HERE AND THERE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1095, 24 February 1893, Page 31

HERE AND THERE.

Mr George Augustus Sala writes in the Sunday Times : In his delightful ‘ Reminiscences,' Mr Sanlloy tells some droll stories about the once well-known playwright, Mr Edward Fitzball, whom I knew very well, and who shortly before his death, some thirty years ago, published his own autobiography, in which, possibly, there may be some stories about Mr Santley. The eminent baritone alludes pleasantly enough to poor Fitzball’s ‘ infirmity of tho nasal organ,’ which led him to say 'dot ’ for not, ‘ robadtic’ for romantic, and a ‘ huddrod biles ’ fora hundred miles. But more than this, poor ‘ Ball ’ as we used to call him, was the victim, iu conversation at least, of a constant confusion of ideas. lie would meet you, for instance, in the street and say, ‘I be buck bedderdow ; ray budder’s det. I dod’t bead w’ab you bead , but you you soe I'be so buch beddor begause my buddor’e det.’ Nor did he moan it himself, for ho was a most kind-hearted and affectionate creature. Curiously enough, when Mr Santley was a lad of fourteon there wus at the Thoalro Royal, Drury Lane, under Bunn’s management, au English operatic singer of much merit —I forget whether he was a baritone or bass —whose stage name was Borrani, and who, like Fitzball, was troubled with * an infirmity of the nasal organ ’—that is to say, his intonation inevitable induced the inferenoe that ho was suffering from a severe cold in his head. This was how he was wont to render the well-known song in Yincent Wallace’s opera of ‘ Maritana ’ Ear be, gedtle Baritada ; By the bagic of thy beaudy, Ear be swear do fair Gitada, This vondfc heart beads but for thee, We all remember the catarh-striokon lovers in Punoh. ‘Swear by tho bool. Oh! swear dot by the bool—the incodstandt bool ! ’ Meaning the moon. The new White Star steamers, being built to lower the record of the coming Cunarderg, are said to be 700 feet long by 70 feet beam ; horse power, 30,000. Of Mr Gladstone’s now familiar designation, ‘ the Grand Old Man,’ Mr Henry W. Lucy says in his book— ‘ A Diary of the Salisbury Parliament ’: —‘ The origin of the phrase is already beginning to he lost in obscurity, but tho honour of its invention belongs to Sir William Harcourt. It will be found in one of his early addresses to his constituents in Derby, end had its birth amid the exultation fehao followed on Mr Gladstone’s return to power in 1880, on tho ruin of Lord Beaconsfiold’s Government..’ Mr Lucy adds: ‘ Thero is still another name for Mr Gladstone, reserved for the inner circle of his official colleagues. To them ho is always “ Mr and the amount of expression this i initial is capable of can be estimated only by

