Mr Sydney F. Hoben’s Letters.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 460, 29 May 1890, Page 3

Mr Sydney F. Hoben’s Letters.

Ths letters of Mr Sydney F. Hoben (formerly of Gisborne), are still continued, and his charming descriptions of student life in Leipsic create much interest-, Mr Hoben being gifted with a style which must be admired both for its descriptive powers and the vein of refined humor running through his letters. The following extracts are from the last letter to hand:—

FOXC3 OF HABIT. I am now only able to practise with each hand alternately, and as the time when I must seek relief in New Zealand approach, s I begin to realise what a hold the life here has taken upon me, and I have now so many acquaintances and friends, to some of whom I am much attached, that parting will be rather a trial. My life has dropped to an easy going routine. In the morning I have a few hours skating, the band often playing while we waltz around, then practice ; after an early dinner come the Conservatorium lessons, and then I drop in with some friends to the cafe opposite, which might almost be considered a part of the Conservatorium, so much is it frequented by the students. Hero we have some tea and a chat—the tea in bright metal tea-pots holding two cups, price 2d, and the chat in many tongues—afterwards a concert or opera, supper with friends at some restaurant, and home. Such is the daily routine, the chinks filled in with study.

THE PROBLEM OF LIFE, My friends are various, and of varying nationalities and dispositions, and a never ending source of interest. One of them, the son of a celebrated composer, is to me a strange psychological study. He is young, handsome, quiet, of romantic appearance, always beautifully and artistically dressed, and with that strange magnetism which makes everyone whom he meets his friend, and without effort on his part attracts all to him, I admire him much. He has a distinguished man for a father, an American beauty as his mother, all that wealth can command, and that which it cannot command —personal ability. He is a fine pianist, has travelled with the very best concert companies through the Continent and England, and has himself been starred and exploited by the greatest of modern impressarioe, and now, after all this dis faction, he is able to come back to bis studies. What more he can want than he has got it would be difficult to imagine, and most people would be unfeignedly clad to change places with him, yet this magnificent creature is utterly miserable. With all the advantages I have enumerated and many which I have not—with health, wealth, youth, genius, good looks, and personal charm peculiarly his own—and with a long list of successes to look back upon already—he calmly contemplates suicide as a possibility of the near future, and looks forward to euthanasia as a means of laying down the burthen of a life of which he has alieady wearied. THE HT¥ OF IT.

This week we have had a genuine sensation which has afforded an inexhaus ible topic of conversation wherever two or three students were gathered toget her. Thesmar—young, gifted, eccentric,—has often been mentioned in these desultory jottings. His mother kept a pension in Paris that her sou m’ght study in Liepsio. He has studied, and achieved distinction. At the abends he played the second piano for the concertos, reading whole orchestra scores fa doing so, he has frequently appeared as soloist, and was to receive the crowning distinction of an appearance Priifungs prior to his final departure in a few Weeks. Although only 19 he is a sound theorist, and was engaged on a symphony, and is, too, something of a linguist. In a few weeks he was to depart, laden with honors, to the poor mother who has sacrificed so much for him, but to-day he is an inmate of an asylum for the insane! He was always rather eccentric and foolish in his talk, but as he was undoubtedly clever this was unheeded in a society where everything is forgiven to ability and where eccentricity is the rule rather than the exception. People who wear ringlets can’t afford to pull their neighbor's hair. The day before yesterday, after not having spoken to his landlady for a week, he went out to the kitchen and told her that he was the ghost of Beethoven and Mozart, and would leave next day for Egypt, whither he meant to take his library. He was always bibliomaniaoal, and of late had been ordering and purchasing old books and rare edirions in all directions. Yesterday friends attendedhim, and with th m he calmly discussed the posiiion. He said that he supposed they would put him in an asylum, as his father had been before him, and was quick to notice and resent any appearance of derision. When evening came tbe friends accompanied him to the theatre, and on their return locked him in bis rooms, but he jumped through the window (providentially it was parterre) and roamed about all night in a tbin coat with the temperature 5 degrees below zero. At 8 o'clock Ulis morning he presented himself at the Oonservatorium and told the castellan tbat be would play in tbe probe this afternoon, but when he went back to his rooms he found two men waiting with the story tbat he must accompany them to receive a theatre conductor, ship. On this supposition he went quietly with them, but the “ theatre manager ” they took him to was a doctor, and the “ theatre ” a lunatic asylum. As I write this to-night there is away in the heart of Paris a poor woman who goes about her tasks with a heart brimming over with joy and gladneas, as she thinks that the weary years of trial and struggle are over, and looks forward to the return of her son, his honors thick upon him, and ready to take upon his broad shoulders and clear head the burlhen she has so long borne; and in a cell of a Leipsic asylum that son paces bp and down, the bright intellect dimmed, and the fair promise of youth blotted out—perhaps for ever. " STUDENT UTE.” When I found that excerpts from my private letters borne had been thought worth publishing I was sanitised, and I was still more surprised when I was informed of the general appreciation which these methodises notes met with throughout the colony. Now, they are being translated into German, and are appearing in the German and Austrian Press, and I have bean requested to write the experiences of my Oonservatorium course tot publication fa book form.