WHERE THE DEAD CARCASE IS THERE WILL THE VULTURE BE FOUND

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume XI, Issue 1311, 19 April 1883, Page 4

WHERE THE DEAD CARCASE IS THERE WILL THE VULTURE BE FOUND

The New York correspondent of the Melbourne " Argus” writes as follows ; The star of Mrs Langtry pales as it sweeps towards the West and South, It obtained, however, a moment, of artificial glow in the city of St. Louis, On her western journey Mr* Langtry was accompanied by a gentleman from New York, named Mr Fred Gebhardt —young, good-looking, rich, a “ man about town." His rather ostentatious gallantry towards the English actress was the subject of club gossip in this city and in Boston, but did not reoeite any notice in the Press, which, happily, has more important if not more interesting matters to discuss. But in Bt. Louis, the chief journal ot the town seised on his frequent appear* ances at the side of Mrs Langtry as a bright opportunity for the exercise of its peculiar "enterprise." On the second night of her playing in the town the “ Globe Democrat" caused to be distributed among the audience hundreds of cards, each bearing five questions, with a request for an answer from those who received them. Of these questions the last was the delightfully impertinent one, “ What do you think ot Freddie ?" Selection* from the alleged answers—which were collected by the ushers at the theatre —were published the next morning. With them appeared a singularly gush* ing comment on Mrs Langtry’s acting her personal appearance, and her social qualities, which the dramatic critic of the journal had tested in an interview. In the same journal was an elaborate account of Mr Gebhardt's relations to Mrs Langtry, as gathered from current gossip, and a diagram of the rooms allotted to her and to him at the Southern Hotel) where both were staying. The diagram represented the suites of rooms as separated by a corrider and two “ six-foot walls," with a Gatling gun stationed at the respective entrances and a sen-try-box in the corridor. On the evening of the publication, Gebhardt ap- £ reached the reporter of the “ Globe lemocrat " in the large hall of the hotel, accused him of being a “ liar " and a “ scoundrel," and challenged him to stand up in order that he (Gebhardt) might have the pleasure of knocking him down. The reporter —one “ Colonel" Cunningham, who had been in the Confederate cavalry —declined the invitation to this rather superfluous ceremony, and intimated that Southern gentleman did not fight with their fists. The two seperated; and the “ Colonel ” afterwards sent a challenge to Gebhardt, which the latter refused to notice. As the New Yorker can box well, and use the pis* tol, and the Southerner is a dead shot but cannot use his fists, they hate spent a fortinight in vain thrist for a ■' meeting.” Gebhardt has left the company of Mr* Langtry, and gone buffalo hunting, The whole affair is pitifully absurd and vulgar, but it fills the columns of nearly all the “ news" papers west of the Ohio for a week) and occupied much of what theireditor* •‘are pleased to call their minds."