those acoustomed to hear it Bpoken in the varying moods in which Mr Gladstone leavei his colleagues.’ Or.e of the anecdotes (old in Mr Lucy’* ‘Diary of the Salisbury Parliament’ has \ reference to the half-crown which Lord Lovesou (now Lord Granville) ‘ swallowed among other delicacies at Christmas, whilst engaged upon an amateur conjuring performance.’ ‘ He was,’ says Mr Lucy, ‘ not a penny, much less half a crown tho worse for the adventure. “ He has gained 111 b,” said Lord Granville to a youthful colleague on the front bench, who was inquiring after Lord Loveson’s health. “ Ah," said the witty peer, “that makes £ll 2s 6d.” ’ Another anecdote is from the store of Sir Wilfrid Lawson, whom it personally concerns. Sir Wilfrid was romping one day in the house of o friend with a little boy, to whom lie said : * Well my boy, we have been groat friends ; but it’s odd we were never introduced. I don’t know what your name is, aud 1 am sure you have not the slightest idea who I am.’ ‘ Oh, yes,’ said the small boy, ‘ I know yctf well. You are the celebrated drunkard.' Mr Lucy traces pleasantly enough Mr Balfour’s forced development from the blase young Sadducee of the ’BO Parliament to the fairly strenuous loader of to day. It is doubtful whether even the prophetic soul of Mr Balfour’s uncle ventured to forecast the brilliant parliamentary success to be achieved in an incredibly brief space of time. Whilst yet unattaoked Mr Balfour was always a pretty speaker, with a neat turn for saying nasty things. But as he sprawled on the bench below the gangway he was taken at best for a parliamentary flaneur, a trifler with debate, anxious chiefly iu some leisure moments to practiso the paces learned in the hall of the union at Cambridge. He was not sufficiently in earnest or adequately industrious to take his full share in the labours of tho Fourth Party. It was all vorv well for. Mr Gorst and Sir Henry Wolff to scorn delights and spend laborious hours over blue-books in order to confound Mr Gladstone, and to show either that the Khedive was a rogue aud the Emperor of Russia an injured person, or vioe versa, according as the exigencies of the moment required. The freshness, versatility, audacity of the new party had attractions occasionally irresistible for Mr Balfour. On a field night he might be counted upon to lend his aid, and Mr Beresford Hope, exiled to the front Opposition bench, chortled in his joy as he watched and listened to his nephew standing in his own familiar place in the corner seat below the gangway, sneering at Sir Stafford Northcote, and speaking disrespectfully of Mr Gladstone. The fair-faced, languid youth, too indolent to stand bolt upright, was tho very last person likely to develop into a civiL Cromwell—the most unbending, thorough administrator of iron rule Ireland has known since ’9B. There was no trace of the mailed, hand under the silken glove that occasionally dallied with questions coming before the Parliament of 1880. There is a reminiscence of a fnvourita oharacter of Mr Lucy’s parliamentary days the great and glorious Major O’Gorman, Once tho Major took part in a thrilling scene, in which the other chief actor was Mr Disraeli. It was thirteen years ago, tho House of Commons being then, as now, engaged in discussing Irish affairs. A Coercion Bill was under debate, and after long talk Mr Disraeli rosa to wind it up. The Major had been dining, and had, after his manner, sat a long tim# after dinner. He was in more than usually patriotic mood, and on returning to tho House, finding the Premier on his feet, ho marked the conclusion of one of his sentences by a resonant ‘ No !’ Cries of ' Order ’ sefc the Major off with increased ferocity. Ho bellowed, ‘ No, no, no,’ like a Bull of Basban. Mr Disraeli, always happy in retort, goodhumouredly observed that if the ejaculation was to bo taken as a reply, the hon. member was precluded from taking further part in tlio proceedings. Then the Major jumped up and bellowed out, ‘ I havo not spoken one word l* In eleven months of last year 416,383ga15, Australian wine were received in Great Britain as against 364,028ga15. in the corresponding period of the previous year. A London paper gives some interesting dofails as to the career of a telephone hero, Mr Graham Bell : ‘ I see from the papers that the inventor of tho telephone—as it is known to us—wag present at the inauguration of the Now York* Chicago wire. There is one man in Great Britain who never—well, hardly ever—hearg the word telephone pronounced without, metaphorically, tearing his hair out. Til® gentleman in question is a miller of repute ia Edinburgh. Graham Bell and he wera friends in boyhood ; and the former wag regarded as something of a crank by hig friends. There was nob a single bit of machinery he did not suggest improvements upon ; and often he would emerge, floury but happy, from a lengthened inspection of machinery which the ordinary mortal cannot ever hope to comprehend. ‘ln the course of time Bell emigrated to the States, where, I understand, affairs wero not always couleur de rose. There an idea, which had long lain semi-dormant in hig brain, took practical shape; but, like Elias Howe and his sewing-machine, the cursod lack of cents prevented for many a day its material appearance. When at last Ilia dollars were scraped together, and the rough model finished, 801 l found himself in another quandary. Here wus tho machine, the machine which, twenty years later, was to revolutionise our business habits, ready to be put in the market, and no one would back the }oung inventor, even to the extent of covering the patent foes. The man was a crank. ‘ So, after much hesitation, Bell shipped his precious telephone to Europe, directed to his oi l friend in Edinburgh. With the mail came a letter explaining the invention, and after it many others. The case vs as 6afely

