ALL SORTS OF PEOPLE

Free Lance, Volume I, Issue 15, 13 October 1900, Page 3

ALL SORTS OF PEOPLE

THERE will be great rejoicings at Home amongst the "witlers" for their deadly enemy, Sir Wilfrid Lawson, has been knocked out at Cockermouth, a Cumberland sea-side town he has sat for since 1886. Prohibition all the world over will deplore the Tory victory, for what the Rev Mr Isitt is to New Zealand Sir Wilfrid is to the whole world of temperance reform. A witty old gentleman— he is turned 70— but of late years " Tommy " Bowles and " Labby have challenged his once supreme position as jester of the House of Commons. He has been an ardent supporter of the " Stop the War " policy, and it is the "Khaki" dissolution, that has dissolved him. ** * • Mr Pritchard Morgan, whom the Welsh mining constituency of Merthyr Tydvill has thrown out in favour of Keir Hardie the Socialist labour extremist and semcrank, popularly known as " Queer Cardie," is an ex-Queenslander who " made his pile " out of Mount Morgans. He went home to his native Taffy Land and astonished everybody by spending tens of thousands on mining for gold in North Wales. He got the ' colour,' but not much more, and after a gallant struggle turned his attention to the Far East, getting, so it is said, valuable mining concessions in Northern Chowina One of the earliest items in the Chain news a few months back was that Mr Morgan's prospectors had been cleared out by "the Boxers, so that with one thing and another the famous speculator is having a run of bad luck. •• - * i-8,000 a year for steamer and railway expenses is the travelling bill of FitzGerald's Circus, but the enterprising proprietors, the brothers Dan and Tim, have to pay a good deal more in the way of "exes"—^9oo a week it is said by those who know, before either can get a shilling for himself. Which proves that Australasia pays for popular entertainers royally. The third brother of the family is Jack, an ex-M.P. in New South Wales, now (recently called) a member of the Sydney Bar, and editor of the once brilliant, but now somewhat faded Catholic journal, Sydney Freeman. The circus men are very proud of Jack, but they make more money out of the " Lion and Elephant " biz in a week than combined law, politics, journalism, and religion make in several years. » • • Several of the politicians who figured in the British election news last week are personally known to New Zealanders. Sir James Fergusson (re-elected for a Manchester seat) was our Governor in the early seventies ; Colonel Willinnis (again returned for Dorset West) is father-in-law of the Bishop of Wellington, whom Jie visitod a couple of years .ago ; Sir Henry Morton Stanley, who drops out of politics, has been with us a lecturer ; and Mr Walter Hazell (the rejected member for Leicester), came out here as one of the repiesentativcs of the English Emigrants' Enquiry Office, to spy out New Zealand, and toiued the best part of the colony.

