TABLE TALK. Social, Theatrical and Literary. (FROM OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT). London, October 18. The Duke of Edinburgh and the Fife Marriage.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 428, 14 December 1889, Page 3

TABLE TALK. Social, Theatrical and Literary. (FROM OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT). London, October 18. The Duke of Edinburgh and the Fife Marriage.

The breach between the Duke of Edinburgh and his English relatives concerning the Princess Louise of Wales' marriage with Lord Fife, is the most serious there haB beon in the Royal Family foi years, and (for the time being, at any rate) quite beyond patching up. To be perfectly fair (which tho majority of Englishmen are not in considering such matters), there is a good deal to be said for the Duke's side of the question. Like Prince Consort, H.R.H. feels strongly that English princes and princesses ought not to marry out of the blood royal. Where they have done so (he avers) great inconvenience (occasionally even disaster) has invariably resulted. Take the two socalled niPialliancei in the Queen's own family. Princess Beatrice's union with Prince Henry of Batten berg, and Lord Lome's with the Princess Louise, can scarcely be said to have turned out ideally. Royalties don't know tho meaning of • ' all for love and tho world well lost." Princess Louise was certainly ready <o marry Lord Lome, but she shrank from taking his rjnk and name, and recently the mot bid pride begot by her unsatisfactory social position absolutely led her to prevent herhusbandfromacceptinga sphere of great usefulness and promise in Victoria. Baoten berg pn.bably cares too much for creature \ comforts to gird seriously at the ignominious circumstances of his life. Fow selfrespecting men would, however, from all accounts, be able to tolerato what he does. The Chaiusk Against Lord Galloway* It being found impossible to altogether burk the disgraceful charge against Lord Galloway, the Premier's brother-in-law was on Friday hist duly charged at Dumfries with improperly assaulting Annio Gibson on the Lockerbie Road, Glenbrae, on the 3id ulfc. The She*. ill substitute heard the case, assisted by u local jury, and tho accused sat in the dock between two constables. He appeared to be a very shaky, eccentric, and fiowsy elderly person, and the request of his brother to be allowed to sit beside him was judiciously complied with. The ptosecution relied chiefly on the evidence of the lilble victim herself and of hei playmates, all young children. This was clear enough, but there seemed to be juab a loophole that the Earl was merely committing an imbecile folly and had no evil intent. He ceitainly, it was? allowed, reined in no way disconcerted by the arrival of strangers nor by their angry comments. On the contrary, the old man asked the inteirupters grandly if they knew who he was, andapparently expected them on learning to apologise and leave him. A long day was devoted to the inquiry, and at la^ the jury tound a sort of "not proven" verdict, viz., that the Earl's conduct might have been consistent with an innocent intent. To irretrievably blast the charactei of a nobleman of hitherto unblemished reputation for tickling a little gill of 12 (pO9&ibly somewhat indelicately) was more than the Court felt justified in doing. They therefore steered a sale middle course. MlJblCAl. NOTHS. Tho attractions of "Dons" at the Lyric Theatre die beginning to wane, and it ia probable that Mi Leslie's next production, Messrs Stephens, and Solomon's "Red Hussar," will be forthcoming about Christmas Eve. This work, the redoubtable Teddy's friends decline, promises to be a big hit, and contains tne best melodies he has written since " Billee Taylor." Two things are known about the new Savoy opera, via., that Hawes Craven is painting a lovely set of the Place ot St. Mark's, at Venice, for the tiist act, and that a famous costumier has in hand a number of Chinese dresoe^. How to reconcile these two apparently irreconcilable tacts is puzzling the coynoscenti tinely. Miss Fanny Leslie gave a guinea tor the '"lopical Cookery Book " aoflft-She tings in " Dick Turpin." An hour aiter she had tirbD warbled it a mubic publisher, ollered £50 for the couyright. Next morning she could have got £IUO for it, and now twice that amount wouldn't buy out her interests in the lyiic. The Leeds Festival was. a great success, barring the lllnei-h of Madame Alwuna Vallena, which all but necessitated the abandonment of Mackenzie's cantata, " The Sword of Arguntyr." The postponement was decided on, and the Committee had even resolved to substitute Sullivan's " Golden Legend," when Madame Valleiia pluckily announced she would do hei best. The prima donna duly appeared and the cantata was performed, but she biokedown badly and is now very ill.

