All Sorts of People

Free Lance, Volume IV, Issue 194, 19 March 1904, Page 3

All Sorts of People

JOHN William Ching, the champion rifle shot of New Zealand, is not a Chinaman. He is a Notv Zealander. A comfortable, plump, con-tented-lookmg Nelson fanner, who has been volunteering in his spare time for sixteen years or so. The dailies call Mr. Ching "Sergeant" Ching. He isn't a sergeant. He is a nlam volunteer ' Tommy." We asked if he had been a good shot all his life, or was his reputation of mushroom growth ? The modest wearer of the belt referred us to the lengthy Colour-sergeant Irvme, "runner-up" for the championrship, and loser of it by four points. * * * Seems that the champion joined the Stoke Rifles twenty-one years ago, and went up to the Auckland meeting with his Snider in 1884 "for a holiday," winning a few pounds, and heating up his ambition. Shot at Wanganui in 1886, still with the cumbersome and ancient gaspipe, that kicked like an Army mule, and did nothing. Shot at Wanganui m 1901, and paid expenses. Was twenty-sixth for the championship at the 1902 Trentham meeting. It wasn't in the Stoke Rifles that Mr. Ching won glory. The Waimeas, in which he was sergeant for eight years, and which he left for five years, to reijoin again as private, is the corps he loves. • » * Mr. Ching attended the meetings of the Nelson Rifle Association seven times. He won the Nelson championship five times, and was second and third respectively during his remaining meetings. In 1898, he won the gold medal for being the best shot in the South Island, and was second-best shot in 1901-2. In 1903, he won the medal for the best shot in the Nelson district. Mr. Ching, who is a smoker, and not a teetotaller, has grey-blue eyes, and a calm look. He says that no meeting he has ever attended was managed better than the one at which he so distinguished himself. Shots quarrelled less, and they had less to quarrel about. Competent range officers and courteous officials made things delightful, and he considers that the introduction of flags on either side of the range an immense advantage to shots. He does not use orthopties, is a married man, and has a nine-year-old son who ia frothing for a rifle. » * • Robert Irvine, the "runner-up" for the championship, is a long-legged farmer, who also belongs to the Waimea Rifles, a corps that may be pardoned for being very proud of itself just now. It is very gratifying to know that the volunteer service owns the two best shots for the time being in New Zealand. Mr. Irvine is a colour-sergeant in his corps, and has been shooting since he was sixteen. He has been colour-sergeant for two years. He is a rather nervous young man, with the grey-blue shooting eye, a pleasant, well-bred manner, and a modesty equalling that of his fellowvolunteer, the redoubtable Ching. * # » As a recruit of five months' service, in 1889, Irvine won the first prize in company shooting, against all-comers. Shot at the Rifle Association meeting at Auckland in 1897, doing fairly well. He has shot well at two Wanganui meetings, and has been to Trentham three times being in the first fifty during the first year, twelfth in the second year, and second this year. In company shooting he has made "possibles'' at every range but 300 yds, and once he

got within one point of the possible at the most difficult rang© known in rifle shooting. He has been to New South Wales (Randwick) and Victoria (Williamstown), to compete at those meetings, and did well. He thinks that on the whole New South Wales men are not such good shots as Victorians or New Zealanders. Many policemen shoot in Australia. It lias become a standing joke that other shots may "turn in" and have a snooze, while Robert gets his shots off. * * * The Lance asked Mr. Irvine if he smoked or drank. He does not smoke, but he "drinks." Here the sedate Ching roared. All the alcohol either takes doesn't matter, anyhow. Mr. Irvine uses orthoptics whenever permitted at competitions. Mr. Clung prefers shooting with .303 solid ammunition, believing that the wind has less effect on the shots. Mr. Irvine on the other hand, is of opinion that the Mark IV. hollow-boied ammunition gives equally accurate shooting at all ranges. The rifles used by the two orack shots were the ordinary magazine arms issued by the Defence Department, and neither had in any way been altered since they left the store. * * * Willie S. Percy and his wife, who stayed at the hotel in Pretoria which was once the presidential residence, have had a photograph taken, showing them leaning on one of Paul Kruger's cele*brated sculptured lions. Reported, before the Pollards went to Africa, that the lions had been removed from the front of the old house. Evidently it isn't so. * *■ * Mr. L. St. Lawrence is the gentleman who produced the remarkable transformation scene that converted the fusty, old-fashioned Nag's Head, of Lower Cuba-street, into the smart, attractive, up-to-date Alhambra Hotel < of to-day. Most Wellingtonians know the Alhambra Hotel and its go-ahead host. Mr. St. Lawrence had an uncle who was a major-general in the Indian service. When that military uncle died, a good many years ago, he left his nephew a fine estate in the isle of Jersey. Mr. St. Lawrence assures us his possessions in Jersey included an "ancient pile, half castle, half bungalow, magnificently picturesque, and charmingly situated." Mi. St. Lawience's artistic leanings are reflected in the striking manner in which he has smartened up the Alhambra. With leisure to look for sensations, he conceived the idea of carrrymg a Moorish scheme of design into a modern hotel. Thus the Alhambra Hotel presents an appearance that cannot fail to arrest attention. Not only_ is the decorative scheme carried to the point of gorgeousness, but the added works of arts are entirely consonant with the van-colour-ed effects. The first thing that strikes the visitor on entering the Alhambra is the internal arrangement, the cosy nooks, and brilliantly-lighted bars w Inch occupy most of the available giound space. Then, in keeping with the decorative scheme, the attendants are smartly uniformed in colours that blend with the general surioundings. * * * The marriage last week of Mr. A. M. Samuel to Miss Nellie Yohe recalls how often the smart young bachelor of the Hebrew peisuasion wins for his bride a popular favourite in the ranks of vaudeville or comic opera. Foi instance, Miss Cissy Stanford, who wed Mr. Chas Phillips, of Auckland ; Miss Marion Mitchell, who is now Mrs. Ernest Davis, of Hancock and Co., Auckland, and Miss Connie Buttel, who retired from the stage to become Mis. Louis Schatz, of Wellington. Louis Schatz only followed the example of brother Ernest, who, at Christchurch , a year earlier, carried off to the nuptial altar that charming little artiste, Miss Lily Stevens.