The much-lauded Donald Macdonald had a surprise when in Wellington. One day the mail brought him a mysterious envelope with three shillings worth of stamps— only that, and nothing more. Even the address was carefully printed, evidently to complete the disguise of identity. The surmise is that it was sent by some conscience-stricken person who had sneaked in to one of the lectures " on the never," and wanted to make amends by payment of his fee. An interesting personage with a romantic career, long resident in Wellington, is Baron Mollwo, formerly well-known as a lecturer, and who occasionally bursts out in that line still. Born a Eussian nobleman, and heir to considerable estates and bands of serfs, he became, in early youth, one of the young Russian Liberals who resolved to give all their serfs for their liberty. And when warned by Czar Nicholas that such an act would be viewed and punished as high treason, they nevertheless did the act of emancipation, and fled the country in disguise. England's hospitable soil afforded the brave baron an asylum, and there he acted as interpreter in the Russian Court of the Great Exhibition of 1852. Once settled in London, he became one of the famous band of revolutionist refugees, of whom Garibaldi, Mazzini, Carl Marx, and others were notable members. # # * By and bye an amnesty was issued, which enabled Mollwo to return to Russia, but his forfeited estates were not restored, and he had to earn his living as a teacher of languages. While thus employed, he fell in with one of his pupils — the daughter of a wealthy Russian—and became engaged to her' in marriage. But his dreams of bliss were cut short by the arrest of both father and daughter on suspicion of being connected with Nihilism. After the fashion of the country in thqse days, both the prisoners were hustled off to Siberia. The girl fell down on the road, dying from exhaustion, and when her father stopped to kiss her for the last time he was shot dead by one of the Cosßacks. .Small wonder that; the bereaved lover then became a Nihilist in real earnest, and soon made Russia too warm to hold him. Exile again becoming his lot, he finally wandered out to New Zealand. # • » " The Baron's " sterling character and wide knowledge of men and things are much appreciated by those who have the pleasure of his acquaintance. Though over seventy years of age, he is more active than many men of fifty. If you want to get an emphatic and candid expression of opinion, just ask him what he thinks of the Czar Nicholas — of the unpronounceable name. # • * Mr Robert Parker returned this week from his trip to the Old Country, and is to have a very enthusiastic welcome home again from" his fellow local musicians. What Wellington owes Mr Parker cannot very well be estimated. He came here at a time when high-class music was practically unknown, and has done splendid service in educating the public taste. He may be a trifle grumpy in manner— when he meets the genus musical ignoramus — and we all remember that when he gets on the subject of encores he also gets " on the high horse." But he is a born musician, and is well worthy of the general esteem in which he is held. The Anglican Church especially ought to be grateful to him, for he is, a thorough-going churchman, who has done ten times as much work for the Church as he has ever been paid for. In Parker, Barnett, and Fyfn, Wellington has a trio of leading musiciaus unequalled in any other colonial centra ot the size oi Wellington.

Clever Clifford Walker, who has made such a name locally with his musical monologues, talks of returning to England next year, by way of India. He goes down to Christchurch very shortly to give three entertainments. Mr Walker is the best monologue entertainer, in the Grossmith and Corney Grain style, that we have seen out here for some years. * # • Malcolm Ross was one of the Gubernatorial party off to annex the Cook Islands for Queen Victoria and King Richard. Mr Ross ought to write a very picturesque account of the proceedings, and he will keep his camera pretty busily employed. He " did " the islands some years ago for the Union Company the time he was private secretary to the managing director. * * • Mr Secretary Hogben, of the Education Department, is a mighty hunter— not of big game or " bugs," but of earthquakes. Nothing delights him more than to get on the trail of a big shake. When once he does, he will not rest till he has traced it to its lair, and he has in this way marked down the starting-place of every quiver of any pretensions that we have had for the last twelve or fifteen years. Mr Hogben is the recognised representative in these seas of the international earthquake observer, and has at his home the most delicate instruments for the recording of quakes. He has had correspondents at work in all parts of New Zealand, and in the Australian colonies and Sonth Sea Islands — well over 100 of them in all — whose business it is to note accurately the times and circumstances of all tremors that occur. These are sent to Mr Hogben, who collates the details, and forms his conclusions as to the origin and history of the irresponsible grievances. One of his instruments has only about twenty of its kind in the world. * * * The breeze in the House the other night between two prominent - u breezers " was quickly dispelled by the Speaker. Of course, " Riccarton " never ought to have insinuated that any honorable members were " full of whisky." But in education questions, the House always gets warm, and Parnell himself can say some very " nasty " things at times, although when the heat is over there's not a better hearted man in the House. Y. V V ' Everybody is remarking how generally popular Mayor Aitken has become since he assumed the gorgeous position of Chief Citizen. The fact is that to many people J.G.A. has turned out a most agreeable disappointment. They imagined that because he is a good staunch •• true blue " Presbyterian, and bosses a Sunday school, he would be too slow, and starchy, and exhale a general atmosphere of tracts and Westminster confession. But Mr Aitken has shown that he has any amount of go, and, like all men who are truly religious, he doesn't bore other people with it, but acts up to his creed quietly and sincerely. He is doing good work, and the best proof of the general esteem in which he is held lies in the fact that you can every day hear men say, " Well, I'm sorry now I voted for Kennedy Mac. Not that " Mac " is not a good chap in his way too, but many of his supporters had got it into their heads that his oppouent was not quick enough to catch worms, whereas the tramway business, the fixing up of the Waterloo-quay trouble, and other things show that he is a great success." Mr Aitken's a moral for a second term if he chooses to stand, and the Fuee Lance hopes he will.

