LITERARY AND DRAMATIC NOTES. London, January 11

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 348, 6 March 1889, Page 4

LITERARY AND DRAMATIC NOTES. London, January 11

Mr Stead's "Truth About Russia" has led to a very pretty quarrel. His erstwhile enthusiastic backer, Mdme. de Novikoff, declares that it is \cry far from being the truth about Russia, and that if she had forseen her friend was going to promulgate such heresies she would never have ghen him the light of her countenance during his tour. " Labby " laughs ab the book and at the transparent manner in which the Russian oflicials showed their visitor just so much of prison life and the treatment of political detenus, etc. , as seemed desirable. The one leally reliable book about Russia and Russian society, etc., wiitten during the last decade, was Grenville Murray's "Russians of To-day." He had been an attache at St. Petersburg in his time, and made good use of his eyes. The work is difficult to come acioss now-a-days, though you will not improbably find it in one of the circulating libraries. If you should, please make a point of reading it. Most people had completely forgotten poor Wyndham Carter till they .saw in the papei's the other day that an application had been entered to make him a bankrupt. He was the editor of the " Kennel Review," and a great authority on dogs. Everybody knew him for a genial and kind, but blustering and fiery-tempered man, who abhorred common sense and defied control. Such a fellow, we all said, -would surely get into a scrape some day. Alas ! we little guessed how serious that scrape would prove. You will remember the story, for I told it you at the time. Carter borrowed money at 60 per cent, from some financial society, and then quarrelled with the lenders anent the exorbitant interest. They sent down bailiffs to fcake possession of his cottage in the country, upon which he locked the doors and turned his dogs (a collection of a dozen or more, mostly bull pups) loose. This would not have mattered, but in the course of the siege which followed, tho foolish man let off a pistol, and a shot recochetting, put out an eye of ono of the bailiffs. Of course, Carter was arrested, and charged criminally, but allowed out on bail. Friends and relatives endeavoured vainly to bring homo to the man that his position was serious. He would neither make an attempt at compromise nor keep quiet. On the other hand, he abused his enemies loudly ; wrote ribald pamphlets about them, and even sent a resume of their evil doings to the judge who was to tiy his case. Carter's friends were terribly apprehensive of the result of the trial ; not so Wyndbam himself. He looked upon the whole affair as " a matter of a fifty-pound fine, Isuppose," and when the judge uttered the fatal sentence, " fi\ c years' penal servitude,'' he fell senseless to the ground. Since his incarceration, Caiter inherited his father's estate, but so encumbered as to be practically Avorthle&s. Hence, I suppose, the bankruptcy. His library, a lovely one, full of rare issues and choice first editions, was sold last February. No matter what a music-hall " star " may earn during his lifetime, he inevitably dies impecunious. Leybourne did so, so did Fred Coyne and Nelly Power, and now we are told that Vance, who earned £20 a week to his dying day, leaves four young children unprovided for. Mr Ruskin is seriously ill again —so bad, indeed, that it is improbable he will ever be able to resume the thread of his literary v. ork. This, time theie is no question whatever about the old man's mental condition, and he has to be most carefully watched. Chicken and champagne followed the fall of the curtain on the first night of "Macbeth" at the Lyceum, Mr Irving's friends, accordingtocustom, goingbehind to bid him "God speed," etc. On this occasion the best part ot the stalls and dress circle were bent on this pleasing mission, so that the crush was terrific. Miss Ti3r*y very soon disappeared, but poor Irving, who looked deaaly tired, did nut, I am told, get away till 4 a.m. Apropos of " Macbeth " Augustus Moore tells a story about a terrible contretemps which occurred this Christmas to the Benedictine Monks College at Ramsgate. The clerics had a sort of recitation of parts of " Macbeth " before their boys' parents, and the youngsters were of course most anxious to distinguish themselves. The littlo lad whose role it wa3 to say "Macbeth be bloody, bold and resolute " had been coached to render tho lines with great spirit, but at the critical moment nervousness overcame him, he spluttered a moment, and then cried, " Macbeth be bold and bloody resolute ! !" This enfant terrible must have been first cousin to the youngster who translated "The Eastern Hemisphere," "Le Demimonde Oriental." It takes a moment to appreciate the perfection of this jokelet. Amongst the new green " six-shillingers " of Bentley's I notice Miss Rosa Monchette Careys badly-named but " sweetly interesting" story, "Only the Governess." This is one of those novels which the strictest matron need nob fear her daughter's reading, and yet 1 scarcely think any man who gets into it will willingly lay it down. The phrase "Go to the Jodrell" has sounded less significant since Patti Rosa came to that unlucky theatre and sang and danced a la Minnie Palmer. Patti is younger and fresher than the fair and finnicking spouse of J. R. Rodgers, bub she has not the latter's cleverness. Still one can sit out the performance ab the Jodrell Theatre now, which one never could before.