QUEEN WILHELMINA OF HOLLAND. WRITING in the Quiver, on the Queen of Holland, Mary Spencer Warren describes the chief incidents in her life-her coronation and marriage-and then proceeds to less well-known details. Queen Wilhelmina, she says, is really immensely rich, her income from the Exchequer Crown Lands and Dutch East Indies amounting to nearly £1,000,000 a year. Prince Henry has also considerable means and a handsome private annual income settled upon him by the Queen at the time of his marriage. The Queen's state coach is one of the handsomest in Europe, and in her palaces a somewhat severe etiquette reigns, the

Queen Wilhelmina of Holland.

officials of the Household and State having practically no share in the royal life, being only from time to time invited to formal banquets, balls, garden parties, and other special functions.

SPLENDID ISOLATION.

Queen Wilhelmina, in fact, was brought up in "almost splendid isolation." There was no one of equal rank for her to be on anything like familiar terms with, not even the children of the Dutch nobility or her cousins of Albany being able to asso. ciate with her otherwise than as subjects. After her accession this isolation became, if anything, more pronounced:

At State banquets she generally dined with grey heads and at State balls danced with aged diplomatists. So that when Her Majesty was betrothed and married, she for the first time enjoyed youthful companionship on an equality with herself.

A SHREWD JUDGE OF CHARACTER. The writer gives the following account of the daily routine and personal tastes of the Queen :

Queen Wilhelmina gets up very early in the morning and dresses quickly; then descends to breakfast, during which she opens her letters, a duty which so far Her Majesty has not relegated to a secretary. With respect to her correspondence Queen Wilhelmina is most conscientiously particular. She gives her earnest attention to minute details, insists on every letter being answered; and, where possible, grants petitions to even the poorest of her subjects. She decides quickly, for she thinks quickly, and people who are brought into personal contact with Her Majesty are soon rated according to their merits, for no one is a more shrewd judge of character than is the young Sovereign of the Netherlands.

Her Majesty is an exceedingly good walker-has been accustomed to walking all her life-plays a good game of tennis, and is a most expert skater-as, indeed, are the majority of Dutch ladies, for it is one of the national pastimes. Queen Wilhelmina is also very clever with her pencil and water-colour work, but, despite statements to the contrary, she is not musical. Of course, she has been thoroughly trained, can both play and sing, and perfectly understands the merits and demerits of the various artistes to whom she from time to time listens; but Her Majesty does not love, she simply endures, concerts. She is exceedingly fond of reading, and peruses all the best writers in Dutch, German, French, Italian, and English, political economy being one of her favourite studies.

Driving seems to be her favourite outdoor amusement, and she is very fond of dogs. Anyone who has even casually seen her, if only driving about the Hague, will not be surprised to learn that "she signs nothing without thoroughly understanding it, and her firm will and decided judgment have more than once brought her into conflict with her Ministers."

WHAT HAPPENS TO SUICIDES.

IN Broad Views Dr. Franz Hartmann writes a curious paper on Suicide :

The number of suicides is increasing every year. Many seck to escape the ills of this terrestrial life by destroying their physical bodies. Some expect annihilation, others imagine that they will improve their condition by entering into a "better world," and there are some who are kept from killing themselves only by fear of dying, which they believe to be a painful affair. There is a long array of what are claimed to be communications from the souls of departed suicides, many of them seeming to be quite genuine messages, and which say a person experiencing a forcible and premature death does not escape suffering, and if anybody kills himself for the purpose of escaping pain, he may by his act be, so to say, jumping from the frying pan into the fire. It is stated that such a 66 spirit or soul" remains still earthbound until the time when the natural term of his life would have expired.

There are in my possession several messages which I have received from what appear to be the spirits of deceased suicides, and whose genuineness has been tested as far as possible. They describe their sufferings after death, and claim to have suffered even from injuries inflicted upon their physical bodies, with which they were still connected, while the astral ligament was not broken. One of these unfortunates was a young lady who poisoned herself on account of some love affair, and a suspicion having arisen about the manner of her death, her body was exhumed three days afterwards and dissected. She claims to have felt every cut of the dissecting knife as if it were cutting her living body. Another suicide who shot himself describes the tortures he felt by the separation of his "nervous" body from the physical; another suffered the pains of being burned alive while his body was cremated before the astral separation took place.

SIR SPENCER WALPOLE AND HIS FRIENDS.
SOME ANECDOTES OF C.-B.

MR. HORACE G. HUTCHINSON contributes to the September Cornhill an appreciation of his friend Sir Spencer Walpole, who died just two months ago.

