SOME FAMOUS LONDON TALKERS.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2558, 1 December 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)

SOME FAMOUS LONDON TALKERS.

Me Smalley has followed up his article on "Mr Gladstone as a Talker" with some'' further notes on conversations, and on the custom of particular eateries" in London. He says : — MR BROWNING NOT AN " ACROSS-COUN-TRY TALKER." Mr Browning is not quite three years younger than Mr Gladstone, and, like the statesman, the poet has the secret of perpetual youth. If you inquire in different companies you will hear different accounts of Mr Browning as a talker. He is the opposite to Mr Gladstone iu this—that he allows his conversation to be influenced by the company. The statesman takes his own line across country. The poet will now and then amble through gates, and wait for a lead over a gap in the hedge, and even go round by the public highway. He is capable of talking as long and with as much energy on that truly British subject, the weather, as the most unimaginative of Philistines.

"kit audience jfin'd, though vew." For his best talk he wants a fit audience. The audience may consist of only one, but the one must be appreciative. Other things being equal, he prefers, I fancy, more than one. Mr Browning is, unlike Lord Tennyson, a diner-out. Lord Tennyson is a recluse; seldom to be met in a London drawing-room. Hardly anybody is to be met oftener thau Mr Browning. Student, thinker, hardworker as he is, he contrives to be a man of the world also. It depends on his host or hostess, on their guest, in what character he appears. Their evening may be spent with Browning the poet, or with Browning the metaphysician some people say they find it hard in reading him to separate these two—or with Browning the man of letters, of music, of art, or finally with Browning the man of the world. They have, however at least one thing in common, these various Brownings. Each of them is a remarkable talker. If you have the good luck to meet two of them, or even all of them, you may ponder a little over the problem of pyschological identity. They are all alike in possessing a wonderful memory—one of those memories which seem to do their work without any volition on the part of their owner ; a memory on which things engrave themselves as deep as oa tablets of brass, but with the rapidity and natural ease of photographic impression. Mr Browning is a mine of knowledge; knows with minute accuracy the history of literature, of art, of music, and many other things ; and knows by heart, I should think, all the verso that has ever been written. You will bear him, when he is in the mood, pour out quotations without number of verses by poets without name or fame. If you an; lucky enough to hear him recite some of his own you will at once perceive how futile is the work of the commentator and expounder. The only commentator Browning needs is Browning. THE FINISH OF LOBD GRANVILLE. It would be easy to single out many other men of the day whose conversation is remarkable in one way or another. There is Lord Granville ; he, too, has a good hold on the past and on the present, nor is there a better example of that elegant suavity of style which never becomes common, aud is certainly less now than it was. He has a finish of manner which is more French thau English, a turn of the phrase, too, both in public and in private speaking, to the neatness of which but few of his countrymen attain ; and with all this a sense of delicate humour which is just as English as the other quality is French. °Mr Kinglake has almost withdrawn from social life, but there was a time when he and Lord Granville might have been almost bracketed together. THE SHIBBOLETHS OF THE SETS. The great increase in the number of those who, in one sense or another, may be said to belong to London society, ha 3 had the effect of splitting society-into sets. It becomes difficult, therefore, to generalise, whether about society or about the conversation of society. If there be anything true of all sets, it is that each has certain shibboleths of its own. Each speaks a language of its own or at least has its own topics, as well as topics which are more or less common to all. Nothing is more characteristic of society than that it takes so much for granted, but each coterie takes different things for granted ; has a different slang, if such word may be applied to the talk of those who dwell in these celestial regions.

" SHOP." There are certain kinds of " shop " which men and women permit themselves to talk. They tacitly assume that everybody else present knows all about their sabjeot, or ought to know. If you do not know so much the worse for you. Strong iustancea might be cited. There came to London some years ago a lady from Germany who had just married an English nobleman. She was well received and every effort was made by bis relatives to do honour to the bride. She was asked by one of them to dine. The party made for her comprised an English lady of greater rank than her own, whom the host took in to dinner. The German lady sat on his left; next her on the other side was a young English lord, whose ideas of life are confined to steepleehasing ; opposite her was a wellknown man about town, capable only of snch talk as flourishes in his own set, a very distinguished and entirely frivolous one, Tho talk during dinner was led by the English countess who went in with the host; a woman with a subject of her own—"shop "in fact. She talked extremely well and the dinner was brilliant, but from the beginning of it till the hostess rose there was not an opening for the German bride. She was altogether " out of it," sat silent, perfectly composed, and made no effort to force her way into the conversation. This will nerve, as well as any other example, to show how exclusive good society may be towards those who are admitted into it. To be in it is one thing; to be out of it, quite another.

THE ART OF SILENCE. It is like a family party; you roust know all the family relations and all the family history, and all the pet names, and all the incidents of domestic life, before you can be on terms with the rest. It changee from one year to another; the note changes; last year's key will no more open this year's secret places than last year's argot will pilot you aloug the Boulevards in Paris. Yes, and in London or anywhere in England among London society, which spends often as much of the year in the country as in London, you want a pilot among the shoals and quicksands far more than in deep water. The art of silence is more subtle than the art of speech. There is a passage in one of Mr Henry James's novels which is more significant, covers more ground, implies a deeper acquaintance with the English mind than any other single passage I know. An American banker in England and his son are conversing. An Englishman has been with them, and to him the father has addressed an observation of which the son disapproves. " Ah, father," says the son, " you have lived here a long time, and you have learned some of the things they say, but you have not learned the things they do not say."