Literary Gossip.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 245, 20 May 1876, Page 6

Literary Gossip.

Mdlle. de la Ram 6, better known to readers of sensational fiction as “ Ouida, has, it is said, lately been married to a Russian gentleman. The authorities of Trinity College, Dublin, have undertaken to assist the publication of the “Book of the Dead,” by photographing the fine papyrus of this text, which is preserved in the library of the college. A Russian paper announces that a successful speculator in Ural gold, Cybulski by name, has presented the sum of 100,000 roubles to the town of Tonsk, in Asiatic Russia, to be used in founding a Siberian University. The question of the establishment of a chair of Chinese was discussed at a congregation held at Oxford lately. A number of gentlemen interested in China had offered an annuity arising from a capital sum of not less than three thousand pounds, if James Regge, DL.D., a Presbyterian minister, who had%een a missionary in China, were chosen first professor of the Chinese language and literature. A further grant was promised by the President and Bellows of Corpus Christi College. Although M- Gounod’s “Polyeucte Martyr has long been finished, there is no likelihood of its production just yet. The composer would like Madame Patti to be the Pauline, the character in Corneille’s play represented in London by Rachel with such singular success some five and twenty years ago under the late Mr. Mitchell’s auspices ;_ but the charming singer requires such an immense honorarium as to preclude all hope of the arrangement of terms.

Amongst the many works Mr. J- H. Foley, R.A., left unfinished at his death was a statue of the late Earl of Rosse, the astronomical mechanician, for which he had been commissioned by a committee of Irish subscribers. The statue has now been completed under the direction of Mr. Foley’s executors, and will forthwith be forwarded to Parsonstown, King’s County, where it is to be erected. It was at Parsonstown, it will be remembered, that the Earl of Rosse constructed the great telescope,

which, at the time, was accepted as the eighth wonder of the world. The ninth will have been accomplished if the local committee in King’s County succeed in unveiling the statue without a squabble. Verdi, the eminent composer, it is stated, has refused an offer of 200,000 fr. in gold to conduct a series of concerts in July and August at Philadelphia. The music for the forthcoming stage version of Mr. Tennyson’s “ Queen Mary” has, it is stated, been written by Mr. C. V. Stanford, organist of Trinity College. The Poet Laureate and Mr. Irving have recently had frequent consultations as to alterations necessary in the drama of “Queen Mary,” in order to adapt it to the stage. Most of Cranmer’s speeches have been, it is stated, considerably curtailed, and some of them will probably be omitted altogether. The Academy of Sciences, Letters, and Arts of Amiens, has announced as the subject of its prize for 1876: —“The importance of play for children and young people, from the point of view of physical and moral education, to compare them with gymnastic exercises.” The prize is a gold medal of the value of 200 fr., to be awarded on a day to be fixed hereafter. Retribution ! Mr. Leslie Stephen is the editor of the “ Cornhill,” in which magazine this month Mr. Forster is frequently mentioned as Foster. (“ I have been trying all my life to get my own name spelt correctly, and have only very imperfectly succeeded.”—J. F., in “ iiife of Dickens.”) In a column of sepulchral liveliness published last week in the journal which was once edited by Mr. Forster himself, and which is not dead yet, as most people thought, under the appropriate heading of “ Variorum Notes,” the “ Cornhill” editor is referred to as Mr. Leslie Stephens. Mr. Phillips Jodrell, M.A., late fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, has offered two or more exhibitions of £25 a year each, tenable for three years, to be given for proficiency in the Cambridge local examinations in December, in 1876, to girls who are preparing for the profession of teaching. Also two or more exhibitions of £25 a year each, tenable for three years, to be given for proficiency in the Cambridge higher local examinations, in June, 1876, to women who are preparing for the profession of teaching. The “ Newspaper Press Directory ” has been issued by Mitchell and Co. for the thirty-first time. It is generally recognised as the most reliable authority on Press matters, and the edition for the present year is characterised by the same accuracy and fulness of detail as its predecessors. "We notice that there are now in England 1276 newspapers, including 320 published in London, in Wales 57, in Scotland 152, in Ireland 138, and in the British isles 19, making a total of 1642. The magazines now in course of publication, includ- - ing°the “ Quarterlies,” number. 657, of which no fewer than 238 are of a decidedly religious character. In Germany the question of orthographic reform appears to have been agitated to some purpose. A commission created by the Imperial Government is now in session at Berlin, and its object is to recommend a purely phonetic system of spelling. The Prussian Minister of Education is said to be prepared to enforce in the schools of that country the changes recommended by the commission. German orthography is already simplicity itself compared with that of the English language. The pronunciation of words is indicated" perfectly by their spelling, with very few exceptions, but there are such, and then occurs a silent letter which slightly affects the following or preceding vowel sound, or distinguishes a word from another of the same sound but of different meaning. The silent letters the commission intend to suppress. For instance, Thor it proposes to spell Tor-, Icihm, lam ; and so on with the whole class of words containing a silent h. The double consonant is no longer to be used at the end of words like Mann and Lamm. There would seem to be some room for improvement in the fearfully irregular and irrational spelling of English, when a few trifling defects in the second great language of the civilised world engage the attention of Imperial commissioners and learned University professors. THE JAPANESE PRESS. (From the Straits Times.) The Japanese Government have lately enacted very stringent Press laws, with a view to keep a tight hand upon native newspapers, by punishing the publication of anything displeasing to the Government. Thereupon an enterprising Britisher, Mr. J. R. Black, started a Japanese newspaper himself in Tokio, in which the Japanese could air their grievances and bid their authorities defiance. The paper flourished for a time, to the wrath of the Japanese Government, but they were not to be done. They made serious representations to the British Minister, and Sir Harry Parkes has startled the foreign editorial mind all over Japan and China with the following summary notification to Her Majesty’s lieges in Japan : The Japanese Government having represented to the undersigned that the publication of newspapers in the Japanese language by persons who are not subject to the Japanese Press laws may be subversive of internal order, and cause grave injury, to the public interests of Japan, and the said Government having also requested the undei'signed, on these grounds, to prohibit the publication of such newspapers by British subjects, the undersigned, her Brittanic Majesty’s Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary in Japan, in pursuance of sections 35, 86, and 90 of the China and Japan Order in Council, 1865, hereby makes and establishes the following regulation, and declares that the same being urgent, it shall, in pursuance of section °SS of the said Order in Council, have the effect in said Consular district of Japan, at the time and in the manner provided by the said Order in Council, unless and until it is disapproved by her Majesty, and such

disapproval is received and published in the manner prescribed by the Order in Council aforesaid. REGULATION. Any British subject who. shall within the dominion of his Imperial Majesty, the Mikado, print or publish a newspaper in the Japanese language, shall be deemed guilty of an offence, and upon conviction thereof before any British Consular or other Court, shall be liable to imprisonment for any term not exceeding three months, with or without hard labor, and with or without a fine not exceeding five hundred dollars without imprisonment. Given under my hand at the British Legation in Japan at Yedo this seventh day of February, A.D., 1876. (Signed) Harry S. Parkes, Her Britannic Majesty’s Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary in Japan. The foreign Press seem generally inclined to condemn the above proclamation as something woi'se than anything ever done by the Czar of Russia, or the late Emperor of France, or any other autocrat, and some language more vigorous than civil has been freely applied to Sir Harry Parkes. But it seems to us that with every respect the liberty of the Press and of the subject, it is only reasonable that the wishes of the J apanese authorities upon this point should be complied with. They, and they alone, are the guardians of the peace of the realm, and it would be intolerable that a British subject should with impunity enable Japanese subjects to break the laws of the empire and flout its government.