People We Hear About.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVII, Issue 30, 27 July 1899, Page 28

People We Hear About.

Mr. Herbert Gladstone is, according to Mr. Justin McCarthy, ' a great statesman and a great Parliamentary orator.' ' I never,' writes Mr. McCarthy, ' knew a man with a sounder judgment, a cooler head, or a more sympathetic nature.' Alluding to the great discourse delivered by the Archbishop of St Paul at the Orleans Cathedral, on ' The Patron Saint of Patriotism,' the llm/j'j Ilujister avers that his address at once places his Grace in the torefront of living orators, and raises him to a level such as few living prelates of the Catholic Church have attained to. Mr. Bowen Rowlands, QC. (says a Home paper), who is to relie\e the Lord Chief Justice in the South Wales Circuit as Commissioner of Assize, will bre.ik the record by being the first exuu I,'jiii.in oi t.i- 1 i'- ""abli-Tril Caurch who h..s been called upon io di-.(.h>u !_•(.' tii ' duties oi. a judi.e ot a— i/e. llr. Rowlands, who is a Catholic, .-ai m ilie; last Parliament tor a Welsh constituency. Sir James Ilenderbon. J.P , managing proprietor of the Belfast Xc,r^-Li tier, will be the next president of the Chartered Institute of Journalists, in succession to Sir Thomas Wemyss Reid, the editor of the Speaker. The conference of the Institute will take place at Liverpool early in the autumn, when Sir James Henderson will be duly installed as the new president for IK'jy-I'JOO. There will, it is expected, be a special service for the Catholic members of the lnbtltUt.3. Lord Forester, who has accepted the office of mayor of Wenlock, England, this year, \ o-^esses the privilege, by a grant to his family from King Henry VIII., of wearing his hat in the presence of royal'y. Lord Forester is the only English nobleman who enjoys this privilege, which was conferred on his ancestors as commoners. Lord Kiii»s.ulp, the premier baron of Ireland, also enjoys the hereditary privilege ot wearing his hat in the royal presence — a tavour granted to his ancestor, John de Courcy, by King John. Mr. Edward Martyn. author of The If-at/u r Fit Id, which has been produced mi ce-^tully under the au~pices of the Irish Literary Theatre, is a landowner in the County Gal way. of which county he is a Deputy Lieutenant. He lives at i'illyra Castle, a tine old place ,to whu hhe has recently built sor.no additions. ilr. Martyn is a musical connoisseur of learning and enthusiasm. He is a student i ot Wagner and Palestrina, and recently he was instrumental in J having some ot the latter master's great works rendered at St. , Teresa's Church in Dublin. He is also a lover of art, and has a , choice selection of modern masters at Tillyra. j Shortly after Mr. San thy' 9 reception into the Catholic Church j by the Very Rev. Vincent Giogan, C.1., now head of the Passionists m An tmha, the great singer, who was a Unitauan, gave a cheque j tor £1000 towards the erection of a chapel for convert Anglican ! ministers preparing tor the priesthood. A little later he received i from his Holiness the Pope the honour of Knight Commander of j the Order ot St. Gregory. It is a puzzle to Englishmen of all creeds why the Queen (to who n the eminent singer is well known) has I not knighted Santley — the greatest singer (great in opera, oratorio, | and vocal music of every kind) that England has ever produced. To-day, with his whi'.e hairs, Santley still holds the highest position a» an artist in England. i The death of Franci«que Sarcey, who has been the chief I dramatic critic in Paris since the dtath of JuleS Janin (says the Catholic 'J'iiius) is a reminder of the different positions held by the successful journalist in this country and in France. In Great Britain he is respected, but scarcely ever becomes a dominant force in public opinion and never makes a fortune. In France if he is a stylist of the very highest class he moulds thought ; his name becomes a household wor. i ; and at least the possibility of building up a fortune is within his reach. The danger is that having be- ' come a recognised power he may misuse the opportunities placed at 1 his disposal, but a corrective is of course always at hand in public criticism. M. Sarcey's contributions to the Temps were for tnlßiy years taken a» final verdicts on dramatic art in France. Though at times unsparingly severe, his judgments were rarely at fault, and hi.s popularity did not flag, tlis religious views seemed to have \ been tormed under the influence of the Encyclopedists, but of late , he showed some signs of a genuine loyalty to the Church, and the I day upon which he took ill he spent at the College Stanislaus with | his son who was making preparation for his First Communion. His 1 characteristics were in every respect national.

Drs^evin Izod O'Dohtrty, F.R.C.S., is the sole survivor of the j Irißli^tate prisoners who were tran.^p >rted to Tasmania in the year | of revolutions, 1818. He was the boy <>f the batch. A. medical student in Dublin, he was, caught in the revolutionary current and started an outspoken little paper, which was promptly .-> up pressed by Dublin Castle. Ah he afterwards humorously observed, be wrote J only one leading amc;e in hi* life, and ho got ten ye.ir& for it. | Being pardoned after five years of exile, he returned to the old ' world to complete his medical education, and then established him- , self in practice in Bn>-I>nnp After nno'her interval in liimdon as M.P. for Meath for six months, he returned in 188710 Queensland and accepted a Government medical appointment, which hf> has has held ever since. i

A short time ago a celebration wa* held at Cambridge rnivcrsity in honour of the eightieth birthday of Sir George < abriel | Stokea, president of Pembroke College. The universities of the | whole of the British Empire sent their congratulation-*. Sir George i Gabriel Stokes, Bart., was born in lSl'.t, at Mcreen, County Sligo, ' Ireland, and was educated in Dublin, Bristol College, and Pembroke < College, Cambridge. In 1840 he was appointed to the Lueasian Professorship of Mathematics, and in IK.">2 wjih awarded the Rum- | ford medal by the Royal Society in recognition (if hrn services to i science by his discovery of the change in the rtfran<ribil ty of light. , He represented Cambridge University for some years in Parliament. , In 1889 he was created a baronet, and in IS',lO retired from the presidency of the Royal Society. '

To Viaoouiit Wolseley must be allowed the credit of heinar one of the hardest-workt d men in England. Rising soon after five o'clock every morning, winter ami summer, it is seldom that hi-> ! military duties do no I',1 ', commence befure nix. and by the tun" his j clerka are turning over in their beils, for their last snooze, and i

vaguely contemplating the pleasure of ham and e^prs the Com-mander-in-Chi"f has d"ne as much solid work as the a\em<re city merchant or stockbroker £ets through in half a 'lav. Lord Wul-eley , comes down to Pall Mrtll between eleven and twelve o'clock. His '

office, which is at the back of the building, overlooking 1 the Mall, is a handsome apartment with four windows and a bijr, fl.it oak di.sk in the middle ; and it is on this article of furniture that most oi our little wars are planned. It is [ire eminently a woikioom, and anyone who enters it expecting to find an atmosphere of easy luxury will be disappointed.