The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1890-04-14
CELEBRITIES ABROAD.
Lively Gossip at First Hand About
Some Famous People in London.

rience," said a lady who had recently
returned from Europe, TO Washington
Star reporter. SIT represents a phase of
existence to which nothing in life to be met
with elsewhere is at all comparable. Among
other things 1t signifies being launched into
circle where everybody one meets is some
body. At the dinner table more par
ucularly, in the character OF lion
one encounters the celebrities of the
day and the exalted of the earth gen
orally All the world meets in London and
in single drawing-room Of the British
metropolis you may see with one glance a
gathering that fairly represents the wit and
brains, genius and achievement of ad-
vanced civilization. You may be a lion II
only you are sufficiently original in your
own way. Robert Browning was honized
In London for twenty years-spoiled by it
somewhat, by the way: Buffalo Bill was
also hon not less worshipped during the
| comparatively brief period of his stay in
England. Society in that country must be
entertained and any one who will amuse
the British aristocracy or contribute new
idea has the best possible letter of introduce
ton to the peerage and gentry"
LEAVING LIoNIsM OUT OF THE QUESTION"
she continued, "the reception accorded to a
professional celebrity in this country is alto
| gother different from that extended abroad.
In America one concludes successful lee
| ture, let us say, and the women rush up
with pleased faces and say that they are SO
glad to have heard the discourse, and that
they are anxious to have their children in
structed on the points spoken of. But in
| England the women would say: Come and
dine at my house on Wednesday. You can't
come then? Well, let us say Saturday. So
sorry. What day next week can you come?
You will understand what | mean when /
tell you that the social rewards for
something done are greater in London
than anywhere else in the world.
Even Ouida London has tried its
| best to make a lion Of Notwithstanding
difficulties on her part which rendered
the task palpably impossible. remember
meeting her not very long ago at a dinner
| in London. OF course, everybody knows
how eccentric she is. That night she was at
her worst. She sat On the end of a sofa in
limp attitude. designed to be anonymously
languishing as | fancy-this was before
dinner was announced-and when any one
was introduced to her she would give an
imperceptible nod and interpose an enorm-
GUS feather fan between herself and further
conversation. At the table she behaved
like spoiled child who is trying to see how
bad it can be among other things raking
into the conversation the unsavory Colin
Campbell case, which has been by general
consent interdicted in polite society When
the ladies' left the dining room, Ouida-she
wishes always to be called Madam Ouida'
said to the hostess:
let me know the moment my carriage
comes, for l wish to 60
| subsequently, when her carriage was
announced, she rushed out with hardly a
word for the hostess and none at all for any
one else, while Rider Haggard remarked:
Did you ever see such guy of a
woman
GIVE THE DEVIL HIS DUE
"And yet she had on by all odds the
handsomest, best made and most costly
gown in the room. Haggard said that it
was very ugly, but the fact was merely that
it was unsuited to her. There has go to be
a certain consonance between the individual
and the dress, don't you know. For my
own part, / admire Ouida very much for
the intellectual part of her and would
gladly talk with her again, Notwithstanding
her eccentricities. She has face very
much like George Eliot's. and there are
only two or three such that we have known
of in the world"
''Tell me something about Rider Hag-
gard said the Star man.
II never knew him very well. He is very
young looking, slim and blonde. Among
the men and women. too he seems to be
very popular. Oscar Wilde 1 am better ac-
qualnted with. He Is growing to be enor-
mously fat; he is very tall, you know, and
it would not be too much to term him ele-
phantine. To rue his face always looks like
that of an amiable old woman. But in fact
he is one of the brightest men in London,
and really brilliant conversationalist His
so-called esUhetic folly was never intended
for anything else than effect. Mrs Wilde
is very ambitious woman with great
deal of style. Just before / left London,
few weeks ago, l went to a reception
where were TO be seen the best dressed
women in England. As l was going
down the main staircase Oscar was sQueeZ-
ing his rotund immensely through the
front doorway, his wife following on his
arm, in dove-colored dress with a round
waist, low neck and short pulled sleeves,
straight skirt, and her blonde hair in
fluff, while she carried in her hand an enor-
nous peacock-feather fan. There were
plenty of beautiful gowns to be seen on
that occasion and literally shovelfuls of dia-
monds, but hers was the most picturesque
and generally attractive figure of oil, al
though she is not particularly pretty wo-
man. 1 tell you that auy woman. even
though ugly, has it in her power to make
herself picturesque. Mrs. Wilde, Oscars
mother, told me 20 or three days later that
the velvetesn of which that picturesque
dress was composed cost only 25 cents
yard Things are not so much thought of
by the yard in England as here.
THE PRINCE AND MR. GLADSTONE.
lyon know the Prince of WalesY'
II have never spoken to him. but have
seen him often. We owe him a good deal,
because it is he who has made the American
fashionable in England 1t is considered
the proper thing over there now to admire
u.s. and everything that is American goes
In referring to America l always heard one
phrase from every one in England, and that
was: oh, you're wonderful people!' The
prince is one of the brightest men in the
| British isles. Nobody realizes how difficult
position he has to maintain, aud what
real genius it requires TO sustain it, The
social side of it is only one side; in politics
he has far harder role to play And vet,
as you have often heard, he is the most
popular man in England. | never met
any one who knew the prince who did't like
him. His tact is infinite. AS for the Prin-
cess of Wales, she is as pretty as a picture
and every one loves her. but she never says
or does anything and is almost like a lay
figure of royalty. Gladstone is great adj
mirer Of ours also; he is accustomed
to refer to the United States as the great
American experiment. have met Whis-
tier several times-the painter, you know
and he struck me as a very brilliant man,
dried up, old-looking and little. He loves
to be talked about and can paint beautifully
| when he chooses, though much of his work