a sixty feet well, inflicted a fearful w ound on the shoulder of the welldigger What sort of a back did the lailwav traveller have Armour-plated p * f- * Mr. J. G. Woolley, the prohibitionist lectuier, who is accused of Pro-Boensin, has wisely abandoned his visit to the colonies this year He has been publishing his. ' Impressions of Australia" in his paper, 'The New Voice," and amongst other remarkable discoveries which he chronicles are the following — "The loyalty of these States and colonies to the British Crown is imaginary in the main and it is certainly a mistake to suppose that the war in South Africa has increased it. . . The war has left a bad taste in the mouth here . . The Duke's visit on the whole has weakened the Imperial sentiment. . . These oeople almost unconsciously, begin to long for independences and it is not yen faa* aw ay. . . In personal affinity Australasia and the United States are closer far than Australasia and England " To all of which I say "Fudge." So it seems Madame Marohesi did not at all relish Amy Castles' action in lea\ - ing her for another season. This ig> how Amy tells the story to an interviewer 'When I started first she said that I wa& a high mezzo, and then later a low one I had an idea that she wa.s training me as the latter, and I spoke to her, but she told me she was not. One day however, I hanoened to see the music of another pupil — a mezzo — and it was the saina asi mine, so I went straight to M. Bouhy, who tried my voice, and said immediately he heard it that I was a high soprano. Then I left Madame Marohesi." "And she did not like it?" "No." ''And threatened, to a friend, that slue would box your ears the first time she saw you?" "Well, as you are aware of it, there is 1 no use in not admitting it Some time after, I happened to meet Madame Melba in London, and she sand she thought I was veiy silly for ha\mg left Madame Marches*, and that I would never be listened to."