People we Near About.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVII, Issue 22, 1 June 1899, Page 15

People we Near About.

Mr. Patrick Donahoe, founder and publisher of the Boston Pilot, celebrated on last St. Patrick's Day, his eighty-eighth birthday.

The young Irish- American who has leapt to fame by ' Mr. Dooley ' proposes (says the Daily Chronicle) to visit this country during the coming summer. His visit will naturally include Ireland, and the centre of Ireland to him will be Rose* mmon.in the dialect of which IDr Dooley 'is written Most authors find it hard to get a publisher for their manuscript, but his difficulty was to find the manuscript when hall a of publishers wanted it. In other words, he had not kept copies of his skits as they appeared in a Chicago newspaper, and it w?is only through a discerning admirer that he was able to get them together.

The first centenary of the death of Maria Gaetana Agnesi — which occurs in August next — has led to the idea cf forming in Milan, her native town, a lady's club of a serious, not to say bluesrocking, character, named after this feminine Admiral Crichton. Born in ]SSS, she at an early age was thorough mistress of seven languages — Italian. Latin, Greek, Hebrew. French, German, and Spanish, at I.i she published a philosophical treatise, and then devoted h< r-elf to sciences, mathematics being her favourite subject. She stated that algebra and geometry wi ro the only regions of thought in w hich peace reigned supn me. Pope Benedict XIV. appointed her protestor of mathematics at the University of Bologna, and -.he died at the good old age of 81.

An all-round favourite of the singing world is Mr. Charles Rantley, and if a plebiscite were taken to discover the most genial and experienced British vocalist the award would undoubtedly fall to the share of this great baritone — the thuji nof native singers. Mr. tfantley is a Liverpool man, where his father was an organist and a teacher of music. Born a-~ f r b.f kas l.v-U, he has been before the public for the loner pen* dof 50 years and more. His first solo was sung at Toxteth Park Chapel on Christina- Day. 1M 7. though St. Juhn'-. Cathedral. Salford, holds the honour i,f having inven him his earliest paid engagement He s< r\ol a five yeir"s apprenticeship in the house of Mess's. Kibbm anil Corduk^. in Livt rpool ; he was bookkeeper in another h< u-e for ;t year before he went to Italy ; and he stands uhvajs an example ot what a musical amateur may accomplish in his spare tune. As soon as he went to Italy, he studied under Nava. Since his iirst appearance in 1 ondon, in Haydn's ' Creation ' in 1 s">7. he his sung in every part of the world, including this Colony, which he visited some 10 or 12 years ago. Mr. Santlcy is a Catholic, and is over to the fore in helping in the choir of the l'ro-Calhedral at Kensington. His favourite recreation is reading — generally theological works. He is a moderate smoker, and spends all his evenings at home when he is not publicly engaged.

Rev. Father Walter Elliott, who wrote the Lift of Father Ilcchrr, about which all the controversy has ras< <1, w aw one of the founder's earliest and best-loved disciples. At pi e-ent he 11,I 1 , giving missions in Connecticut with one of the Community's bands of missionaries, of which he has Ion;? been the bucue».-f ul head. He c mes of an Irish family distinguished socially for two generations in the city of • Detroit. Michigan. His fither, the late Judtre Elliott, was one of the Catholic pioneers of that city. With two of his brothers he enlisted in the Union Army when the Ciul War broke out, and served in an Ohio regiment, winning a lieutenant's commission for gallautry in the field before he was mustend cut. He then studied law, and was admitted to the Bar before he decided to enter the sacerdotal «tate. It seems an odd coincidence that another of the I'aulists, Rev. Father Robin.-on, served in the ranks of the Confederacy, and in that part of it opposed to the section of the Union forces in which Father Elliott was engaged. The p esent head of the Community, Rev. Father Deshon was General Grant's friend and classmate at West Point, and another member, now several yeara dead, was the son of General Rosecrans. The Community has two branches, one at Washington, D.C., where the House of Studies is located, and another in San Francisco.