THE BYSTANDER.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1288, 5 November 1896, Page 13

THE BYSTANDER.

“ vVhen found make a note of.” —Capt. Cuttle

“ Maiden Speeches in Parliament ” is the title of an excellent article in

Gladstone’s MAIDEN SPEECH.

the September number of the Windsor Magazine. The first place is given to an account of Mr Gladstone’s debut. “ On February 21, 1833, a petition

was presented relative to electoral corruption at Liverpool, and, prompted doubtless by a sensitive concern for the honour of his birthplace, the new member ventured to interpose in the discussion, which, in accordance with, the then existing rule of the House, was allowed to take place when its prayer had been read. The new Parliament had not been in session a month, and Mr Gladstone—who had been returned for Newark at the general election in the preceding December —was, it must be supposed, still overawed by his surroundings. At any rate, the young man of 23 was described by the newspapers of the following morning as having been ‘inaudible in the gallery/ a circumstance which may have been, however, as much due to the wretched accommodation of the reporters at that time as to the failure of the voice that has since thrilled tens of thousanas. But the most remarkable 1 estimony to the contemporaneous effect of the speech was not published till many years after in the memoirs of Lord Albemarle. ‘ One evening on taking my place I found on his legs a beardless youth, with whose appearance and manner I was greatly struck ; he had an earnest, intelligent countenance, and large expressive black eyes. Young as he was he had evidently what is called the ear of the House,” and yet the cause he advocated was not one likely to interest a popular assembly—that of the planter versus the slave. I had placed myself behind the Treasury Bench. “ Who is it ? I asked one of the Ministers. I was answered, “He is the member for Newark —a young fellow who will some day make a great figure in Parliament,” said Stanley/ ”

The story of Lord Hartington’s copy of the confidential document in

FOREIGN OFFICE PAPERS.

relation to the defences of Constantinople, issued to members of the Gladstone Cabinet of 1880-4, having

fallen into a waste-paper basket and been sold as waste —as related in our columns the other day —is (says a London paper) probably unparalleled in the history of secret State papers. The greatest precaution is taken to ensure that Foreign Office documents especially shall not fall into wrong hands. It is not generally known that at the Foreign Office there is a small printing establishment, in which only one compositor, old and trustworthy, is employed to put into type and print the required number of copies of any lengthy document in relation to Foreign Affairs which the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister may think it necessary to circulate among their colleagues in the Cabinet. In the case of a big document of a confidential character the necessary copies are made by one of the private secretaries of the Foreign Minister. It is the rule for Ministers to destroy their copies of such papers after the Cabinet has come to a decision on the matter.

The Home Rule Bill of 1893, after it had

left the hands of the Govern-

THE DRAFT OF THE HOME RULE BILL OF 1893.

ment draughtsmen, was too big a document to have printed hurriedly for Cabinet purposes in the printing office of the Foreign Office. It was accordingly sent to the Queen’s Printers, but the copy was

distributed amongst the compositors in portions so minute that none of the men could form any conception of the proposals of the Bill from tho piece he got to set or put into type. One of tho overseers placed the several “takes” together, in their proper order, printed tho necessary number of copies, and then had the type immediately distributed. And yet one of these printed drafts of the Home Rule Bill was found on a writing-desk in the library of the Reform Club! It was left there by a careless Minister. However, the finder returned the precious document forthwith to its owner. The latter must have trembled when he thought of tho look the face of Mr Gladstone would have worn at the Cabinet Council had the Bill, through his carelessness, been made public before it was introduced in the House of Commons.

