LADIES' GOSSIP.

Otago Witness, Issue 3312, 5 September 1917, Page 57

LADIES' GOSSIP.

Lady Ancaster is a thoughtful woman who talks well, reads a great deal, and her taste in books is wide and catholic. The wefaro of children is a subject of deep interest to her, and her views on their bringing up and education are at another delight, and she has a great love for Wagner operas. Lady Ancaster is a fine horsewoman and seems to like sport and outdoor life more than do most

Americans. In fact, her love of nature causes her to spend much time in the country. She docs some useful war work, and as President of the Red Cross Society at Bourne (near Grimthorpe Castle) she lias sent out many "comforts and necessaries to the men of the Lincolnshire regiment. Lady Ancaster has two sons, and two small girls who bear the pretty, old world names of Catherine and Prisciha.

Lady Helen Conyngharn, like her sisters, has busied herself in looking after the comfort of Irish soldiers, and is seldom seen in London. In leisure time she is a good sportswoman and a straight and fearless rider across country, as becomes a Meath girl and her mother's daughter. She is the youngest of Lord Conyngham's sisters, among whom are Lady l>ianche Seymour, Lady Hersey Baird, and Lady Edina Ainsworth, and her aunts include Hersey Lady Linlithgow, Lady Constance and Lady Jane Combe and Lady Florence Willoughby. Lady St. Helier, who recently gave a smali dance, has of late lived a quiet life, out was once a most noted hostess. Scotch by birth she is a sister to Julia Lady Tweeddale and a relation of Lord Galloway. She ha-s been twice married and twice widowed. After the death of her first husband, Mr John Stanley, she lived in Wimpole street, and used to give small smart dinners, at which there was no champagne and the g.uest3 were waited upon by parlourmaids —in those days most unusual arrangements. But the young hostess's wit and verve served her welL and her dinners were attended by men and women of note and by the then present and future Prime Ministers—Lord Beaconsfield and Lord Salisbury. After her second marriage she moved to a big house in Harley street, and gave political dinners and an annual series of large evening parties—or "squashes/' as they were termed. At the popular house of the then Lady Jeuno were to be met many celebrities, among others, General Boulanger, "Buffalo Bill," and —some —say —• King Cetewayo. Lady St. Helier talk* well and has a profound knowledge oil politics; also she writes cleverly, brought out a book called "Memories of Fifty Years," and has contributed many articles to magazines and newspapers. All her life she has worked for others and especially for juvenile charities, such as the Children's Country Holiday Fund and the Children's Happy Evenings Association. Her husband, the late Lord St. Helier, lived for only 45 days after he had been made a peer—one of the records in shorttime peerages. Are Von War-Weary? A tiling that, at it were, "drags on," always brings with it a weariness. Even if it' is a great thing, such as war, and we begin it with a keen desire to do our utmost- for the bravo men engaged on it, there is a certainty that when the long, long months have rolled on, we shall find a curious "tiredness" creeping over us. We shall want to drop back into indifference and putting up with it all, and trying to go on as if it did not exist any more. And that is just what one ought not to do; so much depends upon our being alert and keen, you see. For one thing, the dear lads who come home expect and rightly to find us so; it would be selfish to show them dull facea and neglected looks and general "slackness." So we pluck up courage for the hardest of our tasks, this one of being at concert pitch as far as we can all round. Don't let us sit about when we are at leisure like so many sacks of Horn', or pieces of furniture! We can, at least, change into another frock, and put a tone of interest into our voices, and a gleam of brightness into our eyes. If we are just worn out physically, them we can take a nap and wake up refreshed. It doesn't matter what method we devise for ourselves, but fit and alert we simply must try to be, or we shall only help to prolong what we are all longing shall soon end victoriously. No one ever yet cured "that tired feeling" by yawning; she only infected others who unluckily happened to be present! War should not be excuse for slovenliness or idleness, or any sort of slackness; it should be a trumpet-call to exert all the powers we have. And it is just when the length and the slowness and the dreariness of warfare begins to "tell" upon us that we have to wake up and keep ourselves at our best. Who knows how near may be the day for which we long? We cannot let it find ua unreadv, with part of our work undone, with all the spirit gone out of us. No, the girl who finds this sort of weariness stealing upon her would do well to change her work, if necessary, or to work even harder if wise—at any rate, to set herwits to work to banish that alien enemy" —"war weariness."