HIS CHARACTERISTIC THOROUGHNESS.

Sir Spencer Walpole had a Tory heritage of double birthright, but in profession and practice he showed himself a convinced Liberal. While he was Inspector of Fisheries he made himself so complete a master of the fishery question that he wrote a book on the subject which was of recognised value. When he was Lieutenant-Governor of the Isle of Man, he contributed a preface to the first of a series of Manx Notebooks, edited by Mr. A. W. Moore, in which he aptly observed: "Fifty thousand people still retaining their old laws and their old customs, in the centre of the United Kingdom, is a spectacle as unique as it is noble." As Secretary to the Post Office he put through various new regulations for the convenience. of the public.

A JOKE AT C.B.'S EXPENSE.

As a writer of history Sir Spencer is described rather as a recorder than as a shaper of political events. Most of the leading statesmen of both persuasions were his personal friends. One Sunday afternoon there was gathered together at his house in Sussex such an assemblage of the heads of the Radical Party as would have made a good Conservative shudder. Mr. John Morley and others were staying with Sir Spencer; while others, including Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, were brought over by Mr. Bryce. At the time C.-B. was having a hard time of it trying to gather the divergent interests of the Liberal Party into some net which should embrace them all. As Mr. Bryce's party were going away, some elected to walk, while others remained behind to follow shortly after in a carriage. "We will pick up the disjecta membra as we go along," said Sir Henry, who was one of those in the carriage. “Ah,” replied one of the guests, "you have had a lot of practice in that lately," and Sir Henry took the joke extremely well.

C.-B. AND MR. GLADSTONE.

Another joke which Sir Henry had the hardihood to perpetrate at the expense of Mr. Gladstone is also told. It was on the occasion of a political party at Lord Rosebery's house, "The Durdans," near Epsom. Mr. Hutchinson writes :

Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman was the last of the guests to arrive. It was soon after the publication of Mr. Pearson's book about the "Yellow Peril," with which Mr. Gladstone, like many others, had been greatly struck. When the present Prime Minister came in, Mr. Gladstone said to him, "That is a wonderful book, this of Mr. Pearson's; have you read it?" "What book is that, Mr. Gladstone?" Sir Henry asked, innocently, knowing perfectly well, it is to be presumed, what book was referred to-" Pearson's Weekly" ! But this was a species of Yellow Peril which Mr. Gladstone had not encountered.

"A QUEEN'S FRIEND."

THE HON. CHARLOTTE KNOLLYS.

AN unsigned paper in the Lady's Realm deals with a personality little known to the world except by name-the Hon. Charlotte Knollys, Woman of the Bedchamber to the Queen. Except by name," it may be said, for the person least interested in news of the Court or Royalty can hardly fail to know Miss Knollys by name.

FORTY-FOUR YEARS' SERVICE.

In another six years Miss Knollys will be able to say she has served her Sovereign for half a century. Though there is, of course, a Mistress of the Robes, four Ladies of the Bedchamber, two extra Ladies of the Bedchamber, four Maids of Honour, and two other Women of the Bedchamber, besides Miss Knollys, their positions are more or less sinecures. The work and responsibility comes upon Miss Knollys, who is the sister of Lord Knollys, the King's private secretary, and has several other relations in the Royal service. Nightly, for all these forty-four years, Miss Knollys has slept under the same roof as the Queen, and she is practically "on duty" all day long. She is, in fact, so constantly with the Queen as to have long had the nickname of "the Shadow"; and the Queen's increasing deafness now makes her more than ever rely upon this friend. Miss Knollys receives as salary a Government grant of £700 a year, and £300 from the Queen's privy purse; what else she may receive being a private matter for herself and the donors. She has apartments specially set apart for her in the palaces, and accompanies the Queen on all her visits, such as those to Denmark, for instance. The story runs that she even gave up marriage in order to serve the Queen.

PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS.

Miss Knollys is practically the same age as the Queen-sixty-three :

Neither looks her age, and Miss Knollys's perennial youth is wondered at almost as much as that of the Queen, whose little changed beauty has become a proverb. In appearance she is easily recognisable as a woman of intellect, charm, and character. Unfailing, one might almost write boundless, tact and genial humour are her ruling traits, and she has many accomplishments. She is a marvellous linguist and can converse fluently in nearly every European language. She is, like her mistress, a born musician and an enthusiastic amateur draughtswoman, and often used to accompany the Queen on sketching expeditions. But her most attractive qualities are, perhaps, that she is an excellent raconteur of good stories, a wonderful conversationalist, and gifted with a ready wit. Her tastes are fastidious, both as regards art and the smaller details of life.

