ENGLISH NOTES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 5247, 18 February 1882, Page 2 (Supplement)

ENGLISH NOTES.

(FROM A CORRESPONDENT.) * London, December 29fch. c You will doubtless have already heard * through the telegraph that Lefroy, the mur- * derer of Mr Gold on the Brighton railway, has ] paid the last penalty of the law. ITor some t days previous to the execution England was in ' a 1 state of the greatest excitement, and specula- a tions as to whether his strenuous endeavours.to > escape the scaffold would be successful became > the all-absorbing topic of conversation. Mem- ] bers of Parliament were making out-of-ses- : sion speeches that filled columns in the t dailies'; a French Ministry had fallen ] under most unusual and romantic cir- ( cumstances; storms and shipwrecks were c being reported from every quarter of the globe ; and yet, when the latest sayings and doings i of the convict had been conned over, all the j rest was left unread. As a last effort, Lefroy i made a cleyer attempt to rank himself as one of fc 1 those homicidal maniacs who are retained in t durance vile " at her Majesty's, pleasure," and s by way of escaping one crime lie cbnfessed'to 8 another, the murder of Lieutenant Roper, ' which occurred some few months back at b Chatham Barracks, and hinted at some two or three others. When these confessions reached t the publio ear a perfect howl of indignation i resounded from ono end of the country to the other, and loudly wero the wishes expressed J that the wretch should not escape his = i doom The authorities at the Home OfEce, i . however, were too wide awake to bo taken" in | '■ by this ruse, and "saw no reason for interfering i ' with the course of the law," and accordingly the < [ execution took place. Happily, too, before his i '. death Lefroy fully confessed his crime, ac- ! I knowlcdged the justice of his sentence, and i i added his regret that he should have been in- ' duced to confess other crimes, of which lie ! knew nothing, with a view to hoodwink ; justice. Some time back a rumour was prevalent that i i Mrs Langtry was about to appear as a profes* , : sional actress on the London boards. That 1 rumour, though not unfounded, was prema- ■ ture. After showing her pretty face in 'those inanimate imitations of tho .real drama that are known as "tableaux vi- ' vanls," Mrs Langtry determined to lot 3 the public know that she is something more than a doll, and that her charms are j. more than skin-deep. Accordingly she took _ part in a play brought out by the "Windsor ' Strollers," a celebrated and old-established amateur dramatic club; and bo well did she , perform her part that she has since appeared at the Haymarket Theatre in "She Stoops to ' Conquer," under the Bancroft management. Tho step from an amateur performance to a c professional engagement is a long one; and a iLondon pit—the real critics who make or damn a play — care not for pretty face 3or aristocratic connections ; they 1 only look for acting. At the Haymarket, c however, there is no" pit, all the floor of tl)6 c house being covered with stalls, but tho froquenters of the pit doubtless find room in some other part of ths theatre. Tho Bancrofts' Theatre has long been known to bo freo from , the stains of most such places, and the prer j sence on those boards of Mrs Langtry will be ' a guarantee to others more timid of breaking tho first ice. The opinions expressed ao to the '■ meritu of her performance are as varied as they i can possibly be. The Times gave her three- , quarters of a column of praise, but the profes- , sional papers were one and all "down on her." |Punch can scarcely be said to bo polite in his '"critique, and yet Mr Bancroft, who must i "assuredly be a judge, has engaged her to play

Dora, the .'principal part in "Diplomacy"— t.he:.'greatost-uomedy of the century. Some time-|oack there were reports circulating about the' country that a divorce was imminent between Mrs Langtry and her husband, in consequence of a faux pas on the lady's part. I am happy to be able entirely to contradict theso scandals. Mrs Langtry is endeavouring to adopt the stage as a profession, in order to repair the ravages that three or four years of a life "in the highest circles " have made in a fortune that was never gigantic.

Professor Thompson, in a lecture that he lately delivered before the Society of Arts, referred to the importance of the storage of electricity as a method whereby great power can bo produced at a cost scarcely worth mentioning iv comparison to the work that can begot out of it. By moans of it the intermittent action of the tides can be utilised to give birth to a continual supply of electricity. He said : " A tenth part of the tidal energy in the gorge of tho Avon would light Bristol, and a tenth part of the tidal energy in the channel of the Severn would light every city and turn every loom, spindle, and axle in Great Britain!" There can be little doubt but that human ingenuity will before long devise a method of employing the immeasurable force that is constantly running to waste in our river bods and estuaries. With her narrow gorges and mountain torrents, New Zealand should not be behind the rest of the world in anj' scheme for saving coal and—but I suppose I must not add —labour.

When one has a journey to take by rail in England, one seldom thinks of the dangor attendant on that proceeding, and yet somehow accidents are ■" frequent and painful" if not " free." A catastrophe of a most unusual and inexplicable character occurred the other day qn tno North London line. It appears that the trains belonging to more than one company pass through a short tunnel at Canonbury, at each end of which there is a signal-bos working the line on the block system. This system, I need hardly explain, divides a given length of line up into blocks, and no train is I allowed'to leave one block until the next is signalled "clear." This tunnel, as I have said, constituted a " block," and a train was brought up just within the southern end of it, by the signals at the mouth showing that the next line was blocked. Now, whilst this waiting train was in the tunnel block no other train should have been admitted on to it, but the driver of the first train suddenly became aware that another train was following him on the same line; he, therefore, quickly got steam on to his engine, and by moving his train forward reduced the collision between his hindermost carriage and the following engine to nil; both trains ■ then brought up, but scarcely had they done so when a third train dashed into the rear of the second, which was still within the tunnel, smashingupthecamajyes, and killing and wounding the passengera, and in the midst of the horrid, scene that ensued still a fourth train came up at full speed and dashed into the wreck of the other two. The loss of life and property was terrible, and doubtless it all resulted from the carelessness or inattention of some official, and not. from any defect in the mechanical arrangements of the signalling apparatus. It is, however, premature to offer any opinion on this point,' as n. Full investigation of all the circumstances attending this most deplorable accident has got tq be made.

At this season of the year.thero is a dearth entirely of political news ; everybody, even Cabinet Ministers, bursts out into what merriment is possible in the midst of gales, rain, fog, and sleet, which are now composing the whole menu of onr weather. " Christmas comes but once a year —thank God," is the exclamation of everyone. Christinas means indigestion caused by violent dancing after a heavy dinner, colds in the head, rheumatisms, chilblains, and neuralgias.