After Dinner Gossip AND Echoes of the Week

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXV, Issue 13, 30 September 1905, Page 17

After Dinner Gossip AND Echoes of the Week

Clothes and the Mau. “The conventional black of the men’s attire contrasting with the brilliant costumes of the fair sex.” How many times have we read this well-thumbed phrase so dear to the heart of the sprouting reporter, who has been sent off by his chief to report something extra special in the social work!? Now, why should the ladies always monopolise the gaudy spots on the pallette and leave only the C hinese white ami the Indian ink for the mere men? In Nature, when* these things aren’t regulated by fashion journals, it is the male who dons the vivid hues and the lady who supplies the commonplace but necessary foil of sombreness. Ever since (and jwrhaps before) the days when our worthy ancestors eked out the colours of their scanty garments with wood when they wanted to cut a dash in the forests of ancient Britain at a progressive pig-sticking party, or whatever they had in those days in place of the modern euchre and bridge, man has hail a sneaking liking for colour; hut false modesty has led him to repress this natural predelict ion ami swathe himself in nothing more daring than a drab. Occasionally the inevitable happens. The pot boils over, and man’s fancy runs chromatic riot. Videlicet the period of the unfortunate monarch who so completely lost his head upon a memorable and regrettable occasion. I don’t know whether there lie anything in it. but the scallywags who perpetrated this disloyal act. wore the dunnest of dun colours, and otherwise garbed themselves most presbyteriaidy. Although history is silent on tlie point, I think it will be found that there is more than an accidental connection between their Puritanical dismalness of attire and their dark and dolorous acts. At least that is the theory of a friend of mine who shocks his friends with his ties, which are always of primary colours, lie calls them his •’safety valves.” Man has bottled up his innate thirst for the rainbow for quite a long time now, but there are signs of a coming revolt. Quite recently, indeed. there’ have been unmistakable signs of a growing restiveness under the enforced monotony of drab-cloth ami tweed. Long dormant forms of foppery such as the wearing of hand-painted waistcoat buttons* are recovering something of their old strength, and valiant efforts to popularise the ruffled shirt and silk knickerbocker as articles of modern evening dress have been followed by a well-or-ganised and public-spirited attempt to rescue unhappy man from his bondage by the introduction of green clothes. But even now. few though his opportunities may be, ingenious man does find

an occasional outlet for his pent up longing for finery. All forms of physical exercise have come to be considered by him as so many legitimate excuses for a debauch of colour, and it is astonishing with what facility the quiet chrysalis can on occasion become the gorgeous but - terfly. When he golfs he wears a jacket of some tine rich shade, and a scarlet coat when he rides to hounds. When he plays cricket, or tenuis he is apt to revel in gamlily-striped ilaimels. while a jersey, also elegantly striped in blue and red, black and yellow, or some such pleasing combination of colour, is reserved for the polo, the foot Im Ji and the hockey field. At night when the ryes of a critical world are no longer turned upon him. he dons pyjamas warranted to rival the rainbow in the nundier and variety of hues, and in the morning, when comparatively safe from observation, he, affects a. dressing-gown in the colours of which the full chromatic scale is most' generously represented. Should some unkind person marvel at this unwonted magnificence the wearer is always most careful to explain that the dvsi«m is “Eastern.” 4* 4* 4' Alice in Moral Land. President Hall, in a great American I niversity, has frowned a mighty frown at Alice Those adventures in Wonderland “neither represent the true child, nor appeal to real interest.” They are “mental confectionery, and not mental food.” They should be ruled out of public libraries. “There is “only one standard that ought always to be supreme for the reading of the young, and that is moral inmprovementThis is probably sound. It is certainly more sound than sense. There was a time, in the middle of the sober reign of Victoria, when hooks fop the young were written on President Hall’s identical plan. Why. then, did he neglect the practical application of his preachment that the youth of to-day should be nurtured on t he recital of how Hollo saved 14 cent s on the journey from Paris to Home, and how Elsie made home happy with a hairpin? The preaching juveniles of the midVictorian nursery are as extinct as the dodo, and we venture the belief that they are deservedly so. The classics of maturity are full of joyous sunshine, even inconsequent fun and frolic. No critical dictum is now more generalh accepted than that a dominant moral purpose is fatal to the spirit of art the end and aim of which is not so much to assert that right is right, as to show us in all its manifestations the spirit of life from which springs the moral

