LONDON GOSSIP.

Globe, Volume V, Issue 554, 28 March 1876, Page 4

LONDON GOSSIP.

The London correspondent of the Argus , writing by the last mail, supplies the following “town talk ” : The attempt to place warfare upon high grounds at all, is in fact a lamentable failure. Combatants will use any weapon that lies handiest and proves most fatal, and will be deterred as little by honor as by religion. For example, what can be more inconsistent than to employ spies, and yet to hang the spies employed by others. “ During the revolutionary war, and again as late as the war in 1812,” we are reminded, “the British press and public denounced the use of the rifle by American troops as barbarous, and the picking off of men at long ranges as inhuman.” It was once universally agreed that the use of Greek fire was contrary to the law of nations, and now we have come to “coal torpedoes,” and sending every soul on board ship to the bottom without a word of warning. I believe there is still some shadowy enactment against poisoning wells, but I cannot see upon what ground of reason; a drink of water may be “ a natural want,” but so also is a shovelful of coals. It is no wonder that history is such a difficult matter, when even the most recent events or utterances are subjects of dispute. On the third and last judicial inquiry into the Mistletoe catastrophe, Baron Bramwell is reported in the papers to have said these words :—“ Would Englishmen not be proud to know that the Queei had the privilege of going faster on the Solent than any other person ?” His friends—of whom he has many, and, I believe, deservedly—assert that it is impossible he could have uttered so injudicious, and indeed, under the circumstances, so unseemly, a remark. It would be also, they say, very uncharacteristic of the man, who has a reputation for personal independence. On the other hand the reporters do not often make mistakes. Whether Mr Gladstone was right or not to exonerate himself, as he did, from a charge made by such a journal as Reynold's Newspaper, I think there is no question that Baron Bramwell should set himself right with all the papers, and the public, upon this point ; for the idea of the subservience of our judges to court influence is a new but growing one, and, should it spread much further, would be mischievous in the extreme. Some things certainly do happen—off the Bench—that are very incredible. In the Museum at the London Hospital the other day, a friend of mine was watching a dead mouse being put into a bottle of spirits of wine. “Whathas that mouse done?” said he, knowing that the bodies of those only who had done remarkable deeds were 'thus enshrined by science. "Well, he has just killed his man,” was the reply. The fact was the man had tried to catch him, and it had run up his sleeve, and out at his neck, and while the poor fellow stared with his mouth open (as well he might), the frightened animal had actually jumped down his throat. Even this might not have ki’led him, but it seems a mouse has the power of existing with less air about it than most creatures, and finding itself, as it thought, in a sort of prifo >, it began to tear and gnaw the poor man so badly that he literally died of his wounds. One has heard of people being “ afraid of a mouse,” and it now seems they have some reason. If this accident should deter people from sleeping with their mouths open, and snoring in the exasperating manner used by some folks, that mouse-killed man will not have perished in vain. Apropos of this mouse story, I see the proprietor of a menagerie (French, I am glad to say) has got into trouble for forcing a poor little child to act as a beast tamer, in a cage, with four cats painted like tigers. He was shoved in with a whip in his hand, and bade to compel the creatures to go through certain tricks. But these fierce grimalkins, finding themselves in a cage with no escape, turned upon the the poor boy, and used to scratch and bite him throughout “ the entertainment." It used to be the punishment of female poisoners in France to hang them in a cage, over a slow fire, with half-a-dozen wild cats, who, when they began to feel too hot, always associated their pain with their companion, and began to tear her, But this poor boy had poisoned no one. Some curious particulars have recently come to light respecting another grand playwright—Alexander Dumas, the younger—whose endeavors are directed to reform, not the politics of the human race, but the morals. His “ Lady of the Camellias ” was prohibited under the Republic, but after the Coup d'etat the Emperor sanctioned it, and it still produces its author a large income, From America alone, he says, he would have gained a million of francs, if only he had been justly dealt with. His “ Demi Monde ” was too strong even for the Empire ; and Napoleon 111, told him that “it would displace the national theatre though he added characteristically enough, that it would do forj a smaller house. It was immensely successful, but, singular to say, it did not succeed in getting the annual prize for the piece best calculated to improve the morals of the working classes ! The jury, indeed, recommended it, but the gentleman whose function it was to give the award had scruples, whereupon the jury moved that the prize should be abolished, which was done. Of Dumas’ “ L’Homme-femme" 70,000 copies were sold immediately ; and thoi gh the great ladies expressed their horror of it, and even mobbed him on his first appearance after it at a ball, he had the satisfaction of hearing one of the greatest of them whisper, as he put on her cloak, “ne les ecoutez pas ; c'est une chej d'oeuvre." He gets £6OOO for every play, and realises an income of £BOOO a year from his copyright “without writing in a twelvemonth more than would fill 300 pages.” When talent and virtue, walking hand in hand, are thus rewarded, who shall say that there is no hope for France ? It is not generally known that the two favorite companions—or at all events pets—of Robert Browning, are a couple of tame geese, who follow him upstairs and down stairs, and into the poet’s chamber. From bis classical tastes it is supposed that these are descendants of the geese who saved the Capitol—but this is mere conjecture. His enemies who read this will remark, perhaps, “ birds of a feather flock together," but his admirers may quote another proverb, “ Extremes meet.”