PERSONAL NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 1865, 19 August 1887, Page 36

PERSONAL NOTES.

Lady Palmbrston.— Lady Palmer ston was a remarkable woman, and her personal amiability and knowledge of the world have contributed not a little to strengthen her husband's position. The aristocratic Englishwomen, who need nofc look after housekeeping like our German housewives, exert an important influence on public affairs. The wife of a Cabinet Minister, is, before all things, his private secretary. In spite of Blue Books and the press, secrets of State are preserved better in London than anywhere else. The most important affairs of State are usually first settled through confidential notes, and not put into official »hape till later. Now, there are many cases, particularly for the Premier, when it would be dangerous to confide even in the most trusty private secretary. In such cases the Minister writes himself, but before sending off his note his wife takes a copy for his private archives. Like Lady Palmerston, the wives of Lords Derby, Clarendon, Russell, and others also, performed this confidential function. — Count Vifczthum's Memoirs.

Although Professor Tyndall has been obliged reluctantly to retire from the professorship, which he has held and adorned for so many years, at' the Koyal Institution, it is satisfactory to know that his services will not yet be lost to the public. It is Stated that he now hopes to devote his time to original research ; and those who are aware of the useful work that he has already done in this direction will look forward to the benefits which will most surely accrue to science from the efforts of his busy brain.

Sims Reeves, Edward Lloyd, and Joseph Maas, were all trained choir boys.

Mr James Payn is probably the pleasantest gossip in England. He is not the most earned, nor the wittiest, nor the most suggestive, but he is the most genial. His copiousness does not smack of the commonplace book ; if he uses one at all, he keeps it carefully up his sleeve. — Pall Mall Gazette.

When Johns Hopkins died and left over 3,000,000d0l to found the university which bears his name, he wanted the institution to be erected on his large estate at Clifton, jusfc outside Baltimore. The Univer~ity Hoard, however, rejected the suggestion, and the university was established in the city. Miss Mary Garrett (a daughter of Mr J. W. Garret, a friend of Johns Hopkins), doscribed as the richest woman in the United States, has once more opened the question by offering to give the university, permanently, the annual sum of 35,000d0l to sustain a scientific school if it is erected on the spot that Johns Hopkins desired.— St. James Gazette.

Prince yon Bismarck is not a calm and philosophical looker-on. He is capable of fits of anger, and any day he may inflict on France some slight which she may have to endure tamely or resent by war. —Telegraph.

The new prose work by Victor Hugo, entitled "Choses Vues," is most interesting reading. The poet describes with his own graphic touch the events through which he passed, or in which he was an actor, and makes the scenes depicted as vivid as reality. Take, for example, his picture of the embalming of the French Macchiavelli, Talleyrand. This man died on May 17, 1838. The doctors came and embalmed the body. In order to do that in the Egyptian fashion, they drew the entrails from the body and the brains from the skull. This done, and after they had transformed Prince Talleyrand into a mummy and nailed this mummy down in a coffin lined with white satin, they went away, leaving on the table the brains — those brains "which haa thought so many things, nspired so many men, built so many edifices, led two revolutions, deceived 20 kings, and kept the world within bound. When the doctors left, a footman entered, and saw what they had forgotten. He, suddenly remembered that there was a drain in the street outside, so off he went, and threw the brains into it. Finis rcrum.