Roberts, of the cue, is meeting with a wily opponent in Weiss. The former detestsslow play and Weiss knows it. The latter openly declares his intention, so we hear from Sydney, of wearing the English champion down. Roberts hardly hesitates a minute before making his shot,, but Weiss walks round the table and cockshis eye on one side and fusses about. This irritates Roberts, and irritation is often the prelude to bad play. Weiss knows this. It is not a nice game toplay. • # * Down at Dunedin, in the Fogo case, the S.M., who acted as Coroner, shut out the pressmen from the inquest, but at the Magisterial inquiry he admitted he had made a mistake. In future he should not have the power to make such a mistake. The public have a right to be represented through the press at inquests ; to exclude the reporters is StarChamber practice. The Rev. Mr Coffey is at his favorite game once more pulverising the Wellington editors. Very indiguant indeed ishe, but that is only partially his excuse,, for his indignation is only partially righteous. Let him denounce crime and. vice as much as he pleases, but when he blames the press for encouraging thesfr things let him be sure of his ground. Now, to castigate a certain Coroner for assuming the air and functions of a Supreme Court Judge is not to encourage crime or vice. It is, on the contrary, to discourage a species of inflation which isunusual, unnecessary, and undesirable. It may possibly be an agreeable surprise to Mr Coffey to learn that the press hatescrimes and vices of all kinds quite as much as he does himself. • • • ' Genial Dr Grace had a lot of nice things said about him the other night, and got enough silver plate to tempt the enterprising burglar to take a trip up Havvkston-street. The doctor is as bluntly outspoken as he was in the old Maori war days, when the " Micks " of the old. 65th found him a tough customer to deal with as staff-surgeon. As mild as. milk with a genuine sufferer but " death on malingerers," as we once heard an old 65th man say. He can be sharptongued even now, as more than ione of. of his fellow M.L.C's. have found, and he is down hard on fads of all kinds. But the rough speech hides a warm heart. The doctor, no doubt, has made money out of the trams, but he made it by hisbrains, and after all it was a near thing. As he mentioned the other night, the trains were a losing concern for years. • # • That's a clever move of the loyalist party in South Africa to cable Home resolutions praying the electors to give tlie Conservatives and Unionists a big majority. Mr Whiteley, Mayor of Mafekmg, who has been telling the electors that every seat won by the Liberals will be regarded by the Boers as a gain to them, is a Yorkshireman by birth, and one can easily imagine what will be the effect of his warning upon the " tykes." And that there is good reason for what hesays is found in the correspondence between Liberal members and the Kruger Executive, which was fouud at Pretoria. Labouchere's letters were peculiarly indiscreet. At a time when peace and war actually trembled in the balance he was urging the Boers " to spin out the negotiation*. You are pasiniasters at this game." However, in Northampton, which was once Bradlaugh's constituency* half the electors are republicans, and Labouchere's audacity may pull him. through.