The latest thing about Nellie Stewart it that she has been mistaken in, America for a daughter of George Musgrove. Funny dogs these Yankees. They know an ingenue when they see her. This is what a St. Louis paper has to say about Nellie : — "Miss Musgrove, an English beauty, created something of a social sensation last night at the 'Dv Barry' performance. She is a daughter of George Musgrove, an Englishman, who lives in Sydney, Australia, when he is not actively engaged m looking after the interests of the Shaftesbury Theatre, in London. With his daughter, Mr. Musgrove occupied a lower box, for which he cabled to Mr. Short several weeks ago, knowing that he would reach St. Louis last night, and spend only twenty-four hours in the city. He is en route to London from Sydney, and will sail from New York on Saturday. * * * "The daughter is a real beauty, of blonde English type, tall and slender, with a profusion of soft reddish gold hair, which she wears very low, in the style affected by Mrs. Patrick Campbell and Mrs. Constance Crawley, the latter of "Everyman' distinction. She wore a very clinging white orepe gown, hanging almost from the shoulders, and modelled after the picture gowns of Burne Jones's women. Some old ecru lace added to the effect. Altogether, Miss Musgrove was a striking figure, and the focus for opera glasses during every intermission." Which reminds us that a Wellington tailor, who was in America last year, got a double-headed notice in the "Democrat" describing him as "The New Zealand Millionaire Sheep Farmer." * * • Ben Viljoen, the Pretoria auctioneer, who had a high command in Africa in the evil past, denies that he is going to marry Miss Belfort, an English musichall artist. Miss Belfort sticks to it, however, and it is leap year. * • # Whitaker Wright, who suicided so sensationally the other day just after getting sentenced to seven years, was of Jewish origin, arcording to the "Daily Express," and at one time it was reported that Isaac was his correct surname. He spent a good deal of his life in Australia, and commenced his London career m 1891, and in 1894 he began to take advantage of the West Australian boom to float a number of companies, out of which he made enormous profits. At twenty-one he was cast entirely on his own resources, without a penny of capital, but he never had any difficulty in making money. When he was thirtyone he was worth more than £200,000. President Roosevelt has invented something. It is a new handshake, to be used only by people who are connected by relationship or affection. The gentleman takes the lady's hand, and saws the upper air in the idiotic society style. Then, he lowers the hand, and imprints a chaste salute upon the bejewelled fingers. No American society man is now permitted to eat onions. Crosland, the "humourist," who wrote "The Unspeakable Scot," lately sued a critic who had written a review on his book, "Lovely Woman." The book is an extraordinarily vulgar attack on women, and the judge who heard the case wasn't "taking" any Crosland. Said Mr. Justice Grantham — "Those pages aie a libel of the foulest kind on the women of England, and in so far as it is a book written for perusal in the houses of the country it is simply disgusting. When the reviewer said the book outraged every relation of life, he said what was true. The book is full of abuse of women, and vet, because the reviewer said that if the plaintiff's wife had been a widow the reviewer would have been saved the trouble of having to read such rot, the plaintiff complaiuc that he had been libelled." The jury found a verdict for the defendant newspaper, and judgment was accordingly given.

