LONDON CHAT.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 10263, 22 January 1895, Page 8

LONDON CHAT.

(Faosi Qua Own Corsespohdekt.)

London, December 7.

Tha wedding o£ the Duke of Westminster's danghter to Prince Adolphus of. Tecb tomorrow will bB quite as grand an affair as that of his sister to our future King, and the bridesmaids' dresses will be handsome. The Duke is richer than tha Queen, and he could buy up the whole of ilia Teeks, hera and in their own country. Tliea Eaton Hall, his Grace's princely seat, rivals any of our Eoyal palaces in grandeur and s.rfc possession. The Duke, like his father before him, is not at all extravagant, and looks well after his belongings. He is penurious in the matter of peace, but can on titti'jg; oecasionß give grandly. His father used gsnerally to go to the House of Lords in the season by the psnny boat when he did Dot use a carriage, and many are the stories teld by the tradesmen with whom he dealt as to his " meanness," as thay called it. He would higgle over a farthing, and at one shop where he bought his stationery he never purchased more than three steel nibs at a time, and grumbled at the price—a penny for three. But it is only millionaires th&t can afford to be mean. He was very liberal to the clergy, and always had a contingent of poor, hard-worked curates and vicarg staying at one of his seats, well fed aDd looked after in every way. His donations to religion were enormous. The dresses of the bridesmaids (writes my feminine correspondent) will bo ivory glace ondine silk, with pleated chiffon vests, long pointed. The girdles of pale blue velvet will be edged with cream Italian lace. The folded collars will have gable trimming, and they, like the long narrow cuffs, wiil match tha girdle. The upper sleeve will be accordion pleated, with insets of lace insertion. The hatsi will have Tudor crowns of pale blue velvet, and the brims of white felt, lifted at the Bide with white ostrich plumes, and the surne at the back. The bride's dress is of Bngliih manufacture, and rare old Brussels lace. Her going away dress will be of pale bine electric miroir velvet, trimmed with priceless sables; hat, cloak, and muff, beinff en suite. As for the bridgroom, he will he "turned off" in the uniform of his regimsnt, the 17th Lancers. His brother Francis will wear that of his owa corps, the Ist Royal Dragoons, acd his second brother will appear in the uniform of the 7th Husaars. Thu old Dake of Cambridge will be refulgent in his full field-marshtiTe uniform— a grand military display. The Duchess of Teck may well ba proud of her stalwart, handsome sous, who tower inches over those of her cousin, Victoria I. The young men are very popnlar, and in great request as dancers in the seaasn. There is one date dreaded of the Royal Family, and th*t;is (he 14-th December, the day on which the Prince Consort died. This day is religiously kept in memoriam by her Maj«sty, at Frogmore, where round tha magnificent tomb of her husband she gathers all her children, or Hi many as she can, snd a solemn service is held iv tho mausoleum. The Empress Frederick the Queen's eldest daughter, is hera at present, and the Duke of Saxe-Coburg also. The Duke of Connaught is at Aldershot too, bo the living circle will bs complete. This to the Queen is the most important function of the year, ft is also tlie data of tho death of the Princess Alice. It is sn open secret that the Duke of Coburg is in a. bad way—he has beau ailing for some time. He is vow with his aiuious mother.

There is a member of the House of Denmark who is not bo utterly blessed in matrimonial relations us tbs rest of bis family, and that is the Prince Waldeinar, whose wife, a Princess of Orleans, halt rather suddenly developed eocßiitricitifs that excite si question of her sanity. It was said that a divorce auit was on tha tapis, but at pressnt that is warded off by a separation. When Brat married the young couple, were ideally happy, and three children were born to them. But of quite recent years the l'c incesß changed, and became so eccentric that great scandal wa« caused in Copenhagen. There never was a fire but she was present, placing herself in positions of the greatest danger, distributing cigar money and brandy to the Uremen. She even had her photograph taken in their uniform, and hung up in their barracks. She emoked in public, drank champagne, acd was altogether 60 rowdy that her husband's family would have nothing to say to Uar. She would not attend the silver wadding of the Crown Prince, aud two days after the festival went off to Paris, where she intends to remain. Her children remain with theirfather. It ia believed that she has takeu to morphia, and is uot responsible for her actions.

There is not a reigning family in Europe thoroughly sane. It is, of course, heredity, intermarriage being in many cases owned to excess. The Prince of Wales is keenly alive to the evil, and lately said to a friend that he would rather »cc hi 3 daughters married to members of the aristocracy than to their German connections. "We sro suffering from intermarriages too much already," he added. Thero is one member of the Prince's family who h robust, and that is the latest arrival, the little Prince Edward.