The Ohariu settlers will regret the departure of Mr W. L. Beech from the local school. He goes to the much-dis-cussed Stoke Orphanage as assistant teacher, and a hetter man could not have been chosen, for he combines great natural kindliness of heart and manner with the strictest discipline. # # * Poor " Tommy " Eobertson, who died suddenly at Gibborne the other day, was one of the best known "Ambassadors of of Commerce " "on the road " in New Zealand. Certainly he was one of the biggest, for he weighed some 18 stone and was of enormous bulk. For years he had pushed the sale of that wellknown beverage, " Speight's Beer " of Dunedin, and with " the trade " was deservedly popular for his jovial manner and straightforward business habits. One of the best hearted, most charitible of men, he will be greatly missed, not only in Dunedin but al' over the colony. He had long recognised that in his corpulence lay a grave danger to his health, and personally was of most temperate habits. But he was doomed to apoplexy, poor fellow, and when the enemy met him in the gate there was, mercifully, no long strugg le. # • * Mr Maj-ndie, who tops the poll for Portsmouth, is a son of the famous authority on explosives, and a cousin to a well - known Wellington settler, Mr Mnjendie, of the Ohariu Valley. The latter is himself a keen politician, and he has more than once been mentioned as a possible candidate for the Otaki seat. Meanwhile he has done splendid work on the Hutt County Council and other local bodies. # * * A good many people, we find, are confounding Mr William Allen, who has been returned for Newcastle-on-Tyne, with Mr "Win. Allan (the member for Gateshead), the " poet engineer." The latter is a fine old fellow of 65, famous wherever marine engines are used, for he not only builds them, but writes " poems " on them, as Kipling's " Macandrevv " would have done had he had the gift of verse. The Allen who was rejected is quite a different man, and was the youngest member of the late Parliament. Both Allan and Allen are strong Radical. # * * The lt shaloo " between the Premier and his somewhat eccentrically independanjt follower Mr Napier, which enlivened one of the long nights of last week, was only another example of a well known fact. " You're a nice man to draft clauses. Look at that last one you drafted for me." " You're a nice man to talk about getting lawyers to draft. Pay me my fee and I'll draft you anything you like, ship-shape, and Bristol fashion. But gratis advice, no thanks, not taking «ny to-day. In fact we never do. Any man taking any casual advice of mine in the street does so at his own risk, let that be distinctly understood. Besides, don't imagine for one moment that I admit having made any mistake in drafting on the occasion you mention. Draft was all right 'till you got your blundering pencil into it." All of which, and much more, was said by both disputants with much gusto. The curious outsider only wants to know, on the one hand, what has fallen out between the Sing of men and the King of Draftsmen, and on the other, why the chance of the Attorney- Generalship is not considered a fee good enough to cover many opinions and drafts, casual and otherwise. # • • " If I had a son I would rather see him breaking stones upon the roadside than employed in a bank." This statement is ttributel to a Supreme Court Judge on finding, during a case heard before him, that much overtime was worked in our banks, arfd that tellers received only .£135 per year, and had to keep up something like style on this pittance. Now, this happens to be the very salary paid in a Southern case, of which the newspapers a'-e full just at present. There is the case of a poor wretch who worked for one of our banks for twenty-two years, was in charge of a country branch, and his salary was under i' 3 per week ! The bank would like to know that teller's present address. But if he wjre found, what could he prodnce except proofs of debts ? There is no need to go further than Wellington to see that bank clerks need more than a wharf labourer's wage to keep up appearances and live decently. What with annual, half-yearly, and quarterly balances, our clerks have a busy time of it, and there is a good deal of up-to-midnight gas burned behind bank windows. It is passing strange how small pay goes with long hours, and that in many institutions where such conditions prevail big dividends are paid to shareholders. How long, 0 Lord !

A man of wonderful versatility was Mr W. Skey, an old identity in the Civil Service, and one of the best known of Wellingtonians, who passed away last week. A skilled analytical chemisf, he was well posted in many branches of scientific research, and yet he found time to dabble in literature and write verse with the true ring, some of which has been published. In earlier life he was a keen experimenter in agricultural chemistry, another Mechi in fact, but he had bad luck with a project beetroot distilling, which he started under the auspices of the French Government, and in the early sixties decided, like many more, to try his luck on the Otago goldfields. Fortune did not, however, smile upon him when he wielded pick and shovel and rocked the digger's cradle at the historic Gabriels Gully, and after a while he became assistant to Dr. Hector, then provincial geologist. In '63 he came up to the Windy City, and has been in the service ever since. He did excellent work for the Mines department, where he will be greatly missed. In private life he was a genial raconteur, a well-read and wellinformed man, with a great store of pleasant reminiscence.