Politicians had a night out at the annual dinner of the Fire Brigade, on March 9th. Being a social affair, it was only natural that some of the said politicians should consume something like two and a-half hours of the time in defending the credit of the country, and others in deprecating this defence. There wasn't any need for Councillor John Luke to be painfully surprised at Bong Dick's attitude towards the Legislative Council, or to say that 75 per cent, of them were King Dick's babies, especially as the portly, mellow Kennedy Mac was sitting alongside. * * * Queer thing about the silvery-voiced '"Mac" was that he warned the people that the inflation of land values in Wellington was iniquitous ! When the genial premier land-value-advertise-ment boomist of New Zealand said this the roar didn't die away for five minutes (by the Lance Waterbury). Kennedy Mac was brief, but he emphasised the fact that the Legislative Council would be abolished any time New Zealand earthquaked under the sea. Sir Joseph Ward was in terrific form. He reviewed everything from the financial state of the country to the RussoJapanese war. A propos of the war, he referred to the Hearts of Oak that stayed up the wooden walls of old England, and to the same timber cardiao arrangements that beat inside the armourplated fleet to-day "It is the hearts and plucks ("livers too" chipped in the wild-eyed Charlie Izard) that have made the Empire what it is to-day," said Sir Joe. * # • An opportunity was given with such a patriotic lead for the* Hon. C. H. Mills to tell us how Nelson won the battle of Waterloo, with the help of Blucher and Admiral Hawke with that good ship the Dragoon Guards, but the Minister didirt touch history. He merely accepted the encomiums passed on Ministers generally as to the manner born. Mr. Mills has now the hall mark of the aristocrat. He always says "he-ah" for "here" now-a-days. Associations with royalty no doubt. * ■* * By the way, Sam Brown, who was there, was referred to as "Judge" Brown, which was land of , Mr. Luke. His Worship the Mayor reasonably withheld any political opinions, and Mr. John Duthie deprecated the importation of debatable political stuff at a social gathering, and debated bitterly for over half-an-hour (Lance time). John uttered his usual words of warning, and got mixed with his notes, but was desperately in earnest. * * • Quite refreshing to find that Superintendent Hugo was allowed to say a word, and that firemen were actually to be seen in the banquet hall. It was also gratifying to note that the majority of banquetters listened very attentively to the clever fire captain, and that the pale-faced, earnest ex-skipper with the curly little moustache and the silver shoulder scales was very popular, and didn't brag worth a cent. * * * Mind you, the politicians did let up on their politics to say a word for the fire-fighters, and it was good of them. There were several references to the "grand old flag," but the "Jack" wasn't represented in the fine array of bunting hung round the hall. Sir Joseph having, at 11 o'clock, told a waiter to ring up a livery stable for a cab, the Lance left, and found the said waiter in the Fire Brigade yard waiting for a telephone to come and hitch on to himself. If politicians would let the firemen run their yearly show in their own way, without playing on them the political hose that will be used many times over later on, the said firemen would be glad, and might enjoy their annual dinner.

