Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-01-23
HONOR GLADSTONE
Centenary Celebration at Lon
don of His Birth.
THOUSANDS VIEW STATUE
Comment on Earl Percys Death In
Paris.
RADICALS DISCUSS PEERAGE
Failure in Passage of Budget Re-
suits in Unique Tax Situation.
New Church House.
THOUSANDS VIEW STATUE
RADICALS DISCUSS PEERAGE
>ncrial Correspondence Of The Star.

Special Correspondence OF The Star.
LONDON. January 16. 1910
The Gladstone centenary celebration
was the center of Londons interest last
week His statue in the Strand is. next
10 the Nelson memorial. the best known
statue in London. OF the millions who
pass in the Strand every day very few
can miss the great bronze figure with the
lionlike head high it's stone plinth over
the four seated sybils Education, Broth
erhood, Aspiration and Courage. 1t Is set
at the part where the business city is
changing TO the hotel and theater land of
the West End and round it swirls the
main current OF London life in its bust
ness and pleasure. The decorations
which caused the most careless to look
closely at the statue on tbs centenary of
Gadstone's birth We're chosen and ar
ranged with ar unusual care for design
and harmony for which the Eighty Club
is to be thanked. The large. simple
wreaths of bay, lau ell, lilies and roses
were placed SO az TO accentuate the archl-
tectural lines of the memorial, and the
soft purple ribbons with which they were
tied blended handsomely with the green
leaves and the stone.
The name of Gladstone is not vet far
enough removed from the present-day is
ure of worship from liberal and conserra-
tive No doubt when the bi-centenary of
GIadstone's birth is celebrated the hopes
of his biographers will be fully realized,
and he will stand revealed In the true
Iisht of historical appraisement. In the
London celebrations there was the lneVl-
table one-sidedness; but single sreaS
tribute to the humanitarian as dlstln-
guished from the party principles or the
statesman stood out perhaps above every
thing else. 1t was the presence OF depu-
taton from the bulgarian pa lament
bearing silver wreath to lay upon the
tomb of the friend of their country. This
emblem was first placed upon the statue
i'm the Strand and then taken to Westmin-
ster Abbey. whence it will be transfer. ed
to Hawarden by Bulgarias representa-
tives and finally deposited there.
Several memorial offerings from other
countries were arranged about the statue.
one wreath was from grateful Armeni-
ans in memory of the greatest friend OF
the oppressed and others from the
Greek colony in Holland and the citizens
of Finland. The Balkan committee and
numerous liberal associations also sent
wreaths and flowers. Throughout the day
the statue was visited by thousands OF
people, and in Westminster Abbey a
constant stream of visitors filed past the
tomb. On the plain slab above the grave,
which bears the names of w. h Glad
stone and his wife, lay a large wreath
from the Greek community i'm London.
Associated with the purely political sac
Of the celebration were a luncheon gwen
by the National League of Young Lib
erals at which the lord chancellor de-
livered an Grafton; reception at the Ma
tional Liberal Club, and several even
ing meetings In different parts of Lon
dom An interesting exhibition of relics
and mementos of MIR. Gladstone's ffe, In
Guiding his famous AK. has been topened
at the Cunning Museum, Waiworth ROAD.
Earl Percy's Death.
The sudden death of Earl Percy in
Paris is made the more sad by the fact
that he had not yet fairly grounded the
reputation which his brilliance had al
most too hastily secured for him. lie
was the eldest son of the Duke of North
cumberland and sat in the house Of com
mons for a London division. His work
had that curious mingling of over-seri-
BUSINESS in essence and fhppancy OF View
which had to be outgrown by young no
blernen with brains. His honors at Ox-
ford showed that the traditions OF serl-
Gus mind which attach to the dukedom
to which he was heir were strong In nlih
But in anv case he happened to belong
at Oxford to a time in which young men
OF rank were setting up seriousness
which was not only a pose because II
was backed by brains. Lord Hugh
Cecil was of that period and so was Loro
Balcarres.
Another curious feature of the time as
one looks back on 1t now was that young
men of that type were beginning to travel
not in the conventional routes of their
forefathers, but in the near east ana
Asia Minor That may have been due to
the fact that the most enterprising OF
Oxfords learning was going then to that
Dart of the world Lord Encombe (who
also died young was with Mr.. Hogarth
on the journey that produced the charm
ing Wandering Scholar in the LeVant,
and Lord Percy turned to the same part
,-IA Z may I.Or
IONS travels had also set the minds OF
young men on stranger lands than their
fathers Travelled for IA view OF foreign
affairs.
the making of a statesman has not as
vet justified itself. A wondering scholar
appears TO be able indeed to see the peo-
pies of the nearer and middle east SYM
patheticalIy as individuals, attractive or
otherwise, or as races, but not as ma
lions That showed in a certain tendency
to cynicism Questions affecting Euro
pean or Asiatic Turkey and Persia have
been frequent enough in the past two or
three years, and Lord Percy was too apt
to treat them in the vein that has brand
I'd Lord CurZon "a most superior per-
SON.
He might have grown beyond II, and
made genuine the reputation which need
cd still so much filing out His fastldi-
Gus Impotence, however, was certainly
not q merely personal trait nor was II,
one Tears, Idlt oi iiliseiius Soutiiiu
mess< IL has 10 be looked at as the trait
of aNslew school in foreign affairs. the
school that would presumably have re-
placed in time in his party the older ira
dition preserved by Lord Lansdowne.
That made him significant. even made
MIN TO some eyes rather sinister. Lord
Curzon and he together seemed to repre-
sent the future tone OF British diplomacy.
Whether the prospect is now to be altered
by Lord Percy's death cannot be definite
~ known but ii Is at least certain that
the handling OF foreign affairs by the
tories in the house of commons will have
- be the work of some one as yet prac-
sally unknown.
Will Not Accept a Peerage.
The wish is being strongly expressed in
radical quarters here that Mr. Herbert