Mr Alfred Cox, who was drowned in the Rangiwhaia stream, in the Rangitikei, last week, was at one time well known all up the coast, from Foxton to New Plymouth, as a very daring amateur steeplechase rider, as he has shown often in the Old Country before he came out to the Rangitikei. Although afflicted with deafness, he was a wonderfully quickwitted young fellow, with a good stock of English turf stories. He was a relation of the Hon. F. Arkwright, M.L.C., and married a daughter of the late Major Willis, of Rangitikei. Poor Cox was always most unlucky in the way of accidents. He used to say that he had broken both arms, one leg, put his collar-bone out, had fallen down a ship's hold, and didn't, know what the next accident would be. Alas, he met the New Zealand death. At polo, hunting, and coursing functions, he was a well-known figure. All Kimberley's bright and sparkling gems 'Presenting wealth untold, Or all the richest diadems Can't cure a cough or cold. So if you suffer from a chill, Seek something good and pure, Good health and strength await you still In Woods' Great Peppermint Cure. — Advt.

The popular third officer of the Talune, Mr Gr. S. D. B. Hooper, having been transferred to the Monowai, congratulations are with the Monowai and her new third. Mr Hooper will continue to be an element of safety professionally, and a social success in his bigger little floating world, and therefore his friends are pleased to hear of his promotion. * * • A prominent and certainly bulky figure at the recent big Maori kovero in Wellington was Wikitona (Victoria) Kemp, daughter of the late Major Kemp, grand old chief and soldier, who beat the Hauhaus so badly, and prevented them from raiding Wanganui. Wikky Kemp is an old Wanganui celebrity. When quite a girl she was sent to England, where she was most expensively educated. She returned, speaking good Frenoh as well as unexceptionable English, and was a splendid pianist. Not six months passed, however, before she went back to the " blankets." * # * After the stern faring of an all-night session the unbending of Thomas Wilfbrd, Esq., M.H.R. — good title for a little romance, by the way — is good to see. For example, ask the youngsters what they thought of him at the Flower Show the other day, when he sang " Poor Cockie " for their amusement, with that clear voice — the best in the House — and jaunty manner, and of the riiie drill immediately after through which he put the boys on the grounds. " Boys, 'shun ! When do you move off with the right foot ? " " Never, sir ! " said a little chap who knew things. *' Ah," murmured the member for the Suburbs ; " well, now, right dress, will you ! " And the boys joined in the general grin. " That," smiled this legislation drill instructor, " was a catch question I picked up from my Colonel."

By the death the other day of the one-time great Southern Maori chief, Teone Topi Patuki, a link between the old and the new era in Maoriland was broken. The only indication of Topi's age was given once to a friend, when the man of reticence, being extra communicative, said that he was so-years-old (pointing to an urchin of fourteen years) when the Tcai-paTceha (potato) was introduced into the South. As the potato dates back to 1820, Topi must have been 94, and therefore he "arrived" in those stirring times when the century was young — midway between the colony's exploration by Captain Cook and its annexation to Great Britain. It is recorded that one of Topi's people gave the great navigator a hearty welcome ashore. Topi's was the noblest family of the Ngaitahu tribe, and bore the name Nga-i-te-rangi-a-rnoa, probably because its members had distinguished themselves as hunters of the great bird. The deceased was nephew to the great chief Tama-i-hara-nui, of wnom it was said he was regarded with such veneration that the common people dared not look upon his face, and his equals in lineage recognised in him a spiritual head. # • * What will George Fisher say to the recently expressed opinion of a Bendigo preacher — that the three " noblest works of God " are " a minister of the Gospel, the editor of a newspaper, and the doctor of medicine." According to the only George, the average editor is a pestilential personage whom society should erase from existence with as little compunction as it would destroy an anarchist or a noxious snake. George prides himself that he has seen thirty odd Wellington editors come and go, and he still survives as a politician. But though the editors come and go, the papers remain.