TABLE TALK. (FROM OUR SPECIAL CORRRESPONDENT. ) London, December 14.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 343, 16 February 1889, Page 4

TABLE TALK. (FROM OUR SPECIAL CORRRESPONDEN T . ) London, December 14.

The mild spring-like weather we have been enjoying for the last month or so came t 0 an end with the advent of battle Show week, and ever since Monday fog, frost and an icy noith wind have been doing then worstNevertheless the streets are full of rosyiaced jovia) country cou&ins on Mglit-seeing and present-buying intent, and the shop windows are so brightly lit up and so full of pretty things that it is really quite impossible to stay in the house. The Christmas card mania seems thi3 year to be entering on a new and peculiarly exasperating phase. Instead of the pretty cards and books of Messis Hildesheimer and Tuck being as heretofore in supreme demand, there appeals to be a general disposition to purchase what — for want of a better name — I shall call " seasonable sells." The Clnibtmab cheque and draft forms more particularly have gone up in price from a penny to threepence, and are being very laige>y bought. They so ex actly resemble the real thing that the recipient is> almost certain to be taken in at first, and if he or she happens to be either hard up or expecting a gilt ot money from oorae rich uncle or cousin, the humour of the situation is immensely mci eased. A practical joke of this sort requires, however, to be played on the right person. Poor relations are such queer, cranky creatures, one never knows quite how they may take a bit of fun, 'Tis said in the newspapers, for example, that a forlorn young clerk in difficulties, to whom one of these precious Christmas cheques was sent by a jocular acquaintance, committed suicide in consequence. The revulhion of feeling from intense delight, relief and astonishment to bitter disappointment was too gieat. It turned the poor fellow's head. Poor Mi Bright was only told of his precarious condition a few days ago, and then would hardly believe it. He said he felt too well to be moribund. However, the grand old tribune bade the members of his family an affectionate farewell and dictated a long message to Air Gladstone. He thanked the ex-Premier for his unfailing kindness and courtesy to himself, and said he placed a high estimate on the services which he had rendered to his country. On most vital political questions they had till recently invariably agreed. Mr Bright's head was quite clear all last, week, so much so indeed that he enjoyed being read to. What will Mr Gladstone do next, or, rather, what won't he do V 'Tis said that at the present moment the G.O.M. is wholly absorbed in the question of breeding pigs, and that an article from his pen on certain abstruse phases of the porcine character will shortly appear in a leading review. The stoiy must, of course, be a joke. The chief London dailies are seldom threatened with fewer than three or four I libel actions apiece in a week, but the 1 majority come to nothing. Both the "Star" and ohe "Pall Mali "have been charged with libelling Mr Walpole, the hero of the recent breach of promise case, and I hear they intend retaining Sir Chas. Russell and other learned counsel and making a big thing of the action. This would practically amount to fighting the erratic Miss Wiedermann's case for her, which, I confess, if it were me, I should think twice before doing. Coin-collecting should be good business if Mr Marsham's sale last week be any criterion. He admits that on every lot he made cent, per cent. Fancy £32 for a William the Conqueror penny, £62 for a half-crown of Edward VI., and £27 for an Elizabethan sixpence. The ninth Whitechapel [murder fell due, according to Dr. Winslow and the experts in lunacy, between Friday and Tuesday last. Naturally, the police and the local " vigilants " were specially on the gui live, which, perhaps, accounts tor nothing happening. By the way, the article in the " Pall Mall " attributing these crimes to a black magician, possibly a disciple of Eliphas Levy, was by Lord Crawford, who has made a special study of French works on the subject. I have been three times lately to witness the experiments of the French magnetist of whom I wrote you, and on each occasion my surprise and amazement have increased. A friend who accompanied me on the last two insisted upon going on the stage and offering himself as a subject. He was, rather to my surprise, successfully hypnotised, though not without a struggle, in which the mesmerist was only partially dominant. Thus it took a long time to convince my friend he was a dentist, and even then, as he told me afterwards, he hneio it wasn't so, just as, when De Meyer pointed to a ligid body on the stage and said it was his brother lying dead, reason rebelled. But on the occasion of my friend's second visit the state of affairs was widely different. This time De Meyer had merely to catch his eye as he sat amongst the audience, and he could do with him what he willed. My friend says the conviction of absolute helplessness, and of being wholly at the magnetist's mercy jor ever, made him feel more miserable than he could have conceived possible. Between the first and second part of the entertainment my friend told me he didn't want to sjo