stowed away in the mill lumbor room, no one •Ten taking the bother to open it. There it lay, I think, for years, forgotten by everyone except 8011. His fortunes had mended in the meantime, and one day his miller fr,end vas astonished to receive a request that the case should be forwarded to London at once. Bell had found his capitalist, and the poor crank is now a man with a princely revenue, half of which might havo been the miller’s—but then he might heve lost a hundred pounds or so. Bell was suoh a crank. Lord Jersey says he did not apply for leave of absence, because ‘ he believed it; would not be right to leave so large and important a colony as N.S.W. without a Governor for any length of time.’ That’s the way (says the Bulletin) with these vice-regal gentlemen ; they believe they are the governors on the national steam-engine, whilst really they are only the brass filagree on the fire-box doors. A too constant admirer of la divme Sarah has just gone over to the majority, in Paris, under rather melancholy circumstances. This elderly gentleman, BrJn&tre by name, was a respeotable and prosperous smployd at the Caisse Municipals of the French capital, until, fifteen years ago, he went to see the fair Bernhardt act in * Hernani.* That fatal hour fixed his destiny ; he came out of the Theatre Franqais distractedly in love with ■with the gifted tragedienne ; and, after dreaming of her all night, he went to his office in the morning with his head full of Dona Sol instead of his business. He sat down and wrote a passionate declaration of his feelings, followed by an offer of his hand snd modest fortune, on the official note-paper whereon he should have been inscribing business records; and every day he repeated this fervent proffer of affeotion. y * • • • For some weeks Sarah took no notioe of this importunate suitor, but after a time his daily letters became wearisome; and when it had gone on for nearly three months she became so angry at the sight of the matutinal epistle, four pages long, that she wrote.to the head cashier, requesting that he would interpose to rid her of this amatory persecution. On receipt of her appeal a sharp reprimand was given to the unhappy for wasting his time and using the municipal stationery, thus, in futile persecution of a great artiste who wished for none of his devotion ; and it so affected his mind that he became morose and taciturn, and in a few weeks went quite out of his mind and had to be removed to the lunatic asylum at Ville Evrard. During the years that have passed since 1877, he has never oeaaed to believe that Sarah Bernhardt would oome and fetch him from thence for the purpose of uniting herself to him in the bonds of holy matrimony; and constant to that hope, and to his love for her, he died a days ago in the asylum. Mr Labouchere is doing excellent service hy exposing in his Truth pillory, the imbecilities of the English country 1 Justices.’ Here are two or three samples:— Worcester County Worcester County Petty Sessions. Be- Petty Sessions. Before R. Berkeley and fore the same eight other Magis- Bench. ChristinaTaytrates. Wm. Barker lor charged with and John Roberts sleeping out. Fourcharged with cruelty teen days' hard to a horse. It could labour, not draw a heavy Worcester Policeload up a hill, so they court. Before Hon beat it and kicked it Percy Allsopp, M.P., until the animal was and Alderman Oaldicovered with weals cott. Henry Burston and blood oozed from charged with sleeping the cuts. Fined £t in a shed. Fourteen and oosts each. days’ hard labour. Fourteen days for ‘ Bleeping out.’ What an iniquity! Another disgraceful case quoted by Truth ' is as follows:—Wimborne Petty Sessions. Before Captain C. S. Glyn and Colonel Portman. Ellen Carter charged with assaulting Mrs Asher by striking her in the abdomen so that she had been under medical treatment and unable to walk since. A solicitor for the prosecution called attention to a letter which had been written by one of the Magistrates, the Rov Carr Glyn, who said, ‘ I hope you will not press the assault case against Carter, as you will lose a day on Friday, and make things moro unpleasant in the future. Drop the summons, and try and live well together.’ Fined Is and costs. Mr Hyndman, whom Sir W. Haroourt has "been making so ridiculous regarding the unemployed queßtiou, is the leading Social Democrat. There used to be four, but they did not get on well together, and Mr Hyndman hns now no rival. The special features about Mr Hyndman are a long beard and a process of perpetual buttoning and unbuttoning his coat. When ho came down from tho University he wrote a clever article in tho Nineteenth Century on Cuiver, contested Marylebone as a Tory Democrat with so many different convictions that the printeis who did his bills made a small fortune, met Karl Marx and became a Social Democrat. He is a relation of tho Duchess of Roxbugb. Latterly he has been very quiet, and his place in Revolutionary Socialism is being taken by Mr Hunter Watts, a provision dealer. IK The total output for the just-concluded Queensland sugar-crushing season was 60,650 tons, aB against an estimated yield of 57,127. The latest gossip about the Prime Minister (says a London paperl is that he thinks oi having a special telephone laid on to Downing slreet, so that ho can hoar tin Homo Rule debates—and, indeed, all tin proceedings of Parliament —without tin excitement and fatigue of the Chamber. Tin theatroplione is in vogue in Peris, and ir Birmingham certain popular preachers hav< telephonic arrangements whereby their ser mons can be heard at the firoside of theii parishioners. Why, then, should not Mi Gladstone use all the resources of civilizatioi fco help him in his arduous task of the cominj session?'

