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New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXV, Issue 10835, 19 August 1898, Page 4

According to the Chef do Cuisine to the Emperor Franz Josef, His Majesty is very -,t y plain in Lis tastes and habits. At six o'clock in the morning lie takes his breakfast, consisting of some cold meat, coffee, and fresh-made bread and cake. Between twelve and one o'clock he takes his dejeuner, two dishes of meat and some ordinary pastry, /jv Dinner is served at six o'clock sharp, All his meals are served in his library at his writing desk. He does not leave the desk. Not even a, tablecloth is spread. His per* sonal valet on duty receives the dishes in an ante-chamber on a largo tablet, and puts the tablet before the Emperor on his desk. Very often the Emperor has to take a spoonful of soup between two signatures. He 18 ; |j|j a very busy man. With the meal- the menu for next day's dinner is sent up and . laid before the Emperor. It contains two soups, patties, fish, boeuf, two entrees, two jvl| roasts, two desserts, pastry, cheese, fruiji. etc., and the Emperor, with a blue pencil, crosses off whatever he does not want. 18,. Empress is also very plain and simple in her wants. Breakfast is served at nine o'clock. consisting of two meats, with green yege- ;j||j tables, tea, with ? large assortment of sma cakes, fancy pastry, and fruit. She does ; not eat anything from breakfast until five o'clock, when dinner is served, consisting o soup, two meats, vegetables of the season, and pastry. The Empress has a specia soup prepared for her, which appears to 8 • ■ very nourishing, though rather unique. -I 0 i or three pounds of tenderloin steak are slightly fried or broiled, so as to leave them . . very rare. They are taken up to Her Ma jesty's ante-chamber, slashed with a sharp , knife by the cook on duty, and put into '; . silver hand press. The lever is turned, an , the juice of the steak is pressed out, '§ caught in a cup of medium size. All this is . . done' very quickly to prevent any e® o . J This soup, or beef tea, is of pigeon .hi , • colour, and is served to the Empress in , o ,' fg cup. The Empress is very fond of U* _ pastry. Another specialty of the Empr 6 is her drink of cognac inousseux. Ibis is ß special effervescent cognac, made from ■ '-yiuad

Nicest old vintages, and especially treated, j f| I rtj production of it is the secret of a Vienna; 0 lite merchant. The Emperor does not 1 (ffi juucli for wine. He prefers a glass of I • I beer. ■ Nor does he indulge in expensive | ffavana cigars. A plain home-made cigar, I (be so-called Virginia cigar, long and thin, • *1 rVith a straw running through it, is his /J , favourite smo k°- . I Die malady of the age, according to ProI (essor Mantegazza, the celebrated Italian •k:;| , uithropologist, who fills the cliai, of that 't; 1 ■ icience in the University of Turin, and whose . 1 : published works constitute a library in themI selves, is hyperesthesia; or, in other words, I sensibility. We are all suffering I jjjon, or less from neuroticism; and hence s® , (he alarmin b spread of epilepsy, in- | sanity, and correlated mental disorders. •js- "The atmosphere of modern civilisation," '1 lie (ells us in the " Humanitarian, " has beI come too phosphorescent and too exciting. | One might say, that each who is absorbed in it i might be compared tc a person seated on ( 0 insulating stool traversed by a powerful electric current; his muscles contract, his "I . lair stands erect, and his entire system is | charged with a tetanic cm-rent. Coffee, tea, i , alcohol, in all its forms, wear him away I physically, while romances, spectres, railI flays, and the telephone, spur him to feel 3 too keenly, to live too fast, to pass con- | tinually from the spasms of voluptuousness | to the agitating influences—the anxieties of ; pain and terror.' Speculation in business, i: sensationalism in literature and the drama, s the excitement of travel, merely for the J sake of covering the maximum of distance I in the minimum of time, " plunging" on the I racecourse, and the great extremes to which I competition is carried in all kinds of out i t of door sports, are all of them symptoms of g hyperesthesia > which, is probably • respon- | sible also for the universal habit of smoking, 1 in which i neurotic generation finds a tern- | porary sedative. It is satisfactory, how- | ever, to receive the assurance that "our | nerves will gradually accustom themselves | to the new tetanic atmosphere, and undergo | an acclimatisation just as a plant does when | transferred to the tropics, after having been | raised in the temperate zone;" so that"our < children will be less nervous than we are, ['■ and our grandchildren and groat- ' I grandchildren, by the operation of i a natural law, will be able to resist giving g themselves wholly to the physical and moral j: excitements of modern civilisation." n £ In the recent attack on the Spanish posi- | tion at Manila the defenders lost 150 killed P and 300 wounded. The Americans captured I 12,000 rifles. After the Spanish troops siir- | rendered, the insurgents, it is reported, atI tacked the Americans, but were easily reJ pulsed. Martial law lias been proclaimed in 1 J Manila. Insurgents are not permitted to j enter the city, except unarmed. The AmeriI can press is indignant at the German Admiral assisting General Auguste to escape. It is stated that after evacuating a town in Puerto , Rico the Spanish troops returned, and tore ( | an American flag which the inhabitants had 1 i hoisted, and killed 90 persons. Reports of ' | ■ the Pope's health are now reassuring. Many j fires have occurred on the Continent. A < I conflagration in Finisterre has destroyed half 1 s the town. Numerous accidents have hap- 1 | pened in the Austrian Alps, 10 persons hav- j j ing lost their lives in one week. Anarchy is , I said to be rife in Crete. By a railway acci- 1 j dent in Cape Colony five Europeans and 25 | Kaffirs were killed. Eight deaths from heat ' I have occurred in Paris. I