on to the stage again. I said, " Send De Meyer a message, and it will be all right." But he didn't do so, and he told me afterwards it was because he couldn't. Thioughout the evening this young man's mind obediently followed the magnetist's faintest suggestion. He made him hot or cold, tearful or merry, sleepy or wakeful, merely by telling him he was so. My friend pays he never in his life felt so cold as when De Meyer couched him and told him he was freezing. His head was like a lump of lead, his extremities icy, and he thought he should never be warm again. When told to sleep (or rather willed, for the Professor was off the stage) he, at my suggestion, stood up and we slapped his hands and did all we knew to keep him awake, but unsuccessfully. This subject.like all the rest, was quite powerless and fell back sound asleep at once. Finally the supposed death of a brother reduced him to the condition of mitigated grief one would expBcfc under tho circumstances from a man richly blest with elder fraternal relatives. The result of this semi-conscious atternoon of varied emotions was a bad headache, which kept my triend in bed next day. The conclusion I came to was that the man who tampers with mesmerism out of curiosity is a fool. Once magnetised, you are the operators slave whenever and wherever he meets you for the rest of your life. De Meyer boasts that he could mesmerise a subject and order him to commit some felony, say a murder, six months hence. The subject would wake up unconscious of the doom hanging over him, but when the time came he would commit the crime. After three hundred days, however, experiments of this class are not successful — at least, have not been so yet. "It is," I said to my friend, "rather a gruesome thought that if De Meyer were so disposed, he could perfectly eately convert you into an involuntary Jack-tbe-Ripper." The openings for crime which mesmerism provides are, indeed, it seemb to me, practically unlimited, especially for those sort of viilanies where women arc concerned. The chief safe-guard, of course, is that De Meyer has no influence in 90 cases out of 100. Already there are rumours of serious dissensions between the Duke and Duchess of Murlborough. At any rate, the Duchess has gone off by herself to Monte Carlo, whilst the Duke remains at Blenheim. The Duke is standing for the County Council with the avowed intention of | making things warm for Mr Majendie, the recalcitrant vicar ot Woodstock, who declined Lo hi\e the joy-bells rung in honour ot His Grace's aduJteious union with Mrs Hammersley. The Duke withdrew his subscription to the local schools under the impression it was-, £100 per annum and would lead to their being closed. Unfortunately, it proved to ha\e been only "an uncertain £10" since he succeeded to the title, and Mr Majendie explained this fact bi icily in a letter to the "Times." The parson's hiends are running a local farmer against the Duke for the County Council, and hope to return him triumphantly. A curious relic of old London is at present being impioved out of existence. From Primrose balcony, long ages ago, Old Q. sat at gaze ; who now passes below ? asks Mr Fiedeiick Locker; and the balcony in .Piccadilly, ugly enough it ia true, from which in this century's early years the wicked worn-out Duke of Queensberry — 'old Q.' — leered at tho passers-by from under his parasol, has ju&t disappeared. The steps by which he managed to totter down to the street level were removed not long after his death ; but it is only now that the porch, without steps, perched upon two tall pillars like a small coach-house, vanishes from sight, Here he would sit of an afternoon, his groom, Jack Radiord, waiting mounted in the street below, ready to ride after and s^op any friend that the Duke had a mind to speak to. From this porch he was hoisted out by a kind of inclined plane and lowered to his dark green vit-a-vis with its two longr- tailed black horses. While the porch still remained the gho&t of that colossal roue, that 'emaciated libel on manhood,' still seemed to haunt Piccadily and to take the air that blows from the Green Park ; but now it follows its master to the limbo of oblivion, whither ' the gay Prince and Poms' went so many years ago. Christmas theatrical novelties at the West End (there ai c, of course, the usual pantomimes at the East) include Sims and Pettit's "Break o' Day "at the Adelphi, "Macbeth" at the Lyceum, the " Babes in the Wood" at Drury Lane, "The Balloon" at the Criterion, and "Paul Jones " at the Prince of Wales's. Looking through an " Era Almanac " for 1868, which I picked up on an old bookstall the other day, I came upon some interesting events. How many people, I wonder, identified Miss Lingard when she came over from America in the character of a " star " actress, as Miss Alice Dunning, who just 20 years ago was doing two turns a night at the Philharmonic and South London Music Halls ? Lingard, of course we all knew, graduated on the music-hall stage. In this Almanac I read that on December 7th, 1867, he sang his " Great Statue Song " for the 647 th time. Vance was then as now " The Great Vance," and had just scored a success with "Walking in the Zoo" and "The Late