The San Francisco call., 1903-01-08
GOSSIP FROM
LONDON WORLD
OF LETTERS

People here would like to know, and no
doubt you on your side feel equally inter
ested to know, what the Kaiser Wilhelm
thinks of Rudyard Kipling's anti-German
effusion in the light of the telegram
which his Majesty hastened to address to
the wife of the Banjo Bard of Empire
when he was lying dangerously i'll in New
York in the spring of 1893, a few months
before the outbreak of that BOer war
which was to cause the "open foes" of
Great Britain to pray ito see us drown
The imperial telegram ran: 'As an en-
thusiastic admirer of the unrivaled books
OF your husband, / am most anxious for
news about his health. God grant he may
be spared to you and to all who are
thankful to him for the soul-stirrinS way
in which he has sung about the deeds or
our common race.-William.' Is 1t not
strange that the common deeds of our
common race should now have filled the
object of that sympathetic telegram with
such aversion toward the subjects OF its
sender?
The -penuItimate sale of 1902 at Sothe-
by's salerooms the other day was tri-
umph for the admirers of Thackeray.
Never before probably have equally high
sums been paid for autograph letters,
pencil sketches and other productions
from his hands. The examples which
came under the hammer belonged origin
ally to Miss Kate Perry and her sister,
Mrs. Elliott, formerly Jane Perry, in
innate friends of Thackeray, and
passed into the possession of the
seller. In the total about s1150 (S5750l
was realized for twenty-seven lots.
think the following call for special men
tion: Kate Perry's album. beginning with
an unpublished poem, THE Pen and the
Album and containing much interesting
matter, $3.50 (S2950); three verses, each of
four lines. beginning Il am Miss Perry's
faithful Phil sent with a small gold
brooch having the head of a lady's Skye
terrier enameled in cOlors, $50 ($250); a
small full-length pencil drawing of the
novelist Iecturing, ELS (s39O); five other
drawings, 9149 los ($747 50); the Lords
Prayer written by Thackeray on a piece
of paper the size of a 3-penny piece, and
the same by GOrsOn on another piece the
size of siXpence. s25 (s125); Miss Perry's
soup kitchen account book, with a sketch
of her on the title page by Thackeray. in
scrbed Suffer and Forbid Them Not"
81 guineas (S16S).
AS I was talking this morning to one
OF Londons leading publishers he asked
me the question, What do you consider
has been the most successful book of the
year?" As 1 did not know, 1 replied with
the question, What do you say?' He
rather surprised me by telling me that
undoubtedly the most successful book in
England was Merrimans story "The Vul-
tures-'' 1t had come pretty near the top.
! ''It is at once" he added, 1.-The deepest
and most interesting book Merriman has
yet written. Next undoubtedly comes, so
far as the English readers fiction is con-
cerned. A. Z. w Mason's story The Four
/ Feathers The general opinion seems TO
! be that nothing more touching has been
written for many years than the scene
3 where the girl hands back three white
; feathers to her lover and adds a white
/ feather from herself"
/ book which takes thirty-six years to
! appear is surely rather unusual. This is
! the case with a work begun by the late
Professor Thorold Rogers in the sos, the
final volume of which is just ready. Two
volumes came out in 1866 two in 1882 two
more in 1887 and now comes the seventh
edited by his SON The whole work is Pro-
/ fessor ThOrOld Rogers History of Agri-
culture and Prices in England From 1859
] Till 1898" At the first date England
/ was holding the Oxford Parliament: at
! the second the long continental war was
4 beginning. The book has involved vast
research.
| 1 am glad to be able to say George r.
/ Sims is making good recovery from i'll
ness, which nearly deprived Londoners
! o. their Mustard and Cress" in their
/ Sunday breakfast as served up in the
! Referee. The best evidence of his recov-
! cry reaches me in the form of a Christ
mas card kOot long in which Mr. and
/ Mrs. Sims are depicted backed by dogs
and fronted by ducks, so notoriOusly Op-
posite- Sims bears an enormous plum
pudding on a charger. There is snow on
/ the ground and ice on a pond. Sims
wears the lightest of overcoats. If he
can stand about thus with the thermome-
! tel below the freezing point as shown in
the picture, there cannot be much the
matter with him.
Prunes stuffed with apricots- Townsend's-'