“ Civilisation,” writes Miss O'Conor Eccles in the September issue

is CIVILISATION AN ADVANTAGE ?

of the Windsor Magazine, “ is largely a fraud. To it we owe not only ennui, but the depressing forms of amusement we have invented to kill time. In civilisation we have ‘At Homes/ with songs and

recitations ,* the suave and enlivening organgrinder, who replies, ‘ Me no speakee Inglis/ when told to go away, and such gems of combined music and verse as “Sister Mary Jane's top note.” To civilisation we owe the public-house—which is, I believe, considered an advantage by some people popular seaside resorts, problem plays, and the professional philanthropists. It has created for us an artificial environment and artificial wants. Things are good, bad, or indifferent, not because they are so in themselves, but because in every place a certain set of people, whom nobody knows, have made a certain set of rules, which few know, that arbitrarily include this and exclude that. Not to be * conversant with the forms of the little milieu wherein onp lives is unpardonable ; but move just a few hundred miles from home and you find another set, just as arbitrary, and just as meaningless. In London you must not be seen in town in

August under pain of forfeiting your selfrespect. In Germany, if you sit on a sofa without being asked, you proclaim yourself to be a bumptious son, ignorant of polite society. Pules in themselves have their uses, so long as they are founded on com-mon-sense. What I complain of is that civilisation teaches us to set a higher value on the observance of a certain shibboleth than on personal worth. Our judgment of others is warped thereby, and things have come to such a pass that St. Peter himself, if he appeared amongst us, would be treated with contempt if he drank his tea, as the simple fisherman probably would, from a saucer.

The following singular inscription is to be found over the old-fashioned

CURIOUS INSCRIPTION.

fireplace of an inn at Bradwell, a quaint little out-of-the-world waterside spot ou. the Blackwater River in East

Essex: — More shall trust score I sent Pur what I my and has D, beer if pay Clark brewer I my and must hi 3 the. At the first glance this appears to have neither rhyme nor reason, but reading from the last word “the” and following the columns from the bottom to the top we get at the meaning : The his must and mv I brewer Clark pay if beer do bus and my 1 what f.>r sent I score trust shall more.

We fear that the story of a conversation between the Prince of Monte-

THE prince’s “articles OF EXPORT.”

negro and an English traveller (which comes from a Vienna source) is rather too good to be true. The Englishman complimented the Prince upon the extreme beauty of the

land, but expressed regret at its poverty and at its total defect of articles of export. “ Oh, but we have some valuable articles of export,” said the Prince. “ Indeed, your Highness,” replied the Englishman, “and what may they be?” “My daughters,” said the princely poet and wit of the Black Mountains.

A direct descendant of Dr Martin Luther, in the person of Johann Fried-

a descendant of LUTHER.

rich Luther, has just died at New York at the age of 90. Johann Luther was born at Asler, near Wetzlar, on 24th November, 1808. He learnt

carpentry, organ building and pianoforte making. He is said to have built the first grand upright piano, and in New York, where he settled in 1837, he established the first pianoforte manufactory.

That the bagpipes are really gaining a certain degree of popularity

LADIES AND THE BAGPIPES.

among women —at all events in Scotland —there can be no denying. Glasgow and Edinburgh makers of “ drawingroom ” or “ reel ” sets of pipes

are turning out large numbers of beautifully - finished and richly - ornamented instruments that, with all the parts of the great Highland war-pipe, or piob-mhor, have yet their tone softened sufficient to make them sound rather sweetly in a room or hall. Many Scottish ladies of good family play either the Celtic harp or the bagpipes, and one of the most successful performers on the latter instrument is Miss Elspeth Campbell, daughter of Lord Archibald Campbell, the Duke of Argyll’s second son.

“ Travel through Ireland, north, south, east or west, and you will

IRISH TEMPERAMENT.

find,” says a writer on Irish temperament, “that tiro ‘ Mickey Frees,’ £ IIa nd y

Andys,’ and ‘ Larry Doolins,’ instead of being as plentiful as blackberries on a hedge in September, are as rare as Summer snrw. The Irish are a laughing, jovial, witty people, taking them all in all; but on the other hand, though the statement may seem contradictory, they are probably the most melancholy people under the sun. 'The people of Ireland are like the skies above them —there, is a perpetual blending of sunshine and rain, the smile and the tear. They have not the equable temperameut of the English peasants, they are possessed of finer, keener, acuter, and more sensitive feelings, and they obtain more fun out of their pleasures and more pain out of their sorrows and misfortunes.”