Miss Knollys is the only woman not related to the Queen who calls her "Alix"; the Queen herself calls Miss Knollys "Chatty." She is possibly the only woman, not of royal rank, who calls practically all the great Royalties by their Christian names or nick

names.

Like most constitutional autocrats the Speaker is bound by the rules and precedents of his office. Three small volumes, embodying the rulings from the Chair on points of order for fifty years past, are always at Mr. Lowther's side in the library. These precedents must strictly determine his course of procedure, though he may, and recently in the Redistribution debate did claim time before giving his decision on a point of order :

The question at issue was whether it was in order that the matter be put as a single resolution or as a series of resolutions. Both parties quoted arguments to obtain a ruling for the point of view they represented. The Speaker asked for time before giving his decision. It took Mr. Lowther two days' hard study of the little volumes on his writing-table, and hours of consultation with his official legal adviser, before he felt in a position to come to a decision.

HIS APPRENTICESHIP AND RECREATIONS.

Mr. Lowther served a very long and toilsome apprenticeship. For five years, from 1895 to 1900, he was, as Chairman of Committee and Deputy Speaker, often called upon to occupy the Chair, owing to Mr. Gully's ill-health. One of his first interventions must have tried his nerve, for it was to "pull up" no less a person than the Right Hon. W. H. Smith, then Leader of the House, on a point of order. Known to be a staunch Conservative, it is generally admitted that as Speaker Mr. Lowther has no politics whatever.

Mr. Lowther's preferred sport is deer-stalking, and he is said to have secured many fine heads. He was and still is an exceptionally good amateur fencer, and even at Westminster, it is said, fences two or three times a week, and manages to ride a little in the Park, in spite of his sessional days being mapped out " with a regularity that makes their routine as punctual as Big Ben." Even at the end of a tiring Session, the writer announces, he looks as hard as an athlete in the pink of condition. On days when the House is not sitting he makes it a rule to be in his private library, where Ministers, Opposition leaders, and private members can see him. The Speaker's house, of course, is in the tower just by Westminster Bridge. Mrs. Lowther's boudoir (the Blue Drawing-room) has its windows overlooking the Terrace and river. The house is adorned with portraits of former Speakers. The article is illustrated by an excellent portrait, and ten other illustrations of the Speaker's house, inside and out, his wife and daughter, all being particularly well reproduced.

SIR WILLIAM CROSSMAN. THE STONEMASON WHO BECAME A KNIGHT. THE Young Man has been sending its representative, Mr. R. H. Brewer, to interview Sir William Crossman, the present Lord Mayor of Cardiff, knighted, it will be remembered, by the King when the new Cardiff Docks were opened, and when he, as Mayor, received His Majesty.

A WORKING CLASS LORD MAYOR.

Sir William Crossman still lives in Harriet Street, Cardiff, a working-class locality, in a bow-windowed house, looking out on a narrow strip of garden, just like numbers of others in the neighbourhood. And this although the Mayoralty of Cardiff carries with it a salary of £1,000 a year. The change of locality which the Mayoralty could not bring about, the knighthood will not bring about either. Sir William Crossman is a Devonian, fifty-three years of age, the son of working-class parents. They must, however, have been exceedingly superior working-class people. The father was a local preacher, who often walked many miles on Sunday to preach in some village, in either a Wesleyan or a Bible Christian chapel.

A TRIBUTE TO SUNDAY SCHOOL TRAINING.

Sir William Crossman owes a great deal to Sunday School training :

I began to attend Sunday School when a very small child, and remained a scholar till I was sixteen or seventeen years of age. Boys and girls in Devon and Cornwall go to Sunday School till they are young men and women; many of them remain Sunday School scholars even till they are quite old men and women. In large towns that is unfortunately not the case.

Until public duties no longer allowed him time to get up his Sunday School lessons thoroughly, Sir William was a Sunday School teacher, and latterly a superintendent. He is still assistant superintendent. As for education other than that received in the Sunday School, he had little beyond the three R's. At fourteen he went to Cornwall to be apprenticed to a

stonemason.

