Stage Gossip.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 229, 19 November 1887, Page 3

Stage Gossip.

The celebrated Viennese conductor, Hans Richter, upon one occasion ab London conducted Brahms' Academic Overture, and as usual, wibhoutmusic, as he possesses a marvellous memory. However, on this occasion he forgot the change of tempo from 34 to 74, through which mistake a slight unsteadiness occurred in the orchestra, which was of course noticed by the audience. Instead of making it appear, as so many conductors would, that it was the fault of the orchestra, he turned round to the audience, saying, "Ladies and gentlemen, the mistake was mine, not that ot the orchentra," and under a- perfect ovation he resumed his work. Verdi's " Otello'' i« to be produced at St. Petersburg on Monday next, 14th Nov., the birthday of the Russian Empress. There is a great run at Mudie s in London just now after a dismal and somewhat repulsive novel called "An Evil Spirit." In reality it is really a treatise on the mischief caused by the use or rather misuse of morphia. Mi=s Isabel Goulon, a charming girl with a lovei , friends, and most things that make life worth living, suffers from neuralgia. A doctor injects morphia to afford "her relief, and in course of time the poor woman becomes a slave to> fchfi; drug and utterly demoralised. The crisis ot the story arrives when Isabel's lover, Geoffrey, after four years' absence in India, returns home suddenly. She had intended to pull herself together somehow for this occasion when it came ; but the young man takes her entirely by surprise. He is knocking at the front door almost before the unfortunate girl has realised his arrival and in the horror of the moment she tipples offsome brandy und flies to her room. The ardent lover follows, atid is horrified to find there, instead of the blooming damsel he left behind him four years ago, a half tipsy woman raddling her pale face with rouge. Isabel sees his look of horror in the glass and falls (senseless with drink and drug) to the floor. Naturally her lover does not return. Isabel presently sees him paying attention to another woman, an old friend of hers-. Mad with jealousy she follows the pair to the top of the clitfs at the seaside place where they are staying. Geoffrey kisses the girl's hands, upon which Isabel furiously springs upon him and pushes him over the precipice. The doomed man gives her a look of " overmastering horror " as he disappears, and Isabel's supposed rival cries out : " What have you done, what have you clone ?, He never made love to ?ne. were only (alkinrj about you." For sentimental reasons the witness of the murder does not hand over Isabel to the police, and Geoffrey's death is allowed to be supposed the result of an accident. For an ultra .sensational novel with a daring and mo&t unconventional plot, however, commend me to the latest effort of, the author of " The House on the Marsh." Ib is called " Scheherazade,- or a London Night's Entertainment," and as the title suggests there is a strong flavour of Orientalism about it. The heroine, Nouna , \Ve3ton (a sensuous little animal when we first meet her) imagines herself the daughter of an English officer and a native Indian Princess. Her father is dead, and Jhor mother (a most mysterious personage) 'lives abroad with a Polish Count, her second husband. A governess looks after Nouna, who vesicles in curious rooms over an Oriental warehouse, near Oxfordstreet. Hero the hero, a young officer, " meets tho little Anglo-Indian, and against his better judgment falls in love with, her ancl resolves to marry her. No obstacles are, placed in the way by the mysterious mother,' who, however, does not

burn up at the wedding. After the marriage a number of extraordinary circumstances puzzle the bridegroom. His suspicions are at length aroused, and in course of time culminate in a most painful and crushing disclosure. I need scarcely say, perhaps, that Nouna's mother and father avo associated with it. Terrible trials follow. The villain of the story is a wily Oriental named Rahas, and a notorious courtesan, one Chloris White, al&o plays a prominent part in bringing about misfortunes which tor a time threaten to o\ erwhelm the young couple. The story io briskly told, and has not a dull page in ib, and on tho whole should add to Miss Warden's reputation.