Gossip from Sydney.

Free Lance, Volume XVIII, Issue 949, 19 September 1918, Page 7

Gossip from Sydney.

Dear Christabel, — Tin HE sash is going to be a midsummen- madness if the spring fashions are a faithful forecast of the future. It appears on every otlier frock, is made of soft silk or charmeuse, and ties at the back in a big butterfly, bow.

A charming drees of white embroidered ninon worn by. a handsome Melbourne singer, Miss Elsy Treweek, at a big "Pop" concert in our Town Hall had such a sash as I describe. It was •of a rich bluish green shade. And over the frock was a scarf-like drape— very wide—of tulle in the same tint as -the sash. A country man's version of the graceful vogue is that it reminds "him of the kitchen dresser in summer with a green mosquito net flung over -it to keep off the flies.

But in thei slang sense, there are no flies on Miss Elsy Treweek, who is Mrs. -Collier. She is considered one of the best-dressed Melbourne concert artists, and the Victorian city understands clothes —not mere dressing,—in their most decorative moods. Her husband, Mr. Collier, the well-known singer and concert-manager, has been fiving a- short season of Saturday night 'o<ps in our Town Hall. So Sydney has- not only enjoyed hearing Elsy Treweek' s beautiful soprano, but has also admired her taste in frocks. And with •each there has been a. floating cloudlike effect of tulle in some harmonising •shade. Her coiffure is the last word in liairdressing. Beautifully brushed >silky dark hair taken severely back off the forehead is done up behind in two -small round chignons—rather a Japanese effect. A narrow band of velvet ■worn just above the eyes is a distinctly trying style, and not to be rashly imitated. But it suits the chic Elsy Treweek head-dress.

I>esert Gold has arrived safely and has already been interviewed in the sense of having inspired sporting writers to describe her appearance. The lady was apparently in the best of health after heir trip in the Moeraki. Estland, also the property of Mr. T. H. Lowry, andj several other New Zealand horses of note arrived in company with the famous Desert Gold.

The Royal Art Society is now in the full swing of its 39th annual exhibition. Though the Society suffers in a sense from its own easy-going ways and allows inferior work to squeeize 'through each year, it is capable of bet--ter things. It includes amongst its members many of our leading artists. And the present exhibition is in some Tespeets worthy of honourable mention.

- The National Gallery has bought a very fine example of "Pont Phillippe, Paris" of Will Ashton's painting. He is an Adelaide artist who , has been in TSurope some time, and he is, I believe, one of the Commonwealth official painters in France. Four or five pictures "from his brush, French in subject and in atmosphere,, are the great attraction -of the exhibition. . This was opened by •the Minister for Education, Mr. •James, who is for some occult reason not obvious, to ordinary people, the 'Government's mouthpiece on Art.

Amongst our artists who show good work this year, James Jackson, Muir Auld, J. Banks, Joseph Wolinski, recently returned after six years' absence in England and America —Gladys La,y•cock, a young miniature painter —Tristram with his water-colours, and the •Society's President, Lister Lister, may Tie warmly commended.

A new note has been struck, so far as the conservative old Society is concerned, by the inclusion of R. E. Wakelin's cubist or post-impressionist pictures. Personally, I do not want to live in any of these stiff, unreal and half-baked looking houses. Neither do I see in my wanderings boat sheds of such varied colours with the general appearance of having being built by a child out of a carefully-assorted box of toy bricks. But R. S. Wakelin, a New Zealander now settled down in Sydney, sees nature and architecture in this fashion. And he is sincerely, or one believes so, painting what he sees. "The draughtsmanship is good. And this cannot be said for the usual freak artist who essayed the pre-war Paris craze for sketching a rainbow on its beam ends and calling it "A Lady on a Spring Morning," etc. Probably "Wakelin will gradually evolve a- healthy compromise and stand mid-way between the modernist's cube/ cottage and the early Victorian's villa with ■everything (except the latch key and the china ornaments on the best mantelpiece) painted in detail.

Sydney which knew Lord , Forrest well as plain John, and then as the hurly knight, regrets the death of a

great Australian. That this famous explorer who possibly knew our continent from Perth to Adelaide and thence to Port Darwin in the Northern Territory better than any man of his time, should have died on his voyage to the other side of the globe, is perhaps a. fitting end. Statesman and traveller he has been a giant amongst the Crop of political pygmies who are the prolific growth of our many Parliaments. Of latei his health has been steadily failing. But a few years ago the big man with the huge bulk that never detracted from the dignity of his appearance was a familiar figure here. At the festivities in honour of the American Fleet or at the Commonwealth celebrations John Forrest towered both mentally and physically over the mere puny personalities associated with him. Lady Forrest now the widow (there are no children) is a West Australian by birth, and has been the devoted helpmate or the sweetheart she married in 1876. She was with him on this, his last voyage, Home.

* * ' * -st Quietly married in St. James's Church yesterday evening Armide, only daughter of Mi - . J. D. Hill (a wellknown pastoralist of Yass) and Mrs. Hill. The bride was a dainty vision in soft white silk veiled in tulle. A long tulle veil, caught with a wreath of orange blossoms, floated over the frothy drapery. Miss Marjorie Milson, the bridesmaid, was dressed in white georgette trimmed with silver lace,- a chaplet of silver 1 leaves making a beautiful head dress shaped' like a tiara. Two' small children, Aimie Metcalfe and Keith Harrison, were the trainbearers. Mr. R. Hill, the bride's brother, was best man. The " bridegroom—almost forgotten at these affairs! —was Mr. Frederick Hume, of the> New South Wales family which gave an early explorer of that name to the annals of Australian explorers.

Con. Wallace, M.H.R., a Labour member in the Federal Parliament, has shown what he thinks of the mischievous disloyal section of the movement he represents. He has enlisted for active service at the Commonwealth Recruiting office, Sydney. He is 36 years oJd, and will have to: part with a wifei and young family in order to serve his country. Such men as he truly represent the genuine! cause, which is the cause of freedom and democracy. Mr. Wallace has everything to lose, and nothing to gain—except the admiration of every man who loves his native land—by this sacrifice.

Chaplain McAuliffe, the. famous Sydney priest, formerly of St. Mary's Cathedral, has comei back after four years' service with the Australian Forces. He has tended the dying, nursed the wounded, given the last sacrament to those whose _ glazing eyes saw his kind face as their last vision of earthly things, and he has been the mate of every soldier who came within his ken. The strain of battle has turned his dark hair a silvery white, arid he is due for a, rest. The King has cabled his appreciation of this heroic priest's war work and made him a Commander of the British Empire Order. In Gallipoli, Egypt, Palestine and in France, Father McAuliffe's devotion to duty and indifference to danger made him one of the best-loved A.I.F. chaplains of four years' hard campaigning. Yours discursively, Hon A.