Actors are not even parrots—they arc automatic puppets that move

THE GLORIFICATION OF ACTORS.

their limbs m fixed fashions, and make squeaking sounds at prescribed moments. There was a French Minister of

Education who drew up a most rigid time-code, which hung in his bureau; and it was tho joy of his life to take out his watch and say “ Half-past three ! Ha! every boy in France is now learning geography or, “ A quarter to twelve! Ha! every French schoolgirl is now writing in a copy-book.” I have the same sort of feeling about my actor acquaintances. “ Half-past nine ? Ah! What is Herbert doing P He is taking poison.” “ A quarter to eleven ! Dear me! Rose is crawling under a table.” And these creatures want every privilege, forsooth ! Fame, gold, champagne, the best society and the worst. To be of Bohemia and Belgravia, to make the best of both woi’lds. If things don’t mend, to sit in a stall will soon become an index of imbecility. It will be like being seen at the Academy.—l. Zangwill, in the Pall Mall Magazine.

Bach dedicated all his compositions to the service of God, and, not less

GREAT MUSICIANS.

than Milton, worked ever as in the great Taskmaster’s

eye. Handel, gross as were his faults, had strong religious feeling. The smaller ills of life exacerbated his temper ; but when overtaken by blindness which, by a melancholy coincidence,

darkened the later years of his great contemporary Bach, he submitted himself to the dispensation with pious resignation. “If I am spared a few years longer,” wrote Beethoven in a time of sore trouble, “I will thank the Almighty, accepting joy or sorrow' as it will please Him to ordain it.” Mozart’s Requiem could have come from none but a fundamentally religious nature. No one ever more truly acted out the wholesome maxim, “ Serve God and be chearful,” than did Haydn. “I cannot help it,” he said to one who pointed out that all his sacred pieces were marked by gaiety ; “ I give forth what is in me. When I think of the Divine Being my heart is so full of joy that the notes fly off as from a spindle ; and as He has given me a cheerful heart, He w'iil pardon me if I serve Him cheerfully.” Not less indicative of the essential spirituality of the musical temperament is the experience of Wagner, whose faith a pessimistic philosophy, enthusiastically embraced, could not destroy, but only diffuse into a mysticism which goes far to explain the spell his music has cast over minds strongly antagonistic to definite religious belief, but dimly conscious of spiritual cravings which negations can neither appease nor eradicate. In the case of Liszt the conflict long waged in a restless and penetrating mind between faith and doubt issued in the triumph of faith, and he ostentatiously proclaimed his adhesion to the Church with whidh the romantic temperament, whether expressed in music or literature, has such obvious affinities. — W. W. Hatchings, in Blackwood.

The special correspondent of the London Daily Telegraph at Pretoria

DEATH OF RIDER haggard’s “ SHE.”

says that General Joubert has received news of the recent death of Majajie, the mystical Queen of the Woodbush tribes. The deceased, who

had readied the ripe age of 120 years, was reputed to be the original of Rider Haggard’s “ She.” The Government has approved a successor, who is said to be also an aged woman.

A pupil at the Llandaff School for deaf and dumb has addressed the

A child’s LETTER TO THE QUEEN.

following letter to the Queen : —“My dear Queen Victoria, —I hope you are quite well. I am glad we have your large photo here. The boys and g-irls are happy. Mrs Melville is very kind. We always take

a walk to Cardiff and Llandaff. The boys and girls hailed on your birthday. The boys and girls are learning always at school. The clergymen are coming to examine us on Monday. I love you. I beliove in Jesus, I am learning Gospel history, Bible history, arithmetic and grammar. I have never seen you. I come from Montgomeryshire. I am deaf and dumb. I am glad to be able to road and write letters. I send my love to you. God bless you. —I remain, your affectionate subject, J.C.

