ITEMS OF SOCIAL NEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8472, 24 January 1891, Page 3 (Supplement)

ITEMS OF SOCIAL NEWS.

[from the society papers.]

Few incidents ever occasioned half as much diplomatic correspondence as the contemplated visit of the Empress of Austria to the Pope. The difficulties on both sides were very great, bub I hear on good authority that Leo XIII. finally consented, on account of the Empress' state of health, to forego a formal reception, and to see her privately without any ceremonial whatever. The Empress has expressed .a strong desire to "meet her spiritual head ;" and although the complication is for the moment averted, nobody would be surprised to hear that the Imperial yacht had gone to Civita Vecchia instead of to Corfu.

A letter of November 8 says :—" Winter has set in early at Balmoral. The hills in view from the Castle are covered with snow, which looks like lasting:, and there have been several degrees of frost nightly. The Queen revels in the bracing air, and takes two ' outings' daily, quite regardless of the state of the weather."

Mr. Leonard Courtney is said to be an adept as well in adroit avoidance as in able advocacy of women's rights questions—unless, indeed, marriage with a deceased wife's sister be purely a matter of men's rights. In one of his oratorical campaigns, after a meeting held at, I think, Torpoint, he was asked whether he was in favour of the Bill to legalise marriage with a deceased wife's sister. "May I inquire," said Mr. Courtney, all smiles, " whether the gentleman who puts that question is married?" " I am !" " Has your wife a sister living ?" "She has." "Is your wife present?" "Wo." Well, my wife is present, and she, too, has a sister living." The point was quickly taken up, and Mr. Courtney resuming his seat amid a peal of laughter, the question was not pressed.

We give the following story on the authority of Rod and Gun :The other day Mr. Herbert Spencer sauntered into the billiard-room at the Senior, and invited a nice young major, who was the only person there, to take a cue. The major did so. Beginning to play with deliberation, the great philosopher gave a miss in baulk. His opponent cannoned off the red, and left off at thirty-seven, with all the balls out of play. Mr. Spencer made another miss. Then the major ran out. "Sir," the philosopher said, as he gravely put his cue into its case, "a certain dexterity in games of skill indicates a well-balanced mind ; but expertness such as you have displayed is strong presumptive evidence of an ill-spent youth. I wish you good-afternoon !"

There is only one lady landscape gardener in England — Miss Wilkinson, who has informed an interviewer from the Women's Penny Paper that she received her first instruction in her art at the Crystal Palace classes. She has been entrusted with laying out the lawn at Lambeth, and has all the work for the Metropolitan Public Gardens Association and the Kyrle Society. As a profession for women, this lady thinks landscape gardening decidedly good, r- 1 - they must not only have a natural taste iv». it, but be regularly trained to the work.

"Mr. Bryce is still travelling in the United States, but a private letter jusb received from him," says a London correspondent, "announces his intention of being home in good time for the new session. He has had a pleasant and interesting visit, being everywhere hailed with acclamation as the author of' The American Commonwealth.' Life in America, he says, would be endurable only for its reporters. These pounced down upon him on landing with the usual questions on things in general. Mr. Bryce declined to be drawn into any controversial statement, whether on Home Rule, the position of the Ministry, or the prosperity of the Liberals. He has delivered one or two lectures, and was to speak in the Academy of Music at Brooklyn. s He selected as his topic 'An age of discontent.' "

The Poet-Laureate has left Aldworth, hia summer house, situated on the Blackdown Hills, with the object of wintering in the more genial climate of the Isle of Wight, as has been his custom for some years. His lordship, who was accompanied by Lady Tennyson, his son, the Hon. Hallam Tennyson, and the Hon. Mrs. Tennyson, travelled by special train to Lymington, whence they were conveyed by special boat to Yarmouth, en route for Farringford Freshwater.

Is the tandem again coming into fashion The other day I saw no fewer than three in Hyde Park. Moreover, there is a lady who drives, tandem-wise, a beautiful pair of ponies about Richmond. She is unattended except by a dapper little groom seated on the back seat of her dog-cart, who carries a horn as long as himself, and with it vociferously calls the attention of the neighbourhood to the attractions of the turnout and of his mistress. By the way, the word " tandem," if it was not originally a joke, is a hideous blunder. It comes from the Latin tandem, "at length," which, however, refers to time and not to position. The motto of the old Tandem Club was Tandem dolor —to be roughly rendered, "Sooner or later one comes to grief." The opening words of Cicero's speech against Catiline suggested another motto — Quousque tandem. Bub these classical quips or conceits were, after all, beaten easily by our dear old friend Mr. Jorrocks, who christened his two tandem horses Xerxes and Arter-Xmxea.