The Marquis of Lome is very artistic, and so ia his Koyal spouee, the only pnrsuit in which the ill-matched pair have a mutual interest. Any career the marquis might have had was ruined by his marriage. It debarred him from politics, in which he looked to win his spurs, and it certainly did not enhance his social position. The Duke of Fife, taking warning by his brother peer's fate, made it a proviso when he took the Princess Louise of Wales to wife that she was merely to be the duchess, with no ladies in waiting, and her actions were not to b« supervised by her monarchical mamma. The Wales section of the Royal Family is wonderfully popular. No fewer than a-quarter of a million photographs o£ the Princess of Wales were sold in one year. The number of tea kiosks now in full swing in London is wonderful, and all are paying. The Aerated Bread Company was the pioneer to the improved refreshment of tea and light breads] and cakes. It gave excellent tea and coffee, good butter, and clean handmaidens, airy and well-appointed saloons, and moderate charges. _ The success was so great that the company in the course of a year or two paid a. dividend of a3 much as 30 per cent. Then came the inevitable opposition, and the dividend sunk to 20 per cent.. Dairies gave the best of milk, and added tea, &c.; and there was room for all. Every kiosk opeoed was a score in the cause of temperance. It became an era of tea versus strong drink, and the tea carried the day.

But the most formidable opposition was inaugurated in the sacred name of art. A well known firm of caterers acquired premises wherever they could in the immediate neighbourhood of the A. B. C. Company. They decorated and furnished in a costly and_ highly artistic manner, and made their depots a dream of beauty. They also put their prices lower than their rival's. The consequence is the public are filling their saloons, though the others are by no means empty. The luxury of a teapot to oneself is felt, and both tea and coffee are Al. The places are carpeted, and the seats are comfortable, and the tables have napery, not the uncovered marble of the other establishments. And they are paying 50 per cent, dividend. Their big rival has come down to 6 per cant.

Muoic is rampant. Forty concerts are down for next week. These include, not merely the multitudinous ordinary concerts, but several of the highest order. At Mr Henschel'g Symphony Concert the immortal "C Minor" of Beethoven will be given. The same evening, unluckily, Berlioz's marvellous " Damnation of Faust" will pa presented by the Royal Choral Society, vndfyc Sir Joseph Barnby, at the Albert Hall, with a chorus of a thousand singers. On Saturday Mr August Manna will revive that wonderful masterpiece of the same French composer, the unrivalled tone-colourist, his choral symphony illustrating " Romeo and Juliet." Here is a feast to look forward to.

The usual Advent church performances of Spohr's oratorio "The Past; Things," commonly and erroneously translated as "The Last Judgment"—to which, by-the-bye, it does not refer at all —commenced last Tuesday with a magnificent presentation of this superb work by the choir of St. Paul's Cathedral, reinforced by a powerful orchestra. This was listened to by a vast audience numbering over 20,000 persons, many of whom had waited since morn on that day, the oratorio beginning at 7 p.m. Is not this something like enthusiasm ? Who can truthfully say England is no longer a musical nation ?

Poor dear old Sims Reeves was announced to sing at last Wednesday's "Ballad," and, strange to say, he really did sing. More than that, he sung delightfully. What if he did "dodge" the "top notes"? We could do without them, and no one truly musical or cultured could fail to be charmed with the rare tenderness, the expressive pathos, and the still exquisite tone-colouring with which the famous veteran, the more than septuagenarian tenor, presented Blumenthal's " Requital" and Balfe's b&llad " When other lips." It is still a real joy and a true lesson in high art to listen to old Sims Reeves.

Eniil Saver, the latest pianistic wonder, continues to "enthuse" London audiences, who have already begun to make fools of themselves. There is too much of this tomfoolery, often purchased; but not in this case, for Saver hates it, and will not notice the "floral tributes," es the penny-a-liners call them. He was the "crack" pupil of Liazfc and Rubinstein in succession, and wag regarded by each of thosa unrivalled masters of the pifino as a genius of rare brilliancy. He is jnsb 32 years of age. He has a very long, pale, sad face, and still longer but darker hair—not all curly, likathatof "the fellow with tha mop-head" (as a rude New Zealander termed the divine Paderewski), bub straight and rather lank. But it rustles up into a big fuzzy mop when its owner bows, aa he so often haa te do, and as ha does with quite alarming energy, not to say fierceness.

May Yohe is drawiag crowds as the " Lady Slavey," in which she ■ncara a most becoming cap and apron, aud a simple dress, carefully abbreviated so as just to show the pretty little feet and ankles in the neatest of black Bilk stockings gad the brightest of patent leather shoes. I cannot help being totmentad with doubts whether any mistress would permit this very "fetching" sort of " get up" in the case of a " slavey " of any sort, even of a " lady slavey," but that is how May Yohe dresses the part. She has so much confined herself hitherto to boy characters that even her admirers were hardly prepared for the killing effect of her remarkable personal beauty and sprightly grace in a thoroughly feminine part, fall of fun and miischief. She has made the play a complete success. There seems no flagging in the popularity of " The New Boy" and " Charley's Aunt," which still go on piling up fortunes for the lucky owners of the copyright. That very mild Savoy stopgap, " Mirette," in spite of its reSnishiag, lma remained ito the end a "frost," which I felt from the Srst was its destined doom, and is to betaken off immediately. It may not have been quite so bad as last year's " Jane Anaie," —there hardly could be two such things ; but it was weak enough—too weak for Gilbert and Sullivan-spoiled Savoy audiences. And yet it contained a few happy hits and some sparkling music. Sir Arthur Sullivan is hard at work at the rehearsals of the new opera which he has composed for the Savoy with Burnand as his librettist. The title ie, sb usual, left a profound secret. It will ba curious to note whether Snllivan-<M«n-Burn«nd -will be able to score such a success as Gilbert-c«»»-Carr managed to win with "His Excellency," for which seats are already bsoked up to next February. Gilbert has succeeded in taking his public by storm, though his brilliant play is illustrated by some very moderate music. Will Sullivan be able to " knock 'em " similarly as illustrator of Btirnand's libretto ? Much intereet is felt in this question, because there is great disputation as to whether Gilbert or Sullivan be the real "draw" in the operas of the past, or whether their phenomenal successes were due to the fact that they continued to make a pair of " draws."

