The Banner-Democrat. [volume] (Lake Providence, East Carroll Parish, La.) 1892-current, 1895-08-31
PERSONAL AND LITERARY.

Sidney always attributed his love
Of poetry and his skill in verse to the
training of his mother. 1t was her
practice to read him passages from the
best poets.
The duke Of Wellington said that
the first thing he learned from his
mother was the Lords Prayer. Late
in life he said: ''It is the most sublime
of compositions.
Mrs. Phil Sheridan is said to be one
of the prettiest of the numerous young
widows in Washington. She was mar
ried when only nineteen, and she is
still of slender and youthful appear
ance. Mrs. Sheridan has four chill
dren, the eldest of whom. his fathers
namesake, is fine boy of fourteen.
Jose de Heredla. the Cuban poet,
has just been formally received into
the French academy. He should have
eulogized his predecessor. Charles de
Mazade, but as the latter had written
a life of Lamartine. he branched off
into glorification of the great poet
Francois Coppee delivered the address
of welcome.
The empress OF Austria may be
queer" but she retains sufficient FEM
mime vanity to spend two hours over her
toilet each day. her beautiful hair hav-
ing special care bestowed on it. After
lunch of strong broth and some light
meat she starts off on five-hour walk,
wearing short black dress just reach
ing the ankle and carrying dark
parasol and dark fan.
-Alphonse Daudet has been greatly
impressed by the size of things in Lon
don. Everything, particularly the
Tower bridge, seemed colossal to him,
and in comparison Paris appeared like
delicate and artistic jewel. He went
to England with a detestation of the
English race. but now finds himself
''in spite of the horrible cookery of big
joints and the tea, which he could never
bring himself to like, completely bro
ken in"
m. Lobn de Lalaive, a venerable
but robust French gentleman, says of
his longevity: II have always summed
strong drink and reveled in sea bath
ing. l used to be an even more intrepid
swimmer than Lord Byron, and Inever
bad to call doctor in until l was
eighty-nine. As regards tobacco, /
have consumed a veritable mountain
of cigars. My two greatest passions
have been reading and poetry, and
still write verses at the age of ninety
eight"
Capt. Gardner, who died at North
allerton, England, recently. was a
veteran of Balaklava. In the famous
charge of the Light brigade, Capt.
Gardner got as far as the mouth of the
Russian cannon when a ball struck
the chest of his horse and threw the
rider into the air. When he recovered
he found himself across a Russian
cannon. He scrambled down and ran
for mile and three-quarters through
a storm of shot and shell before he
reached his comrades.
Mrs. Amelia Barr, who is proba-
bly, the most prolific woman writer of
the first rank in America at present,
lives for the greater part of the
year at her beautiful home near Peeks-
kill. She has one daughter at home,
who relieves her of all household
cares, and another living in Boston,
who is married to Kirk Munroe. whom
all small boys know and adore. 1t is
rumored that Mrs. Barr is going TO
write novel about Cambridge. If she
gives to it the local color that Is the
charm of 1.-THE Bow of Orange Ribbon"
she viii add another gem to American
literature.