PERSONAL ITEMS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 7002, 26 April 1884, Page 4 (Supplement)

PERSONAL ITEMS.

In is' rumoured that Sir Thomas Brassey will at no distant date receive a peerage. General Cadmus vVilcox, a doorkeeper of the United States Senate, was one of Lee's favonrite major-generals. Baron and Baroness Gustave de Rothschild have just celebrated their silver wedding, on which occasion they gave a grand dinner and a splendid ball in Paris, . The Queen is making her grand-daughters splendid presents on the occasion of the marriages at Darmstadt; the Honiton and Irish 3ace workers have received munificent orderß, tind the Queen's gifts will include some very ralnable jewels. The fates seem to be fighting against the Tennyson peerage. The poet peer's robes were duly transmitted to the House of Lords, hut went astray. Hence the Laureate was not able to take his seat, as was expected, on one of the first evenings of the session. The new " beauty" for tho coming season is a young lady, a niece of the late Prinoess of Capua, who in her day was one of the loveliest of her sex. The young lady attracted the special notice of fthe Queen at the last Drawing Room. According to all accounts, she is "divinely handsome." The Marquise De Hautefeuille is a very brave woman. She created a sensation in Brussels the other day by entering the lions' cage with the lion-tamer. The h\dy bore herself with the utmost intrepidity, and played with the wild beasts as if they were tame cats. She was greeted with tremendous applause, while the band played the national hymn, "La Brabanconne." Tho Marquis d'Altavila, former Chamberlain to the ex-Queen of Spain, is said to be about to make his dihut on ths operatic boards nnder the stage name of Raimondo Silla. The gentleman is handsome, and possesses, it is said, a very charming voice. But it is one thing to sing a few arias agreeably and acceptably in a drawing-room, and another to go through an entire opera in a theatre under the blaze of the footlights, confronted with the professional critics and a paying public. M. d'Altavila is said to have lost all his fortune by speculation.

During Sir Stafford. Northcote's speech in the House of Commons on February 15 hundreds of eyes were watching Mr. Gladstone, who, with his head thrown back, his eyelids closed and listless figure, might have been asleep or fainting, so worn, weary, and depressed did he seem, and one felt sorry for the aged man, who had to stem the torrent of such a storm of disaster, indignation, and difficulty. Bat when he rose to reply, as if by magic all this passed, and he burst forth into a speech" of two hours' length, in which action and oratory were alike forcible—a powerful speech, it was true, and masterly in its object given with a flash and vigour of earlier years, but with all that, it was not an answer to the challenge.

As Prince Albert Victor of Wales has entered upon his 21st year, it is highly probable that Parliament will, in the present session,* have to consider the question of a separate establishment for him. in snob, a case the Legislature would be wholly unassisted by precedents directly in point. Never yet has the eldest son of a Prmce of Wales come of age during his father's lifetime, and before his father's accession to the throne. Frederick, son of George 11., who went nearest to doing so, was 20 years and a few months old when in 1727 the latter became king. It would, however, be misleading to compare the status of Prince Albert Victpr with that of his ancestor, who never set foot in-England till a year and a half after he had succeeded to the position of heir apparent to the Crown. The formal separation between Prince and Princess Frederiok Charles of Hohenzollern, and the breaking up of their establishment, is a grievous blow to Berlin " society." The Princess was only induced to abandon her intention of applying for a divorce by the influence of the Emperor, and of her brother, the* Duke of Anhalt, who came to Berlin from Dessau on purpose to do ihis best to avert a public scandal. Satisfactory pecuniary terms have been arranged, and the Princess is on a visit to the • Cake and Duchess of ■ Anhalt, at Dessau, and proposes to fir her residence at a villa belonging to her brother in the immediate vicinity of her native place. Very great sympathy is expressed for her by all olasses Prinocos Henry of the Netherlands is about to proceed to Dessau on a visit to her unfortunate mother.