ROLLING STONES AND MOSS-GATHERING. Sir William has had the good sense to combat this dictatorial old adage. He thinks moving about for a few years does nothing but good, provided, of course, the time is not idly spent. It is the man who has moved about somewhat who usually rises to become a foreman of large works. What first brought him into prominence locally was a dispute in the building trade in 1892, resulting in a strike, in which he naturally sided with the strikers, but in such a manner as to win not only their confidence but also that of the employers. Then he became Labour League candidate for the Town Council, a seat which he has held for fifteen years. He also served on Boards of Guardians and as a Justice of Peace-in fact, in most branches of municipal life. He is a strong advocate of Friendly Societies, and still more so since he became a Guardian and saw how many young men, overtaken by a little sickness, applied for outdoor relief.

THE LEGEND OF PIUS X. UNDER the title of 'The Legend of Pius X." E. Philippe begins, in the August issue of the Bibliothèque Universelle, a character study of Cardinal Sarto as Pope. To some people, he writes, the Pope is a saint, and to others a good country curé, little prepared for the functions of his present position. Five years have made little change in him. In appearance the Pope is almost the same as when he first appeared in the inner loggia of St. Peter's for the benediction after his proclamation in the Sistine Chapel.

HIS CHARACTERISTIC NOTE.

Sarto's valet de chambre relates that his master was in tears when he first put on the pontifical vestments. Tears were the first manifestation of Pius X., and he continued to weep after the benediction. Nor will he allow a single occasion to weep in public to pass. Every time he has received in audience a band of French pilgrims he has had at a given moment tears in his voice if not in his eyes. It is a characteristic note which differentiates him from his predecessor. Leo XIII. was the proud, triumphant Catholic Church. When he spoke of sorrow and resignation it was in a tone which denoted present consolation and certain

victory. The eloquence of Pius X. is very different. With him Catholicism has suffered from the beginning, it has been reduced to despair, has undergone persecution, and finally has wept. The resignation of Leo XIII. was only in his words; he had the pride of spiritual power. Pius X. had the pride of humility

and the despair of weakness from the moment that he became Pope. He is sincere in his display of his feelings, but from the struggle of this sensitive character with daily events there has come into existence many contradictions, all the more spicuous because of the exaggerated humble, feeble, and modest part played by the sovereign pontiff.

THE DIGNITIES OF THE PAPAL CHAIR.

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All sorts of stories are told of his simple habits. He was no sooner crowned than he indicated his hatred of pomp and ceremony. Nevertheless, the Pope has been constrained to modify somewhat the habits of Cardinal Sarto. It has been respectfully explained to him that the successor of Leo XIII. detracted from the prestige of the Papacy in not adhering to the magnificence and the pomp of sumptuous ceremonies, and gently he has been made to see that he must no longer resemble a country curé. And he has at last given way. Two or three dignitaries in his entourage were suppressed, but the number of prelates and attendants of all kinds has been increased, and gradually the Pope is becoming accustomed to the dignities befitting his new mode of life.

Mark Twain's Originals.

IN the autobiography which he is contributing to the North American Review Mark Twain declares that the original of Huckleberry Finn was Frank F. He says Frank's father was at one time the town drunkard an exceedingly well-defined and unofficial office of those days. Then Jimmy Finn disputed the place with him, and they had two town drunkards at one time, which made almost as much trouble as two rival Popes in Christendom. Mark Twain says, "In Huckleberry Finn I have drawn Frank exactly as he was." He had as good a heart as ever any boy had. Four years ago he was Justice of the Peace in a remote village, a good citizen and greatly respected. Once Mark's father tried to reform Injun Joe. "It was a failure, and we boys were glad. For Injun Joe drunk was interesting and a benefaction to us, but Injun Joe sober was a dreary spectacle." In "Tom Sawyer" he starved Injun Joe to death in the cave. That may have been to meet the exigencies of romantic literature.

IN the Strand Mr. A. C. Maclaren writes a paper on Prince Ranjitsinhji as ruler of his estate of Jamnagar ; and the magazine opens with reproductions, in colour, of some popular French pictures, one of which in particular, Edouard Detaille's "Morning Parade at the Tower of London," is remarkably good.

THE KAISER'S NEW "DREAM PALACE."

ACHILLEION, IN CORFU.

ACHILLEION, in Corfu, which has recently been purchased by the Kaiser as a summer retreat for the members of the House of Hohenzollern, is reputed to be the loveliest pleasure palace in the world. It stands, says Mr. C. M. Hook, who describes its beauty in a well illustrated article in the September London Magazine, a monument of glistening marble," in the midst of the characteristic Corfu woods of blue olives, fig cactuses and cypresses. The castle grounds look out upon the Hyllaic Bay, with its wild fissured cliffs, and on the solitary, mysterious island of Ponticonici, which legends say was created by Neptune from the shattered ship of Odysseus. Achilleion was called by the unfortunate Empress Elizabeth of Austria, by whom it was built, her "dream castle," partly because the beauty of its situation was so idyllic as to seem something more than earthly, and partly because she abandoned herself there unreservedly to melancholy dreams of lost happiness.

