LONDON CHAT.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 10599, 20 February 1896, Page 3

LONDON CHAT.

. (Fbom Oub Own Cohbespondbbt.) London, January 3. RAILWAY RECORDS. A spirit of competition seems to have set in with regard to railway working which promises to give us some striking developments ere long. The result of last summer's " race to the north " has left us with a daily train service from Londou to Aberdeen in lOhr 25min, and two to Edinburgh in 7£hr, ail by the east coast. The weit coast, though accepting defeat by SO miuutes during the winter; is said to be makiug extensive and vigorous preparations for some startling.advances in the coming summer. But the astoui»hing thing i 6 the way the easy-going old Great Western bas suddenly roused itself. Ib has started with a resolute determination to - beat'the . South Western's Southampton mail service to Loudon by running swift " specials " from Plymouth to Paddington directly an important mail steamer arrives at the western port. The second performance of this kind took place last week, when on the Hamburg-American boat landing her mails, passengers, and specie at Plymouth, these were at once put "on board" a train that was waiting at Millbay Pier. The train ran thence to London in 4hr 27min, delivering the mails and passengers several bours earlier than tbose Bant by way of Southampton. Tbe special rau frvm Plymoutb to Exeter, 53 miles, in . 63min. This does not look much, but ib included tbe climbing of two long inclines of 1 in 40—that is to say, as steep ss tbat from Welliugton to Khnndillah, and much steeper than auy gradients on the Duuedin-Oamaru line. From Ex?ter to London the train averaged exactly a mile a minute, includiug a fivepiinute stoppage at Bristol to cbang" engines, the actual travelling time being 189 minutes for the 194- miles. ' The run of 118^ miles from Bristol to London was done without a stop in 116 minute; and the times h-oni parsing Swindon and, Didcot respectively to arrival at .the London terminus were 71 and 19 miuutes for the distances of 77 and 53 miles. This j beats the bast records of the old broad-gauge j days.

New Year's D»y witnessed another notable j development bo the Great Western. Pick-np water-troughs have lately been laid as en the I North Western to euable the engine to pick up water while .running and obviate the need of frequent stops, while also reducing the weight of water carried. With tha aid of tbis useful appliance the South Wales express now runs from Newport to London without a stop, a distance of 145£ mites, the longest unstopping run but one in tbe United Kingdom. MISCELLANEOUS. Apparently it is ouly a ques'ion of (not very I long) time for horseless vehicles to be running in our streets with no more restrictions than those used iv the case of horsed carriages. At present the absurd old limitations to a walking pace with a man and a flag iv fronc are rigidly enforced. But the feeling in favour of,the "autocar" is growing so sbrong aud is so widespread that Parliameut can hardly maintain thr; old-obstructions for auy lengthened period. The opposition ta the autocar comes, of course, from the horsey interest. At a dinner party lately a discussion arose as to the characteristic value bf a shirp uose —bhe sign, pbysiiiii-.ouiists say, of cruelty. The p-jrtrait of tbe Saltan in the Graphic of last week was brought to the table, and it was proved that the un^al appendage in question was >-.s thin aud sharp as a razor. No one pre- i sent had ever se^n a nose so sharp, and the I whole face was evidence of rapacity and greed, j besides insatiable hatred of everything and j everybody—a face to shudder at, nob to see. i The North A'oericaa Indian has a nose of this I type, and a crueller race never lived. Dr 1 Pritchard, who was hanged over 20 years ago ! for the murder in cold blood of his wife, had a I razor for a nose. Thin lips, a razor nose, and i steel-blue eyes are all warning signs of character. Iv allotting this New Yeir's honours her i Majesty has gone one better than last time, and has opened the ranks of the peerage to art in the handsome pprson of Sir Frederick Leignton, the president of the Royal Acadnny. A more personality for the honour could not be. He will reflect honour on his new grade, and that is what vary few of the receut creations have done. .'he. K.A. peer is 65 and singularly handsome, witb a bearing as grand as tbat of any fall-blooded -.hike. He is in failing health, with no son to succeed to his honours, as he never married. His sister (Mrs Sutherland Orr) is a keen and clever literary critic, and her book on Browning made her a reputation. She is a very, delicately-handsome womau about her distinguished brother's age. Her husband was a colonel in the Indian army. He has been dead some time. THE NEW POET LAUREATE. Some surprise wss caused by tbe announcement that Mr Alfred Austin, one of the, Standard's leader writers, had been appointed ■ Poet Laureate as successor, longo intervallo, to the immortal Tennyson. It is indeed a long step downward. Mr Austin has written some decent verses, but has never risen above mediocrity, and has more often fallen far below it. Mv Austin is not an ideal successor of Southey; Wordsworth, aud Tennyson. Much of his verse is mere- prose chopped up into lixed lengths, utterly lackiug the divine afflatus. Some is rank doggerel, if unexceptionable in sentiment—to wib : Nothing cau match, where'er we roam, Au English wife in English home. In some "sonnets written in the midchannel," Mr Austin by some singular ineptitude talks about " reaching out his soul." Illnatured commentators ask how, if he were such a dreadfully bid sailor as all that, he managed to pen those sonnets ? But the new Poet Laureate will not notice 6uch low ribaldry. An apostrophe to the Prince of Wales, which Mr Austin produced in 1871, is about tha blankest bathos that I have ever met with, aud my experience in tbis respect has bsen large. Just read this awful stuff :— And you, Sir, hope of this once famous isle, Round whom its halo plays, its favours smile, Hark to the Muse, which, poised on Candour's wings, Flouts the base crowd, but scorns to flatter kings. Hark, while she tells you, not her counsel spurn, From giddy Pleasuro'n gilded toys to turn; That uot from minions opulent or coarse Do princes gain their lustre aud their force; That Reverence anchors not in deep carouse, And that a Crown fits only kingly brows I Nobody can understand'why the vacancy left by Tennjson was filled up at all if no morasnitable candidate was available, or if Swinburne wete deemed inadmissible. To make Alfred Austin the Poet Laureate while Swinburne still lives and writes, and even in front of Sir Edwin Arnold or Sir Lewis Morris and' Mr William | Wateon, may be a pleasant reward to tho Standn-d's leader writer, but does seem scarcely I in accord with "the eternal fitness of things." MUSIC AND THP. DRAMA. A few days a.go I went to St. James's Hall to | hear Alfred Reioenauer, the newest of the tbree great pianists who have so suddenly burst upon us as fresh revelations of pianistic possibilities, Ernil Saner and Moritz Rosenthal being of course the other two. Barring the first " number " on the programme—Liszt's " Fugue on the name of Bach"—the whole performance : was a musical enjoyment of the highest order. Reisenauer followed up his inauspicious beginning with a series of true gems of the first water, a prominent instance being the glorious " Waldstein Sonata" of Beethoven. In this he delighted me entirely, aud I think he equalled any of the great pianists whom I have heard in that masterpiece. In all respects his playing was superb, and he infused into his reeding of that mysterious little adagio, which Beethoven terms " Introdozione," a certain poetic suggestiveness which was quite new, to me at any rate, and most impressive. As to the mere technical difficulties of the work, which are uot small, they were child's play to this wonder-worker. Subsequently he gave us come delightful bibs of Schubert (including the exquisite ■■" Impromptu in A flat"), Schumann (" Kindersceiien"), and Chopiu. The delicacy of his touch aud tho poetry of his interpretation were as remarkablo as his power and technique. I do not,rate him quite so high in these two latter respects as Rosenthal, who never has bad an equal in tbem, aud perhaps never will have. But as an artist Reisenauer is in my opinion fully equal to either Rosenthal or Saver, while he has some individual merits which are all his own. .-...'