Some interesting comparisons have recently

been made by a German savant in what lie terms the psychology of animals. He says: “It has often been pointed

ASS VERSUS HORSE.

out that a donkey is not half as stupid as he is popularly believed to be. Less well known is the fact that a horse is far less gifted than he has the reputation for. Wherever you go, you can observe that a horse is a tolerably intelligent, good, timid creature, which learns with difficulty when young and not at all when old. A donkey, on the other hand, is above all things an individuality; a headstrong fellow, who knows, with lightning quickness, what his master wants him to do, and frequently does exactly the opposite.

A Japanese author having resolved to

“paint” a book for the Japanese use a brush, and not a pen —he betakes himself to his workroom. It is a little room, a vcy little room.

HOW JAPANESE AUTHORS WORN.

“Two mats” is its Japanese measurement, and a mat is about six feet by four. The author sits on tho floor in a flowing garment of brown silk, lined with blue, his legs disposed comfortably under him. In front of him stands a lacquered table, about a foot high, and upon it his writing materials, which are as idyllic as his surroundings; his paper is delicately tinted yellow, with blue lines running up and down. His inkstand is a carved ebony slab with one end hollowed out for water to rub his cube of Indian ink in, and it holds the four or five daintily decorated bamboo brushes which are his pens. Naturally, he does not write his novel; he paints it. Beginning at the end of the whole, at the left of every page, and at the t»p of every line, straight down between the two parallels his small brown hand goes, with quick, delicate, dark touches. Although this novelist’s “ copy ” might seem to a stranger to be daintiness itself, yet he always has it duplicated “ by an artist” before sending it to the publishers, the success of the book depending so largely upon its artistic forth-bringing. The “ artist ” to whom the “ copy ” is now entrusted proceeds to repaint the long series of word pictures with a professional dexterity which is something astonishing.

It was bound to come. Since there are

bicycle corps in the Army and in the Volunteers, it could not but happen that General j. Booth must follow suit and mount some of his “ blood and

SALVATION ON WHEELS,

fire” soldiers on bicycles. A few of these mounted Salvationists, says the St. James’ Gazette, may be occasionally seen in London, flitting towards the headquarters of the Army in Queen Victoria street. But the task was allotted to Commander BoothTucker, now in charge of the American Army, to inaugurate an organised wheel corps in Now York. The first parade of this corps has lately been held, and the result seems to have been “all that could be

expected/’ though we learn that the fact was also revealed that the average Salvation soldier wobbles considerably on his wheel. This, however, is not surprising, since, besides guiding his mount, he has also to bear a banner, beat a drum, play a cornet, or brandish a War Cry. The Hallelujah lass, meanwhile, seems to have mastered the situation completely.

“ The elephant, standing in the furthest corner of his house, notices a

AND VERSUS ELEPHANT.

small piece of sugar at the other end, and appropriates it without delay. But this is less astonishing than when

the donkey, being stroked on the back by a visitor, turns round and pushes his head under the stranger’s hand, because, for some reason or other, he finds it more agreeable to have his head stroked than his back. The donkey, in this case, acts on a sudden and a very logical idea, while the elephant acts only as a result of much experience.”

The well-known Wesleyan preacher and author, the liev Mark Guy

A WESLEYAN'S EARTHLY' PARADISE.

Pearse, has found the Earthly Paradise. “ The climate of Durban (Port Natal) in winter,” he writes, “is simply the

very perfection of an ideal English summer; day after day a sky of cloudless blue and a blaze of sunshine. It is delicious simply to live. Oranges, bananas and pineapples are everywhere. Here, too, I made the acquaintance of the Avocarda pear—l am not sure of the spelling—but the fruit itself is something which leaves you wondering what heaven is like. If another paradise is to be lost by the tempt ation of a fruit, I am persuaded that the fruit will be the Avocarda pear.”

A touching little “dog story” comes from the Austrian Tyrol.

A FAITHFUL FRIEND.

