Personalities.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 368, 28 May 1903, Page 2

Personalities.

A ROYAL VISIT THREE HUNDRED ' ---' , YEARS AGO.

SRbMOYAL visits to the Hebrides have Sl»«a been very few and far between. King Edward is the first Sovereign of Scotland to set foot on these .islands since his far-away ancestor, James V., the father of the ill-fated Mary Stuart, made a progress through the district with the obj°ct of striking terror into the hearts of the clansmen by the siJß'ht of his pomp and power. i While King Edward .required only a cruißer and two torpedo boats as escorts, King Jameß took'with him twelve ships of the line crowded with men-at-arms; glittering in their burnished armour, J and loaded with deadly weapons. | James sailed hither and thither, overawing the chiefs, and' if ; any turbulent souls dared to make but a hint of resistance, they were seized, carried away, and safely immured in some dark corner of the bulls of those towering ships, King Edward's progress after three hundred, years was of a very-different nature, the chiefs flocking down to the stores to do him homage without the inducement of a host of men-at-arms.

WAITING FOtfiTHE KIHG. •' f 'Tim,' the : railway./dog, a Srivileged spectator of and epartures at Paddington. JErfieemedY to divine the reason why carpfr was laid oh the platform, for there he. .would sit withhis nose between his pawe'and refuse to. budge until the Royal travellers came. ,■' Not long ago, King Edward, after taking his seat, Baw Tim gazing wistfully up and asking, as plainly as any dog could, to be noticed. The train was delayed while his Majesty, reopening the.door, cried ' Come alone-, old man!' and Tim. n'o^ waiting for a second invitation, leapt beside his Boyal patron in the carriage, whence he did not emerge until his collecting box had been enriched. -

A picture of Tim in oife; how hangs on the walls of the King's apartments in Buckingham Palace, and, so .successful is the portrait, that his Majesty commissioned the artist to execute a painting of his favourite Irish terrier Jack, between whom and Tim-there wae some resemblance.

The largest individual sum ever received by Tim was a cheque for £2OO from Mr. Astor.

THEIR FIBST KAILEOAD BIDE.

Übunu, the young king of Swassiland appeared in full court dress, that is to say, a 40-shillinr slop suit, with a bowler hat, and attended by his 'tail' of Indunas —about a dczen nearly naked Swazis—on the station platform at Barberton, and waited patiently until it was almost dark, when the rumble of the train could be heard in the distance.. With straining eyes they watched the track to see the flying wonder they had heard of. But when the engine, with screaming whistle and two great lamps glaring like eyes of a monster dragon, rounded thecuive and came screaming towards them, they fled like panic-stricken rabbits to the nearest cover, leaving their chief and. a few white men on the platform to face the danger, Next morning the chief reappeared oh the platform with his • tail,'-; and begged the acting station master to show his Indunas the locomotive in less bellicose mood, and if it were humanly possible to give them a short ride behind J it. As there was really nothing doing at the station, the station master decided to humour the young chief's wish, and; hooking an enaptj coal truck onto the locomotive, he told the driver to take them for a few miles' run along the line. Übunu and his 'tail' got into the coal truck, the station master into the cab of the engine, and off they. set. It was ' fair and softly * for a short distance from the start, and the Swazis seemed delighted, with the new sensation, but the driver put on speed, and when it got to about twenty .miles an hour the. passengers were i clearly in a state of alarm j they grasped the side of the truck, and gazed like paralytics at the rocks and;, trees flying past them,- ; [*.«! Übunu did his best to reassure them, but in vain and some of them were on the point, of. jumping overboard to escape a worse fate, when Übunu shouted to the driver and asked: him to please slacken the pace. No sooner said, than done, and in a.little more than a minute their speed was reduced to that of -ah 6xl waggon. The Swazis were quite reassured, and, were soon laughing and talking again as lively -as ever. At a siding, half-way to Ayoca, they halted, the engine changing ends and the return journey began. Übunu gave the sign that he would like a bit of speed put on* i and' ,tfte driver, ; nothing loath, whipped her until she was going between thirty and forty miles an hour. .He imagined that the Swazis would get the funks again, for the road was not "very smooth and the truck was jumping about a good deal, but he was mistaken. .The Swazis had seen enough to satisfy 'them ;that he was master of the.' smoking horse,' and a .hundred miles ~an hour would not have shaken their confidence. ;.-.

On returning to the station they got out of the truck with .evident "reluctance, but highly delighted with their adventure. The station master was no longer a person o£ coneequence. They 'crowded round the cab of the engine, made their moat dutiful obeisance to the master of the smoking horse and his mate, and departed with shouts of ' Inkoos; iakoos!' (Thatft: you my loi&i thank you!)