CURRENT GOSSIP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XIX, Issue 6566, 2 December 1882, Page 3 (Supplement)

CURRENT GOSSIP.

Ak appeal by Victor Hugo, deprecating . the execution of Arabi Pasha, has been published. The Earl of Aberdeen lately entertained , his whole tenantry—4,ooo people, comprising BS2 families. The London Times says that the punish- : ment of death has been richly earned by Arabi Pacha and his chiefs. The Russian Police Agent, Priene, who had formed a friendship with the Nihilist . Committee, was assassinated in the churchyard at Smolensk. The Prince of Wales is described by an \ English writer as being very jealons of the military reputatioa of his bruthcr-in-l.iv, the German Crown Prince. Washington has "comet parties." The guests assemble at four a.m. and view the comet until the sun rises. Meantime refreshments are served. Never let go of a good tiling that you really have for a better thing about which there is some doubt. The dog in the fable who dropped a piece of moat to snap at a shadow went hungry the rc.st of the day. Lord A'lchibald Douglas, brother of the Marques.i of Queeusberrv, recently arrived at Ottawa with fo.-t; hoys from England, for whom lie obtained engagements with fanners. He ia now travelling in Ontario and Manitoba. Her Majesty has forwarded, through Sir Henry Ponsonby, a donation of il'J.j in aid or the new Shetland and Orkney Islands CVntre of the St. John Ambulance Society, of which Princess lieatrice has consented to become president. J , A commissary of police levied on the goods I and chattels of ex-Khedive Ismail l'asiia the I other clay in Paris. A coaehbuilder claimed a I balance of £'2.">0 clue on a number of I vehicles he had furnished the Khedive while i occupying his vicu-reiial throno. To so*-, out for a holiday is very delightful, and without change life would be very wearisome ; but more delightful still is the comfortable settling home in the ;u<-;a----j sar.test winter resilience in the world—dirty, • foggy, homely, much-abused Londnn. Professor Koberts has calculated that thu I soot in the pall hanging over London on a winter's day amounts to 50 ton.- , , and th;it the I carbonic oxide, a poisonous compound, rei sultinp from the imperfect combustion of j coal, may be taken as at least five times that ! quantity. j The Freethinkers' So-iety of Charier.-)! have deposed their prositlest, because, in order to I comfort his wife, he had allowed his son to Ibe buried with religious rites. The father 1 had not followed the Ron's body into church, but none the less was he condemned by the Charleroi champions of free thought. Land says that the Marquis of Bute is building a new mansion in the Isle which bears his name, to replace Mount Stuart Ho ",se, which was burnt to the crouud some four or five years ago. The total cost is estimated at a quarter of a million, and it is calculated that £50 000 worth of marble will be ised. 'Kosmos," the r.uthor of "Letters to Eminent Persons," in the London World, has an idea that he is quoting Shakspcare when he writes :—" They were of the type of men which Othello distrusted; like Cassio, they had 'a lean and hungry look.' The Moor wished to have about him fat men who sleep well of nights." Of course all readers ot Shakspearc know that these words are spoken not by Othello but by Cesar, not of Cassio but of Cassius. '■ Due ds Morny, tho '•hero" of the Fcyghine tragedy, has thought it advisable to I withdraw into rural seclusion for;i time. He is a short, insipid young man, with a glassy : eye and r. very heavj moustache. He affects < English correctness in his attire, and culti- < vates Anglo-American beverages. His noble 1 mother, the Duchess do Sesto, was a. beauty ' once. After the death of her firwfc husband, 1 the Due de Moray, she cut off her magnificent' 1 hair as a mark of eternal mourning. A few . months later she married again. The Law Journal states that the attention t of Mr. Justice Day, the vacation judge, i having been drawn to reports appearing in i newspapers of private judicial proceedings !: heard before him in Chambers, it was repre- ( sented to the learned iudgo that the Master 1 of the Rolls had decided that the reporting t or publishing of private judicial proceedings ( was a contempt of Court, and rendered the £ reporter liable to be committed. In reply to t the representation the judge's clerk has t written: —"I am directed by Mr. Justice c Day to say that be intends to adopt the same - e rule as that; adopted by the Master of the £ Rolls with regard to reporting in Chambers."