PERSONAL ITEMS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8670, 12 September 1891, Page 4 (Supplement)

PERSONAL ITEMS.

Rev. Sam Jonf.s, in an interview, estimated the number of conversions under his preaching as 150,000 to '200,000. M. Alphonso Daudet thinks that after dinner nothing is so good as a pipe, taken with one or two little glasses of excellent brandy. Mr. A. J. Balfour intends to travel abroad to recruit his strength during the recess, storting at tho conclusion of the present session. The Rev. John McNeill, the well-known Presbyterian minister, a few days since somewhat suddenly lost his wife, and is left with a young family. | Engineer charts prepared by Robert E. Lee, then of the United States army, over fifty years ago, are now in use in St. Louis for river improvements. Tho Earl of Elgin, Lord-lieutenant of Fifeshire, has appointed 27 new magistrates for that county, among whom are the Earl of Rosslyn and Lord Balfour of Burleigh. Lord Dufferin's visit to England will last several months. He will spend .July at Clandeboye, in County Down, and afterwards be the guest of -Mr. Munro-Fer-guson in Scotland. The seven-year-old Duke of Albany performed his first public duty the other day, when he distributed the prize-money to the successful exhibitors at Usher Horticultural Show. His sister, Princess Alice of Albany, helped him through his task. The Czar is very fond of wood-chopping, and the other day ho was taking exercise in this fashion at Peterhof, when the head of his axe flew off, and struck a servant who was standing by. The very next day there was a widespread rumour in the capital that a man had tried to murder His Majesty with an axe I Sir Robert Pigot, whose death was recently announced, for many years had lived so much out of the world that his very name was unknown to tha vast majority of modern frequenters of racecourses. Fifty years ago, however, there were few better-known faces and forms than his upon Newmarket Heath, at Epsom, Ascot, and Goodwood. For many years Lady Pigot, who survives hj&t' husband, was noted for her tine herd of Booth Shorthorns.

~ord Tennyson, who has\availed himself of Colonel Crozier's invitation to a yachting cruise in the English Channel, sailed from Freshwater, accompanied by the Hon. llallam Tennyson. The trip will extend as tar as the Land's End, and probably last a fortnight. On his return the Poet-Laureate, who was in excellent health, will go to his summer quarters at Aldworth, near Haslemere, with Lady Tennyson. Her ladyship the meantime remains at Farringford, Isle of Wight. It is impossible not to admire the persistent endeavour of Mr. Patrick Chalmers to obtain justice for the memory of his father, James Chalmers, of Dundee, the inventor, as his sen claims, of the adhesive postage stamp. That .Mr. Chalmers is not alone in his opinion is evident from the fact that in the Postage Stamp Museum just, opened in Vienna the finest specimen is a Dundee stamp worth, live hundred pounds, which is, in reality, an original adhesive stamp invented by James Chalmers in 1834.

Traditions have gathered round the House of Common- Bullet. One of the best remembered is connected with the late Mr. Tom Collins, the member for Boston. The hon. member used to come out of the House to an old woman's stall, buy a pennyworth of apples, put them in his trousers pocket, and go back to his place in the House. During the remainder of the evening the dear old boy was to be seen from time to time taking an apple out of his pocket, a bite out of the apple, and then replacing it! Mr. William Stewart, who was recently admitted to the Bar in Toronto, is stone blind, notwithstanding which he was at the head of the list of the successful candidates in the examination. Mr. Stewart lost his eyesight through an attack of smallpox in ISSS, after graduating from Queen's University, Kingston, and taking the gold medal in mathematics. Having no means, he was compelled to support himself by various occupations after the loss of his sight, and he contrived eventually, after a hard and heroic struggle, to qualify himself for the Bar.