One afternoon a few weeks ago, two farmers heard a peculiar bark which seemed to come out. of a deep abyss

near a neighbouring alpine hut. After a while as the whine continued, the men followed the sound, and climbed down to the place whence it came. Here, to their distress, they found the corpse ot an innkeeper near by, who had evidently been killed by a fall. By the side of his dead master sat a little clog. For thirty hours it had kept its watch, and its plaintive whines only ceased when the man’s body was taken up and carried home.

Dii Friedrich Thieme, the geographer,

has become jealous for the honour and dignity of the South Pole. Under the title of “ Der Siidpol,” he has com-

THE SOUTH POLE.

piled an elaborate history of the successive expeditions to “ the rival and equal of the North Pole,” as he terms it. He begins with the hypothetical guesses of Buff on and other scholars, and the voyage of Captain Cook in the eighteenth century, and carries down his narrative to the expeditions of the Challenger under Sir George Nares and of the Gazelle under the Gorman Vico - Admiral Von Scheinitz. The North Pole is the talk of the day, and the explorers and scientists all over Europe and America are enthusiastic over it. The astronomers at least, says Dr Thieme, ought to turn some of this enthusiasm towards its sister and rival at the other end of the globe, for the starry heavens of the Southern Hemisphere offer a spectacle absolutely different from that of our northern half of the world. The writer informs us ( Westminster Gazette) that while he was compiling his eager recommendations of the South Pole as a field for the explorer and the scientist, he was greeted by the welcome news that no less a person than the bold Nansen himself shares his feeling that the South Pole has been unduly neglected. It is Nansen’s hope and ambition, lie tells us, to become the leader of an expedition, with two ships, for the exploration of the Southern Polar region.

Tt is of great advantage to have a musical ear in tin; management of

TIIE AEVANTAG E Oh' A MUSICAL EAR.

rapidly moving machinery, as variations of pitch, and therefore of speed, can be readily detected. A farmer with a good ear can detect at once if the thrashing machine is im-

properly ‘‘fed,” for its speed increases and the sound it emits is higher pitch when an ixsuilicient amount or corn is supplied, and in the same way an electrician can tell if an electric motor is running at its due spood. With a musical car the physician more readily interprets the sounds elicited by percussing the chest, and the potter more easily separates the sound from the unsound, it is a mooted point whether the musical are naturally the better readers and speakers, but there is no doubt that they improve more quickly when taught elocution, for they caii appreciate the pitch of their own voices, and so correct their errors. A good ear includes an acute appreciation of time or rhythm. At all the principal railwaystations at Home, inspectors armed with light hammers examine the carriage wheels and axles, a sharp knock being given to each, the sound therefrom telling the experienced mechanic if they are sound or not.

“There is not a large or important known

language in the world which has not now the whole Bible translated into it,” Major Pauli, who has just retired from the service of the Bible Society, has been telling a New Age interviewer. “So

THE BIBLE IN 333 L A NGUAGES.

that, as far as language is concerned, we are able to put at least a gospel into the hands of three-quarters of the world s population. Notwithstanding this, at the present time we have translations or revisions of existing translations going on in more than 100 languages.” During the past twenty-five years the number of lan-

guages in which the society prints has increased from 200 to 333. Some years ago a Pushtu MS. was sent to the society from India with a request that it might be printed. But no one m Europe knew the language. At last it was suggested that it might be printed by means of zincography. For this purpose a copy of the MS. was obtained, and written, as beautifully and correctly as possible, in a large hand. It was then reduced by photography on prepared plates of zinc.