A MAGNIFICENT INTERIOR.

The palace was designed by Rafael Carito, an architect of Naples. Along one façade twelve Ionic columns, each background to an antique marble statue, shut in a splendid peristyle, a columned walk decorated with fine paintings :

Empress Elizabeth's personal taste is responsible for all the interior decorations and furnishings of the palace, and they strikingly reflect her beauty-loving individuality. Vast halls lined and floored with marble, curtains and carpets of heavy crimson velvet, wide mirrors reaching to the ceiling, broad, shallow stepped marble staircases, are the dominant features immediately within the entrance. The private chapel of the palace is in Byzantine style; the magnificent dining-hall in Italian Renaissance; the smoking-room is modelled on the halls of Pompeii. Pompeii relics have, indeed, served as models for decorative effects in many places. They are supplemented by relics from resurrected Mycenæ, marvellously executed mosaics, pictures which cost fortunes, and priceless antique art objects of all descriptions.

At night these are lit up by countless electric lights, hidden in exquisitely moulded flowers or soap-bubbles blown by wall Cupids. Its combination of antique dignity and modern charm and convenience is what gives the Achilleion "dream castle" its peculiarly individual note.

A full hour is needed for the inspection of the Achilleion park. Here the cypresses and olive-trees are everywhere relieved by giant rose-trees half as high as themselves, in full bloom throughout the year. Empress Elizabeth spent most of her time in this park, looking out over the sea and the distant mountain peaks of the opposite Albanian coast. The sixcolumned Grecian temple containing the statue, by Hasselriis, of her favourite poet, Heine, was her most frequent restingplace. But it is the splendid statue of Achilles which is the sculptural masterpiece of the park, and which gives the castle its name, Achilleion. Empress Elizabeth chose Achilles as the name-giver of her home because he was, she used to say, the embodiment of classic strength and beauty, and because of his fine contempt for kings, and traditions, and ordinary men, an attitude of mind which she herself so conspicuously shared.

ITS COST-£640,000.

Since the death of the Empress Elizabeth the palace has been tenantless. No one was rich enough to

purchase it. A syndicate proposed to buy it with the intention of turning it into a gambling palace. The offer was emphatically refused. The Kaiser's offer to purchase it as a pleasure palace for his family came as a welcome surprise. It will be the home for several months in the year of the Crown Princess Cecilia, whose rather frail constitution finds the northern climate of Germany somewhat trying. At present many building alterations are being made, rendered necessary after its nine years of utter desertion. When these have been completed and the palace is ready for occupation the Kaiser will have expended upon Achilleion almost as much as the Empress Elizabeth spent on acquiring and building it— £640,000. For the castle and estate he paid £600,000.

DOES PARTY GOVERNMENT DEMORALISE?

YES. BY MR. GOLDWIN SMITH.

To the August number of the Canadian Magazine Mr. Goldwin Smith contributes a brief but vigorous denunciation of Party Government, a system by which Government, he says, becomes standing machinery for the demoralisation of the people. Nothing

surely but blind devotion to party, he writes, could have induced British members of Parliament to vote for a bill giving Ireland a Parliament of her own and at the same time a representation in the Parliament of Great Britain. There must be only two parties, otherwise government breaks down. But to-day it is impossible to shut up in one penfold enough political sheep to give a government a safe majority when political opinions are so divergent. It can be done only by compromise of principle. The government majority at present in England, though numerically large, is really made up of sections most imperfectly united.

It is, however, in the United States that the system is carried to its greatest extreme, and the consequence is sacrifice of the national interests to those of faction. When the military pension list was instituted, an annual cost of twenty-five million dollars was talked of as the probable amount of the expenditure involved. Now forty years after the principle was adopted the annual cost is 140 million dollars. Private pension bills go through as a matter of course. The late Mr. J. M. Forbes, of Boston, left on record his conviction that war was made on Spain only to keep a party in power, and Mr. Goldwin Smith says that those who have read the diplomatic correspondence will be inclined to think that Mr. Forbes was right.

As to Canada, what is it but the necessities of party, he asks, which compel it to pay its adherents, that is impairing the integrity of judicial appointments? Corruption has its instruments in party organisations and conventions which practically take the elections out of the people's hands. It seems impossible, he declares, that the world should for ever acquiesce in such a system.