A missing word lottery was inaugurated the other day by a few restless spirits on the Manchester Royal Exchange, who know not how to endure the tedious hours of enforced idleness during the present stagnation of business. Tho mystic sentence which was to be the basis of the competition ran as follows : —' Moses Abrahams was a !’ A very large entry came forward and the stake assumed somewhat alarming proportions, when, on the final scrutiny being made, it was found that.no one had been successful. Yet the missing word was ‘ gentleman !’ Recently Sii James Crichton Browne, tho great physician, tho late Thomas Woolnor, R.A., and Mr Balfour Browne, Q. 0., sitting at different parts of a London dinner table, were in turn banded a portrait of Dr Neill Cream and asked who it was. Each one said, , ‘ Oh, it’s Deeming.’ The likeness between tho murderers must have been great. . i New Zealand may have an occasional high- J wayman of the bogus, Taranaki stump, but the American railway highwayman is a type unknown in Maoriland. A New York paper of .Deoember 21 says ‘ As the Cincinnati express train on the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway was leaving Huntingdon late on Monday night, the doors of a carriage were suddenly opened and four masked men, each | with a brace of pistols, ordered the passengers i to throw up their hands. Two of the passengers Beized one of the robbers, throw him down, and endeavoured to disarm him. In the scuffle one of the passengers, a German resident of Cincinnati, who had started on his bridal trip to Europe was mortally wounded. Another, named Peter Drake, of Cincinnati, was wounded in tho leg and arm. While this desperate oonflict was proceeding, Zingley, the ticket collector, secured a couple of revolvers and discharged the contents of all the barrels at the robbers. Seeing that further persistence was useless, the thieves pulled the bell-cord and jumped off the train. In the darkness they managed to effect their escape, although they are believed to have been seriously wounded. Thore was intense excitement on the train during tho conflict — women fainting, children screaming, and many people trying to get under the seats of the carriages. An American showman had a lion which he called ‘ J.G., short for Jay Gould, because he swallowed everything he camo across.’ A good deal has lately been written about Arctic adventures. The December number of Blackwood’s Magazine contains a readable article in which tho writer contrasts tho haphazard expeditions of a Davis or a Hudson with the elaborate equipment of the perfectly constructed vessels which were commanded by Sir George Nares. He tel's us that the ships in these haphazard expeditions seldom carried a surgeon, and yet tho victualling, if tho cruise was unduly prolonged, was sure to cut out work for tho faculty. There was laid in good store of salt meats and salt fish, but there was neither lime-juice nor anti scorbutics of any kind. One thing the men had in their favour. They drew their drink, so long as these lasted, from barrels of sound English ale. This, he rightly adds, was more wholesome than the fiery new rum of the period, and more nourishing than the diluted spirit which at a later dalo got the name, of grog, from the sobriquet of a gallant admiral who wont in for temperance on the unhealthy West Indian station. The Dominion of Canada has an area as large as that of Europe. It has a population of nearly five millions, or an average of less than one and a half to the square mile. The majority of the inhabitants are British immigrants and their descondents, except in the Province of Quebec, where five sevenths of the inhabitants aro of French extraction. There are also about 100,000 Indians in the ! North-West. Phil Armour, who has just given £300,000 to endow the Armour Institute in Chicago, is one of the big men of the ‘ Garden City ’ — big physically, financially, and politically. He is also one of the moat hard-working men in the United States, and the traveller arriving in Chicago by one of the early morning trains, should he chance to pass the Armour office between seven and half-past., will always Bee the ‘ head of the firm ’ hard at work at his big desk by the window. Mr Armour does not reqnire or expect his employes to keep the same early hours, and, in fact, rather prides himself on being the first to arrive at the office. The record of his immense business is condensed as far as possible, and placed in an immense ledger, and the inspection of this daily record is his first work each morning. Mr Armour has four managers, each receiving a salary of £4OOO per annum. While it is probable that the successful pork packer, like old Perkyn Middlowick in ‘ Our Boys,’ novor passes a pig without a desire to lift his hat, and so acknowledge a debt of gratitude, a large portion of his fortune, now estimated at £5,000,000, has been made out of railways.

The farewell tea meeting given to the Rev. Mr Griffin by hi 3 parishioners took place on Tuesday night of last week in the Oddfellows’ Hall, Waipawa, and it proved a successful affair. After the tea had been disposed of, the Rev. Mr Dodds took the chair, and in a capital speech alluded to the devotion shown by Mr Griffin in the discharge of his duties, and he hoped he would succeed in his new sphere of labour. Addresses were also delivered by the Rov. Mr Gardiner, and Mr Macfarlano. Mr Maddison then, on behalf of the Methodists of Waipawa, presented the Rev. Mr Griffin with a purse of 30 sovereigns as a slight acknowledgment of the manner in which he had carried out his duties.

Visiting cards tastefully printed at 5s per hundred, post free, at the New ZEALAND kUXL office,