LADIES' GOSSIP.

Otago Witness, Issue 2683, 16 August 1905, Page 74

LADIES' GOSSIP.

— The Court lady of old days, says Lady Violet Greville, ia the New York Tribune, was merely a superior kind of servant; the Maid of Honour of to-day is a charming, accomplished girl, whose fluty it is to make herself pleasant to the guests, and talk agreeably to the important personages who may be visiting aS the castle. She should be a good linguist, have read the most talkecl-of books of the

day, and possess musical tastes. She is expected to take a hand at bridge, if required to make up a rubber ; but she must not play for money, as the Queeu disapproves of- girls gambling or playing ior larger stakes than they can well afford. Smoking cigarettes, too, which is such a modern :raze, is discountenanced by the Queen. The life of a Maid of Honour is an interesting one ; she is brought into contact with all sorts of illustrious people ; she constantly meets celebrities ; she hears talk on all kinds of subjects; she receives, in fact, a most cosmopolitan education — the education that, makes a wise woman of the world. She learns tact, sense, courtesy, and becomes infinitely adaptable. Court life being su much simpler than in the past, it also has become more human and more "^eal. ' Much precious time no longer is wasted in idle etiquette or the trivial gossip and petty jangling and scandal-mongering of a superior house-keeper's room, of whica we get such vivid glimpses in the d'Arblay Memoirs. A delightful story is told of Queen Alexandra, which exhibits the pleasant relations existing between her and her Maids of Honour. On one occasion <.pne of the young women arrived at the castle minus her luggage, and quietly informed her Majesty of the fact. The Queen, instead of reproving her for carelessness, merely remarked : "My dear child, how did you manage it? I never lose mine." — The daughters of Prince and Princess Christian are not " Royal " Highnesses, but Highnesses without the prefix. The children of even Royal Princesses dc not take their rank from their mothers ; otherwise the daughters of the King's eldes 4 daughter would not be simply the Ladies Alexandra and Maud Duff. Rank comes from the father, save when the mother is ruling queen, ruler, or peeress in her own right. — The President of the United States is not usually accounted a stickler for correct costume, and in his hunting expeditions he is often described as attired in a manner that would shock Washington. During his last huntingtrip Mr Roosevelt was photographed with his party, but when the pictures were submitted to him he discovered a pretty young woman ■in the background who had no business to be there. She was a journalist who bad ridden up unobserved by the photographer, and taken her stand near the President. The photographs have been ordered to be destroyed, but the reason is not the prettiness of the young lady or her intrusion, but her dress. The skirt lacked many inches of touching the ground, and the cocked hat, bandanna handkerchief around the neck, and sleeves rolled up in washerwoman style made her appearance decidedly grotesque. Colorado costume does always please even a hunting President. — Home Paper. — Talking of marriages reminds me of a somewhat curious wedding solemnised a little while ago at Allonville, near Yvetot, in Normandy. The wedding itself was pretty and picturesque. The curious feature lay in the fact that theceremony was performed in a church built in "the trunk of a tree, of such tiny dimensions as to be able to accommodate few save the bride, bridegroom, and their nearest of kin, the wedding guests taking part in the ceremony from outside. The tree is a venerable oak, standing in a cemetery, and is nearly one thousand

years old. It was in the seventeenth century that the little chapel was erected, which, with its bell-tower, overlooks the sides of the hollow trunk. At the rime of the great Revolution an attempt was made to burn the oak because of the church it contained. The people of the district, however, bravely defended their beloved fanctunry, and eventually succeeded in saving it. The little church not only stiJl exists, but is in fairly good repair, and every Sunday the country folk gather beneath its boughs to worship. Although the oak is of such a great age, and is completely hollowed out inside, it still flourishes, and when the great branches are covered with lenves they almost conceal the small tower which peeps above them. — The usefulness of women on hospital boards, which has been much discussed, and in some quarters denied, received .i striking tribute (says the Nursing Times) in the recent speech of Mr J. Danvcrs Power, at the annual meeting of tho National Hospital for the Paralysed and Epileptic. The hospital was in a virtual state of bankruptcy, and economical reform became an absolute necessity. Where to begin was a vexed question, an^l a committee of ladies was appointed to investigate the domestic side. As a result of their year's labour, a saving of £1150 was made in provisions and of £500 in general domestic expenses. By this means the cost, of a bed is £81 a year, as against £94 in 1903. In the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, too, the lady superintendent has helped the committee to make considerable reductions, and in that hospital, for the first time, a lady has been elected to the board, Mi.«s Gadesden, headmistress of the Norwich Sigh School.

— Under the heading "A Socialist in Splendid Attire" Joseph Hatton writes in Cigarette Papers : — Eccentricity is a feature of the day. The ladies are among the most notable examples. At the banquet of the Vagabonds' Club Lady Warwick, with surely an affectation of "the pride that apes humility," told the literary and artistic ci'owd of men and women workers that she is "a Socialist," that she is "nobody," that she is "a working woman," that she is not famous in the arts as many of her listeners were, but "merely a working woman." One is willing to admit that Lady Warwick does a great deal of good in and around her stately and historic home, but to tell us that she is a "Socialist" is simply — I say it "with bent head and meek apology" — silly. Th© Vagabonds ought to have smiled at her. They might have been excused if they had laughed. She was the most expensively dressed woman in the room. Th© /jewels she wore would have been worth a king's ranson in the clays of the ancient Warwicks. . And in her own right she possesses, I believe, no end of freehold acres. She lives up to her wealth, rejoices in retinues of servants. own motors and carriages and horses^, No one questions her right to these luxuries, but will it please her ladyship not to mock those of us who earn no more than she probably pays her cook by continually telling us that she is " a Socialist " and " a nobody,"' and '" merely a working woman." I can assure her ladyshop that we shall appreciate her good deeds (and they are many) none the less without this pretence of humility. It takes the gloss off her genuine philanthropy.