PERSONAL ITEMS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 10629, 18 December 1897, Page 4 (Supplement)

PERSONAL ITEMS.

The Queen of Denmark is eighty years of age. • One who professes to be well-informed declares that the Pope is the first writer of Latin verse now living. Lord Wolseley's daughter has taken to literary pursuits. She will shortly publish a book on Marlborough. At least £100,000 was circulated over the preparations made for the private entertainment of the Duke and Duchess of York in Ireland, While Mr. George Alexander, the actor, was taking a holiday in the Austrian Tyrol, he read the Lessons one Sunday ab the English Church service. While at Harrow School the late Dr. Vaugban was famous for his extreme politeness, which, when he invited boys to dinner, took the form of Baying at ten o'clock, " Must you go?" Isabel, Lady Barrington, is one of the few people now living who perfectly recollect Sir Walter Scott. Her father supplied the " Wizard of the North" with much of the material used in " Rokeby." The early morning cup of tea has conquered General Booth, who has battled against the desire for it for a long time, but now confesses that he enjoys his bedsidecup as much as any fashionable beauty does hers. Flowers, says the Whitehall, are the one item in which Her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales is lavishly extravagant, and they are more essential to the happiness of the future Queen than frocks or anything else.

The "crack" lady shots of the day are, according to the Weekly Sun, Lady Breadalbane, Lady Tweedmouth, the Duchess of Bedford—who is described as a " dead shot" at partridges and grouse—and Lady Sandhurst.

In order to signalise his appreciation of the good fight fought for Italy's honour by the Count of Turin, the King of Italy has presented that much-beloved nephew with a splendid sword, upon which the date of the duel is engraved.

A steady correspondence goes on between the Czarina of Russia and her grandmother Queen Victoria. It was the young Empress herself who begged the Queen to write to her, in answer to her own letters, on an average once a week without fail.

Lord Aberdeen's daughter, Lady Mar jarie Gordon, has for some time edited a children's magazine called " Wee Willie Winkie," and to this publication Mr. Kudyard Kipling has contributed tho following " nonsense" rhyme : t There was once a small boy of Quebec Who was buried in snow to the neck. When they asked, " Ate you friz V He replied, "Yes, lis. But we don't call this cold in Quebec." In 1889 the Kaiser, then Prince William, was loaving his hotel when a great row in the next room led him to find its cause. It was the housekeeper busily sorting laundry articles and exclaiming, " The hussies are hanging their heads out of the windows all the afternoon to see the Prince go away. What has become of the matches ? I must go to the basement for some." Catching sight of the Prince, whom she failed to recognise, she said, " Sonny, find an old woman some matches; your legs are longer than mine." "Certainly, mother," replied the Prince, who returned to his room and brought his matchbox to the woman. Lord Wolsoley has been heard to declare that to dub a soldier "Tommy Atkins" is an insult, and one that he wishes would be discontinued. The way the nickname grew is interesting. It was in the middle of the present century that a new method of keeping accounts was issued to the Army, and on the "pattern" sheet the name Thomas Atkins was chosen haphazard to show where a soldier who could nob writo (and there were many such then) was to place his mark, Out of this grew the habit of calling men who couldn't write Tommy Atkins; and this is why, presumably, Lord Wolseley considers it an impertinence to call all and sundry soldiers Tommies now.