law. If oldsters have their FalstnfT and their Puck, their Scapiii, and their Sancho, why should youngsters not lune their Allee? It is even possible to answer our scientist according to his science. The latest biologists tell us that in all animate life the spirit of play is a powerful factor in education. Young animals, metaphorically speaking, chase their tails, and their mothers spend nincli time in teaching them to do so. It is the easiest and most agreeable way in which to develop their powers for the pursuit of other things, the attainment of which is more momentous. If any one doubts the amount of menial exercise which this generation had in chasing the tale of Alice, let him note the frequency in 1 he gravest literature of quotations from the children’s classic. It is bail science the head of ( lark University has been speaking, ami all lovers of Alice will be moved to cry with the Red Queen: Oft’ with its head! 4? 4* ♦ William and the Diplomats. When the European statesmen rub their weary eves and yawn Do they start the day by puting their official trousers on? Nay, each scans the far horizon, and then Huns with thoughtful brow, Saying as he grasps his paper: “What is William doing now?’ When a whistle tots in London, or it thunders over Greece, Or a rooster crows in Paris, or a donkey brays at Nice, Or it rains at Copenhagen, or a bomb bursts at Moscow. Eiuope rises to inquire: “What is William up to now?*’ When a rloud floats over Holland, or a Polish baby cries: When a match is struck in Belgium, or a Swedish maiden sighs; When in Koine the startled people hear the mooing <» fa cow. Europe’s trembling statesmen wonder: “What is William up to now?” When the evening shadows lengthen and the western sky is red: When the lights glow in the castles and the ;’ children go to bed; When the statesmen don their nighties and in reverent silence bow. Eiirh down in his heart keeps asking: hat is William doing now?*’ 4* 4» •fr A Sane View of Russia. >ir Donald Mackenzie Wallace—.vhose work, ’.Russia,” published for the first time in 1877 and just republished. is generally regarded as the most authoritative work on that country in ■English has recently expressed his views on the present situation to the New York “Tribune.” lip says, in effect; that 1 he present Russian revolutionary movement has been going on for 40 years, and arose from a determination Io make Russia conform, at one bound, to the usages of Western Europe the results of the best governments of which it was fancied that Russia could at once enjoy. Alexander the Second utilised this desire for progress as far as possible by emancipating the serfs, granting larger measures of self-go-vernment. and reforming the courts. I hen the students’ revolutionary proclamations frightened him, ami he entered on the reactionary policy, which finally culminated in his death in 1881. Alexander the Third followed the reactionary policy of his father, and it Mas not until 18911 that the revolutionary movement again lagan Io stir under the name “social democracy.” There ate to-day three groups of revolutionists- 1 he liberals; the social democrats, who regard constitutional reform as a lirst step to social reforms: and tiie social revolutionists, who include also the terrorists. The Russian Government has halted between a policy of repression and one of conciliation, and Ihe Liberals have always expected 1o reap their harvest when the country was involved in war. Of the Czar. Sir Donald says that hr would make a splendid constitutional monarch, but 11. at hr has not the iibi-<» for an autocrat. lie decbiros that thr people are a cry devoted to him, and that thr peasantry. representing nine-tenths of Ihe population, would vote unhesitatingly for the autocracy. The peasant attributes his miseries not to the Czar, but tn thr minor official. “I repeat.” he s.iys, “that did the Czar but know how he would cure the dissatisfaction absolutely and once for all.” His comment cm the war is as follows: “During the progress of the Japanese war 1 have

been completely thrown out of >ny calculations by thr well-timed manoeuvres of the Japanese. They are the direct antithesis to the Russians. They are exact; the Russians are inexact; and while they do not lark in courage, in force, in energy, ami in patriotism, they do lack in organisation.” 4» 4* 4* England's Smiling Premier. Faith is generally supposed to strengthen the weak knees and to produce a feeling of fervent optimism which will enable a man to face contrary fates with the proverbial smile. Arthur Balfour, Prime Minister of his Britannic Majesty, and the champion of philosophic doubt, smiles, adversity down, and continues to bold the seat of power in spite of the confident predictions of his enemies. It is nearly twenty years ago since he stretched his long, lanky body on the cushions of the House, and smiled imperturbably at his enemies, who Hung at him all the vituperative abuse with which men express their feelings concerning political enemies in strenuous times. His dolce far niente air, which seemed to imply an unwillingness for exertion, was discovered, at the expense of those who encountered it, to be a mask for a very persistent nature and a character which partook of what may not unreasonably Im* called Scotch stubbornness. The harder the conflict the more actually bright was the smile of the Irish secretary. It was not a cynical smile, but the hearty, ,/jven triumphant, smile of the man who loves the fray. So he smiled his way into the position which he now holds, and he keeps his tenure smiling. He even smiles at defeat in the House, and continues to smile when his enemies Hing at him the taunting advice to “Resign.” The smile of the Prime Minister is that of the cool, strong man who knows his purpose and cannot be diverted. 4* 4* 4* t *. j The Real American Capital. We read that Chicago has just found that she has a population of two millions and a quarter, and we pass on with some commonplace comment on the marvel of it.* But it is a fact worth pausing over. Chicago is American in a dee]) sense in which no seaboard city is or ever can be. The seaboard cities represent much that is foreign. Chicago stands for the great Mississippi-Missouri Valley. It is the true capital of the true American people. Its very ugliness, like that of a mighty, incomplete work with the workmen swarming in and over it, and the noise of their toil splitting the heavens, is inspiring and splendid. In its two millions and a quarter there is no vast, inert, undigested mass as there is in New York; Chicago seizes upon its newcomers as the fire seizes upon the fresh shovelful of coal.