Lamented Jones," and Arthur Lloyd too was popular. Gilbeithas resolved to defy the critics and hold on with " Brantinghame Hall" at the St. James's. At present, the houses are only so-so, bub they may improve. I know several fairly good judges who consider it a better play than "Captain Swift." The new Lyric Theatre, which, from all accounts, outvies in perfection even the Shaftesbury, will open on Monday nexb with the evergreen "Dorothy,'' moved on from the Prince of Wales's. By- the- way, I see M r Cellier has been tel ing someone that the air to the popular song, " Queen of My Heart," was written by him some years before the other music of the opera, and sung about the music halls to other words without attracting any special attention. Just like "Two Lovely Black Eyes." Lady Mun&ter's novel, "Dorinda," has been in rare demand at Mudie's since ib leaked out that the "kleptomaniac" heroine was identical with an unfortunate lady whose adventures in London society caused a rare "to do" some fifteen years ago. Not that " Dorinda's " story is the same as the real kleptomaniac's, but Lady Munster has certainly utilised at least one wellknown episode. The late Lord Dudley, for instance, was the peer who, losing some jewels of great value during the progress of a large house-party, introduced a couple of detectives secretly as guests. The men at once recognised a certain noble lady who had been pointed out to them by London tradesmen as a c}ever thipf, and' watched her. Presently she attempted to take something, and then Lord Dudley was informed. The thief being a wealthy woman, and having jewels galpre of her own, he could hardly believe his ears, but the detectives persisting they were right, he spoke to the unfortunate •woman's husband. Then ensued just such a terrible scene as ia, described in ♦' Dprinda." You should read, the book, which is well written and interesting apart from its associations with a painful ocandal.

"Cleopatra," which commences in the "London News" of January sbh, will, Mr Rider Haggard saj r 8, be his chef d'wurrc. He intends to rely on its transcendent merit* alone in 1889. " Colonel Qnaritch, V.C.," has deservedly been "slated" all round. A very atniisinn book has been published in America (only), entitled " How the Men Propose." 1 1 contains extracts on this evurinberesting question from almost every author worth mentioning — li\injj or dead. You can (jot, it from Brent ano, of Union Square, N. V., but not as yet in England. The new novel by the initiator of the '*L» Marriage a Failure" discussion (Mrs Mona Caird) will not deal with any absbruso social problem. It is. however, the story of an unhappy marriage, brought about from diffttent motives \>y an impecunious country squire and his Puritanical wife, the i victim, of course, being their daughter. Mrs Humphry Ward has received £100 in copyright fees from America. This is not much, considering that in the last nine months the Yankee pirates boast of having sold over 100,000 copies of "Robert Elsmere " alone. The boos has been published in ail soit^ of editions and at all sorts of prices from 25 cents to $2. By-tho-way, a new English edition is in preparation, which will be called the " Cabinet'" and be in two handy volu nes. The programmes of the magazines for the coming year arc, with one or two exception.", unusually weak. "Corn hill" will rely on Miss Ty tier's ghost story, " French Jautt," and on a new novel by an anonymous author entitled " The Counbx .'' This is rumouied to be one of Jameo Pa\n'> " finds, ' and people Mill, in consequence, peruse the opening chaptcis with special interest. The " Argosy " has still some of poor Mrs Wood's '* copy " (a Johnny Lu>llow story) to diaw upon, but, warned by the failuie of " Charles Strange, ' will support it with a serial by T. W. Speight called " The Village Blacksmith." Temple R.,r merely announces "two new >-torie^ " without giving names, and " Chambers " has not apparently fixed its serial for 1889 yet. The fact i-=, of course, that the st.v t ing of Tillotson"^ and other notion buieaitx, and the publication of so many higii-claa.* novel 8 in the weekly papers, is gradually killing the non - illustrated maan/inep. "Time," "London Society,'" "Home Chimes," " Tinsley's," " Belgrav'a."' and the " Gent'emen's," none ot them pay, and neither " Longman's " nor " Coi nhiil " are too flourishing. "Belgravia"' ha? been on sale for some months, and how often "Time" and "London Society"' have changed hands I shouldn't like to s-ay. Three years hence 1 don't belie-\e there will be a non-illustrated magazine save, perhaps, " Temple Bar," in existence. Already peopie are beginning to discover that penny papers, like the "Sheffield Weekly Telegraph " and "Glasgow Citizen," contain equally first-class fiction and quite as much miscellaneous reading matter as any sixpenny magazine. Meanwhile, I recommend " Longman's *' and " Good Words " as the two best investments for 1889. The Messrs Murray's detective sboiy in the former, " A Dangerous Catspaw," is first-rate of its sort, and Walter Besant's "Bell of St. Paul's" sounds promising. The programme of " Good Words " I detailed some weeks back ; suffice it to say Edna Lyall, Black and G. M. Fenn supply the fiction.