At the close of the recital a rather curious thing happened. Reisenauer had been recalled six times after his last piece, and the audience bad departed, except some 20 or 30, Passing out in front of the stage, some impulse moved those remaining to give the great pianist yet another round of applause. To their surprise and intense gratification, he not only came out arid bowed again, but actually sat down to the piano and played to the small knot of enthusiasts no fewer than three extra pieces, two being Chopin gems. One was the florid D Flat Waltz, which, after giving it just as written, Reisenauer proceeded to play as Rosenthal docs, giving all the rapid scales in chords and octaves ! It was a marvellous feat of technique, whatever one might think of such treatment of Chopin.

Europe is well off just nowagregards pianists of the first rank, what with Paderowski, Rosenthal, Saver, and Reisenauer, to say Dotbing of such very fine performers as Saiut Siiene, Sophie Menter, Siloti, Leonard Borwicb, Fanny Davies, Frederick Dawson, Frederic Lamond, Agnes Zimmerman, Ernest Walker, and othera.

Some grumbling was heard lhat no Irish choral society had received the honour of a " command " to perform before tbe Queen, as in the case of various English, Welsh, and Scottish societies. Bot it waa promptly pointed out that Ireland* does not yet possess auy choral body, of sufficient distinction to bo entitled to such an honour. This discovery has stimulated some leading Irish musicians to make a vigorous effort toward the removal of this reproach from the Emerald Islev and

arrangements have already been set on foot for a musical festival which is to form a new departure and lead to the active encouragement of choral singing iv Ireland, with tbe hope that one day it may rival that of Wales or Yorkshire. Dr Culwick, the Dublin Cbapo! Royal organist, who is urging forward tbe -festival scheme, says that in Ireland {' at pref ent thero is almost no choral singing, and even in our larger towns there are comparatively few people in any rank of life who are able to read mnaic witb facility." So tbe cry has gone up, "Oh I reform it altogether," and Irish part-singiug is to he made equal to that of Yorkshire or Wales. Ireland has giveu us some excellent composers io Pi of elisors Stewart and Stanford and Sir Arthur Suliivan, and it is strange that she should hitherto have been so far behindhand in tha matter of choralism.

London dramatic news chiefly consists in the record that Sir Augustus Harris has achieved another huge -uecess with bis Drury Lane pantomime. It is based on the old " Cinderella " legeud, but that takes a subordinate place as compared with the spectacle, which is magnificent beyond the powor of words to express. All sorts of spectacular. novelties, which it would be tediops to desoribe or to read about, have bseu introduced, including a most ingenious and effective stage device of'brilliantty illuminated revolving wheels, and the theatre is nightly thronged with admiring crowds. Perhaps "The Late Mr Castello" at the Comedy Theatre i 3 ona of tbe brightest of the newest plays. It is only just out, but "scored" at ouce. lbs fun turns mainly on the plotting and counterplotting of an exceedingly flirty widow and an equally flirty officer. It is a case of " diamond cut diamond " until at last the war of wits ends in a happy union. Misß Winifred Emery, one of soir prettiest, actresses, plays in her most frolicsome mood, and has delightful opportunities of showing off all her strong points, her graceful figure, pretty little hands and feet, and trim ankles, in practising her favourite amui>em-mt of "bringing all th* men to her feet aDd lea»ing them there," as one writer puts it. The whole piece abounds in tailing and diverting "piiuts "■ and " business." It seems in for a " run." .

Mr W. T. Stead's new move, the issue of "Penny Popular Novels "—abridgments of the origiaal issuaa—has begun with Rider Haggard's "Sho." The abridgment by'Mr Stead is wonderfully well done, aod is cordially approved even by the author himself. It is a great contrast to those awful mutilations of, the Waverley novels perpetrated a lew years ago by Miss Braddon.