In the leading French review, the Revue cles Deux Mondes, M. Deherain

A FRENCHMAN ON THE KHALIFA.

has an interesting article on the Khalifa. He shows us the great Mahdi, Mohammed Ahmed, the conquerer of the

Soudan, appearing every day at the hour of prayer in the midst of his faithful followers. It would be difficult to exagerate the influence which this practice, continued perseveringly throughout his career, had upon the consolidation of his strange theocracy. At length, one day in June, ISSS, the people of Omdnrmau are alarmed by a report that the Mahdi has not appeared in public as usual, and that he is dangerously ill. It is true. Eying in one of the slightly raised beds, which in the Soudan are called angarebs, the dying Mahdi, the pretended envoy of God, whose design had been to conquer not only the Soudan, but Egypt and the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, shook off for a moment the fell typhus which had him in his grip that he might nominate a successor to carry out his schemes. This he did in the memorable words; “The Khalifa Abdullah is marked out by providence to be my successor. You have followed me and obeyed my orders ; do the same with him. May God have pity on me !’* The authority thus strangely conferred on him has been firmly defended by Abdullah, and for the past eleven years the territory, which extends from Dongola to Lake No on tho Upper Nile, and from Darfur to the River Atbara, has remained under his dominion, whatever the Dongola expedition may have in store for him in the way of a diminution of his power.

In France, Belgium and Germany experiments are being made with a

A NEW USE OF ALCOHOL.

view to the use of alcohol instead of petroleum in lamps. Alcohol burns with a blueishvellow flame which is hardly visible; but the flame has a

great heat, and it is proposed to utilise this properly for the production of a strong light on the principle of incandescent gas—by using special burners which will become incandescent. Experiments made with one of the ordinary incandescent burners nowin use, fitted to a lamp filled with aloohol much under “ proof,” have given most satisfactory results and show that the consumption of alcohol for a given candle-power is only half that of petroleum, and that the air remains more pure. Of course, the duty on alcohol makes it dearer, but the production of a commerc ; al alcohol, of a nature that would prevent fraud, and be free from duty, is taking place in France, and there is a great probability that alcohol lamps will be seen on the market at no distant date.

In a charming art : cle frcm t}ie oharming pen of William Dean Howells

“ ONE GOOD STORY DESERVES ANOTHER.”

on Longfellow in Harper, there is a story that the poet used to tell of Washington. It reminds me of another:

that is the best of good stories; they remin 1 you of others. Longfellow at Cambridge lived in a house that in the great war wa3 Washington’s headquarters. Longfellow rarely referred to this, but one day with peculiar relish he told his friend Howells the true version of a pious story concerning the aide-de-camp who had blundered in upon him while he was at prayer. The father of his country rose and rebuked the young man severely and then resumed his devotions. “ He rebuked him,” said Longfellow, lifting his brows, “by throwing his scabbard at his head.” I saw the beginning of a play called “ The Old Homestead.” It was built up year after year with fresh incidents, and became a standing theatrical dish, with a remarkable actor, Mr Denman Thompson, as the hero. When last I saw it I looked for the inoident that had captivated me years before; but it had been cut out. It was this: —The hero, an honest old fellow, had bean induced to visit a poor woman who was ill of a fever. Her only son, a beggar lad, bad brought Thompson to tho widow’s bedside. He kneeled down to pray with her. While thus engaged tho villain of the scene arrived. He was a wretch, and had come to seize the widow’s goods for rent, and was about to lay His hands upon the very bed where she was lying. The hero rose from his knees, took the villain by the neck and the breech. hurled him down-stairs, and then “ resui. d his devotions ” as if nothing unusual . ad happened.—Joseph Hatton in the Yorlcsuire Post.

The special correspondent of the London

Daily News was taken by Mr Gladstone’s son recently into Mr Gladstone’s library. There are some experiences (he writes) which, however long one lives, are never forgotten.

THE OLE MAN AT WORK.

I think my visit to that apartment will prove an enduring memory. At the other end of the room, before a table laden with books and manuscrips, sat Mr Gladstone, his profile sharply cut against the window. His back was ourved, and his face almost touched his quick-travelling pen. uHe will take no notice ; that is his way,” said Mr Henry Gladstone, in his ordinary tone of voice. “ But surely,” I whispered, “we shall disturb him if we talk.” “ Oh, no ” was the prompt reply, “ nothing disturbs him when he is absorbed like that in his work. His attention becomes so concentrated that he is oblivious to everything else. Besides, as you know, his hearing is mpaired.” 9