Mr. J. R. Eraser, the clever elocutionist spoke a piece to us the other day. The Lance cannot spare thirtyfour pages and an inset, but if anybody wants to bring out a new work on general and insurance topics in twenty-five volumes they should send their stenographers along to Mr. Fraser for an hour or two. But, Mr. Fraser is really a modest young man, gifted with an unusual exuberance of speech Jbor twelve years he wielded a nib and a good set of brains for the Government Lite Insurance Office, and then the bugle called, and he went to Africa as a khikero in the New Zealand Hotchkiss Battery that didn't batter. He sustained a severe lee injuiy, and became an accountant, and later an auditor, to the Military Administration. • * * Mr. Fraser tells voluminous tales of things Johannesburgy. He kept right on at the book work connected with the feeding of the Boer ladies and thenchildren, until the Fourth and Fifth Regiments were striking for home and mother, when the orator threw his kit on the troop train, and here he is. The Government Life Insurance gave him hs billet back, but a catarrhal affection weakened his sight, and he had to leave. Now, he is engaged as metropolitan superintendent to the New York Life Insurance Company, and his persuasive eloquence is wafted far and near. His Government Life mates gave him a very fine cold watch and a valedictory social a little while ago. * > * * They say that since the -n ar started the Russian Czar has been more than eyer devoted to his religious .duties. He always has l>een religious, but now he spends hours at his private devotions, and in writing prayers in Russ and Slavonic for the Imperial family. A strange rumour is current in both Moscow and St. Petersburg that if the child expected next June should be a son the Czar will abdicate in favour of his brother. Who will become regent until the Czar's son comes of age. Up to now, the Char's family consists of four little > rls - Although Elijah Dowie may be a "restorer," he isn't much good as a hairrestorer. If Dowie's faith-healing business is genuine, he could easily grow a crop of hair on an aggressively bald head. All the seeds seem to have got down, into his whiskers. • * * The Rev. Mrs. Laura G. Fixen, the spiritualist lecturer, from Chicago, is a wordy wrestler for women's rights. She met the ' Wellington Women's Political League the other day, when it welcomed Mrs. T. K. Macdonald home, and talked to them. The American lady said that woman wasn't mad© from man's foot, to- be trodden on, but from his side, to be helpnieet and companion. She also said that woman enters into public life to ennoble it, into literature to hallow it (good old "Family Herald"), and enters into the home to bless it. • o • Speaking of pioneers of woman's rights in America, she said she had attended the eightieth birthday party of Susan B. Anthony. Eighty little children passed by her, and each dropped a lovely rose into her lap. "They throw flowers at me now. Once they threw cauliflowers, and they weren't as sweet as roses," said Susan. Mrs. Fixen said that the public men of New Zealand, in the matter of probity, gave the Americans a big start. The public servants of America often sell their votes and influence to the highest bidder. Mrs. Fixen perorated thus • — "May it be yours to help make a garment whose woof shall be inwoven with the shimmering gold of woman's ideals, whose weli shall be the precious- metal of men's deeds, that men and women may unite bass and treble together and sound the true, clear note in that harmony whose music is the hallelujah before the highest throne." • • * Mrs. Pagel wife of Wirth Brothers' strong man, leads an anxious life. She doesn't mind her husband throwing weights about, for there is to him comparatively little danger. You will observe the stout, good-looking German lady before the lion-wrestling "turn' domes on. She is much agitated, and sees to all the preparations herself She coos softly to the big lion to get him in good humour, makes the rope fast on the cage gate so that she may bang it to as soon as the lion is done with, and is in some agitation until the badtempered beast is once more locked up. Mrs. Pagel hates this "turn," and, but for Herr Pagel s contract, might persuade him to cut it out as being extremely dangerous. • * * Sir Joseph Ward tells the Lance that he "went shooting" on championship day at Trentham. Also, Sir Joseph was much shot at. He was photographed no fewer than three times. Sir Joseph remarked that during his complimentary words to Champion Ching he was tempted to say "chin-chin," but refrained, as the sentiment might be misconstrued. "Chin-chin" ia synonymous with "hare one with me,"--»"one" referring to the cup that cheers but doesn't help scores.

Dairy-Inspector Singleton has taken the Taranaki rustics by surpuse. At a Waimate Plains milking-shed the other day he threw off his coat, and sat under a cow to illustrate some points which he had been explaining, and, catching on to a competition with the local cow-spankers, soon showed himself able to beat them at their own game, both as to speed and thoroughness. That an instructor should know lus own business was not considered so lemarkable. But, Singleton was the hrst of the hundreds of peripatetic Government inspectors the bucolics had ever seen do any work. They haven't ceased to marvel at it yet. • * • Lord Lonsdale has the distinction of being the only foreign person not of royal birth on whom the German Emperor has showered the blessing of a special warship so that his Lordship might see the glories of the Fatheiland No wonder. You see, it cost Lonsdale £50,000 to entertain Sweet William last year. * * • His Excellency the Governor is one of the most methodical men in New Zealand. The Governor has a huge volume, in which he enters up particulars concerning every undertaking he carries out. The scores of banquets, the multitude of foundation-stone layings, the little trips, the fishing excursions, etc., are all entered up. The Governor knows by reference to his book the exact distance between, and time occupied in travelling, every vehicle and tram load in New Zealand. It has become a part of the Governor's religion to see that the book doesn't get behind-hand. * * * Australian papers have already got hold of the. news item that the New Zealand Rifle Championship is held by a Chinaman named Ah Ching! • • • A propos of the published statement that Major Madocks, well-known here, had been winning polo honours at Home, it is thought likely that the Major, who is on General lan Hamilton's staff, may have gone to Japan with him. General Hamilton is British Military Attache at the headquarters of the Japanese Army. At Majuba, Hamilton was a lieutenant, and suggested charging. Was told by Sir George Colley not to be presumptuous, whiph were the last words of Sir George. The late Hector MacDonald was the colour-sergeant of the company of which Hamilton was subaltern.

Kaiser William of Germany never goes out now unless the streets are barricaded. Kaiser Wilhelm is the head of the Army, and the Army uses its foot on the common, soldier, who may be a socialist, and whose mana grows. Beloved Kaiser! • * * Mr. T. J. Whelan, against whom it is alleged a writ for breach of promise of marriage is to be issued, has rather a history. Last year he came_ to New Zealand with his wife, who is a daughter of the ex-President of the Transvaal, Mr. Kruger. Whelan was a soldier in a Queensland Contingent, and, after the occupation of the Tiansvaal capital, he joined the Secret Service Department of the police, distinguishing himself so quickly that he became chief detective in Pretoria. He was a remarkably fast runner, an excellent footballer, and had, previous to enlistment, in Queensland held^ a junior position in the Bananaland Civil Service. He put in some months at Waterval as a prisoner of war to the Boers.