I must change my subject to a leas agreeable theme. London has been disgraced lately by a caries of atrocious outrages. One girl has been murdered and two others have been at&bbed at Kensington, and a French waiter has been shot at a Regent street cafe. There seems quite, an epidemic of this sort of thing at present, and timid people dread to go out of doors attar dark, especially these' foggy evenings. As yet the perpetrators of the Ksgent street ehootiag and of the two Kensington stabbings have not been discovered, but the murderer of the unfortunate girl Augusta Daweg {alias Dudley) does aeem to hive been run to earth.

He is a young mtn, good-looking and athletic, bat mentally deficient, a aon of Mr L. T. B. Saunderson, and a nephew of Colonel Saunderson, the " fighting M.P.," who took such a prominent (if not initial) ptirfc in the House of Commons free-fight. The mother of the unhappy young man, Reginald Saunderson, is Lady Rachel Saunderbou, daughter of the Earl of Clomneu. Ha had taken a morbid interest in the South End murder—which surely hs should not have been permitted to read, as he was under special care, though not strictly speaking under

restraint, and burned with eagerness to imitate Koad. So he obtained a knife, and, man&ping to slip away unobserved, prowled about Kenaington till he mot the hapless Augusta Dawe*, whose throat he promptly cat from ear to ear, lie wai *ctu».lly (seen in the act by a foreign artist resident near, who pursued him for a

long distance, but could not cr.tcb. him, Saandersou being » capital athlete and a very fast runner. Hb boUed to Ireland, bat wrote a letter confessiug his crime, and was sooneaoght by the police. Efforts are being made to hava him eommifct'i*"! to an asylum without undergoing a trial for murder. It is a very melan* choly case. James Canham Read wag duly handed lasf Tuesday for the murder of Florence Denuiis. Some surprise was felt that tun execution took uJaee co soon, and that the Homa Secretary did uot deem it necessary to maka farther inquiries. However, he had Bead's own statemeut before him whicii did not go before the judge and jnry, no it must bo presamed that this was dßßinftd to disclose no ground for interference with the law's sentence. Could Kead have proved the alibi ho alleged, the case ayainst him, which was purely circumstantial, must have broken down. Many people are profoundly distrustful of the evidencs given by Mrs Aythn, who was self-convicted of gross perjury, and do not like tbe idea thst a man should have been hanged on testimony of which hers forintd one link. She was admittedly Bead's diccarde.d mistreae, and believed, or professed ta believe, that the murdered girl, her sinter, had BupplaDted htv in Read's imiaor*l affections. She did not stick at perjury, and people wonder how much farther she may have gone in he/ vindictive jealousy. And now since Bead's execution tome chance evidence has turned uj which seems to bear out his account of where he waa and what he was doing on that fatal night. I wish the authorities had uot been in quite such a hurry to hang him and have dona with it. True, ha was a thoroughly bad, immoral fellow, a thief, a profligate, and an adulterer, and he owes his fate to the retribution which sin seems automatically to beget. Bat he was not hanged for any of those things; He was hanged as a murderer. Was ho one I I confess I doubt it.

That strange Ardlamont cass has been again before the law courts and the public. Majoi Hambrough, father of the Cecil Hambrough whose tragic fate led to the sensational murder trial in Scotland some monthß back, with result of a "nut proven" verdict as regards Mr MonsoD, brought an action against the company in which his son was insured for £20,000 through the influence of Monson. The company pleaded that fcho policy was vitiated through the insurance being effected by means of fraudulent misstatements aad misrepresentations, but expressly exonerated the unfortunate lad Hambrough. So Major Hambrough lost the case, and now the papers are asking very reasonably whether nobody is to be prosecuted for the fraud which has been exposed. It ia quite needless to indicate the person pointed to.

" Museum Sunday " was celebrated in Lon« don last Sunday, and with great success. The mußeums and picture galleries, which were thrown open on the occa-sion, wete numerously attended, and the privilege seemed to be highly appreciated.

Next week tho world-renowned cattle show takes place at Islington. It will be the " biggest on record" so far as cattle and sheep go, but there will be no pigs shown owing to tho pre« valence of swine fever. A chaDgo in the weather has set in to-day. The fog has partially cleared, and the wind ha! gone into the S.W. with a drizzling rxin and a much milder temperature. This will pieaue some people, but many will grumble. Ihej always do!