Litkrary Notes. Bentley'd annual programme of new works ot general interest, to be published during October and November, is nob as attiacb.veas usual. Sala's "Autobiography," advertised " nearly ready " three yeaife ago it) the same list, is still conspicuous only by absence, buo we are promised an additional and linal volume ot the veteran Thomas Adolphus TroJlope's "Recollections," which were so successful two winters ago, and a somewhat belated memoir of Edward Askew Sothern ("Lord Dundreary") by T. Edgar Pemberton. This last ought to give us some of the famous good stories of poor Sothern, who was one ot the most brilliant talkers as well as one ot the most incorrigible practical jokers of his time. Amongst the more serious oi Benbley's works may be mentioned "The Correspondence of PrincessLievenand Earl Grey," translated by Guy Le ,Strange ; and Mrs Julian Marshall's " Life and Letters of Mary Shelly ;" and amongst piomi&ing books of travel Mr VV. H, Mallock's "In an Enchanted Isle,'' an account ot a visit to Cyprus in 1889 ; Miss Betbam-Edwards' " The Roof of France ; " and another of Mr Hissey's " Diaries of Coaching Expeditions in England,' this time thiough the Eastern Counties. B,en.tley also announces new editions of " Lord Uundonald's Autobiography," and GusbaveFrey tag's "Reminiscences," and cheap re-issues of George McDonald's version of the gloomy " Letters from Hell," and of Henry Erroll's highly successful story, "An Ugly Duckling," which ran through no fewer than six editions in the three- volume form. Mr H. Marriott- Watson has just commenced a story (destined for publication in a syndicate of Australian and .New Zealand newspapers in 1891), the sceno of which will be laid chiefly in the New Zealand bu&h. Judging by the excellent quality ot the same author's short bush story in Mr Mennell's "In Australian Wilds," I should fancy this is an experiment not unlikely (after the manner of "Robbery Under Arms") fco prove highly successful. The play on the subject of "Richard Savage," in which Mr Watson has been collaborating with J. <M. Barrie, is, I think I told you, complete, and has been submitted to Beer-bohm-Tree, of the Haymarkefc Theatre, for whom the authors destined the title role. Barrie has been getting tremendous notices for his "Window in Thrums," which, despite its intense Scotchness, is pronounced

by such diverse authorities as " Blackwood," "The Spectotor " and the " Saturday Review," "an undoubted work of genius."' Mr E. B. Kennedy, author of "Four Years in Queensland," has turned his experiences of the " Never Never Land " to account in an exciting storybook (suitable alike for boys and juvenile grown-ups) called " Blacks and Bushrangers," which is effectively illustrated by Stanley Berkeley and published in a smart cover by Sampson Low at ss. The now issues of Low's standard novels at 2s (or in red cloth at 2s 6d) includes Blackmore's " Clara Vaughan " (not one of this author's best books), Oliver Wendell Holmes's little-known "Guardian Angel" (a sequel to "Elsie Venner"), and a volume of short tales from the magazines by Mrs Walford, called " Her Great Idea." Since that unsophisticated child of nature, Amelie Rives, started the school of torrid sensualism in America there has been quite a run on works of the same suggestive sort as " The Quick and the Dead." One of the last of these is a startling production called "And After Death," by E. H. Cahill, which is selling enormously in New York just now. Roughly, it is the story of a young and lovely girl, the daughter of an habitual gambler and an immoral actress, who ia, courted and won by a man to whom she dovotes every emotion of her existence helplessly and willingly. Having satiated his passion for her, the lover tires of his mistress and marries another innocent girl, to whom he grows genuinely attached. This naturally does not suit heroine number one, and she resolves by hook or by crook to bring her lover back to his allegiance. How, by the most persistent and malignant determination, the unhappy girl achieves this end, and how her triumph is clouded and spoilt by tho fumes of the drug by which she has tried to deaden her despair, is told in the most approved Amelie Rives fashion. The book has a cleverness of an unwholesome hot-house soib, but its general elTect can scarcely be aught but deleterious. '• Stepniak," the Russian Nihilist, whose works on " Underground Russia " and "The Russian Storm Cloud" are well known, is just about producing a novel called " The Career of a Nihilist," which will be published next week at 25-j by Walter Scott. The initial volume of the new " Contemporary Science Series " will be " The Evolution of Sex," by Patrick Geddes and J. Arthur Thomson, Amongst rifcincr lifcrafeim of the "goody-goody school must be mentioned Mr Frederick Langbridge (biother of the late Mr Langbridge of Auckland), whose ballads of the "Sent Back by the Angels" sort run " Dagouet's" more robust compositions very close with " popular reciters." Mr Langbridge is now editing a new series of stories with a moral called the " 0.U.R." books. One of the first will be by Grant Allen and is called "The Jaws of Deabh." It deals with life in the Wild West of America. Mr Allen has also a volume of stray papers collected ftom the magazines on the stocks. Messrs McClure (the American Tillotsona) have offered to provide Rider Haggard with £1,000 travelling expenses in order that he may thoroughly explore the scene of the semi-Biblical story on the subject of "Queen Esther," which he has undertaken jto write for their syndicate in 1892. They j hope by advertising and what not to make Haggard's " Esther " as big a " boom " as Lew Wallace's "Ben-Hur," which has tho largest and steadiest sale of any book in the States. Max O'Rell's next work — if his brochures can be dignified by such a title — will be a continuation of " Drat the Boys," called "John Bull, Junior." Percy Fitzgerald is writing the thrilling history of that great, erudite and never-to-be-understood work, "Bradshaws Guide." It ought to prove a rich treat. An illustrated daily paper (with process illustrations- well up to date) will be issued from the offices of tho "Graphic" early next year. The staff has already been pro visionally engaged.