Aristocrats Who Have Come in the World.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XXXII, Issue 7024, 12 November 1906, Page 1

Aristocrats Who Have Come in the World.

THEIR STRANGE ADVENTURES IN THE COLONIES.

If you wish to know what becomes t f many of the younger son s of our noble houses you should go to the Colonies, said ! a friend of the. writer Avho ihas isipemt ihalf ; a lifetime m "globe-trotting." There you will run across them m scores m the most unexpected places, and doing -work which they would pa/then* starve 'tlh&n (touch ant England. There is scarcely a British colony m •which you will not meet these aristocratic derelicts who have been turned—or, rather, m most cases have turned themselves—adrift to make a living <ss best they can. ' In Johannesburg alone, when I was there a few years ago, just 'before the war, I was told that there Avere at least sixty of these sprigs of nobility, some <"f them men with titles, filling all kinds of humble roles, from barman to groom and from 'loafer to liftman. Among the iriem working m on© livery stable on the Rand Aver© two young fellows who bore two of the proudest names m the peerage. On© of these held a commission m a crack regiment, and. had been one of the most fashionable and popular men m London society. He had a mania for gambling, however, got heavily into debt, and, as his father irefuse-d him any further as-t sistance, disappeared one day and turned up m. South Africa, where after a close brush with starvation he was glad to get employment as a groom —about the only kind of work for which he had any qualification.. This man is the son of am. eari and is closely related to one of our great noble families, while his comrade, who is brother of a well-known baron whosa purse is as short as his lineage i s long, had no resource but to emigrate after faiding to qualify for th© Army. There are many men of noble ibirth, too, who ere working at the gold-mines, including the brother-in-law of one of our dukes, who, when I was on the Rand, was acting as foreman of a gang of Kaffirs.. In different parts of America there t.ve literally hundreds of these aristocratic failures, Jiving m log-hute m the backwoods of Canada, acting as cowboys m the States, as clerks and porters m New York and Chicago, and so on. Two if 1 them whose acquaintance I mada had enlisted as privates m the American army and fought through the war with Spain. One of them was the son of a Scottish earl, a handsome, clever man, who might have done something good at home if it had not been for his love of roaming aud adventure. The other, who is the- younger brother | and heir presumptive of an Irish peer, had been an officer m our Army and had distinguished himself m the Burmese Wai^ j But he was extravagant far beyond I's means, and after his family grew weary of extricating him from debt he had to resign his commission. After a spell <i acting with various touring companies, be crossed <he Atlantic and was glad to drift j into the army as a private. But it is to Australia that tlif* avis}/'- l cratic ne'er-do-well mostly gravitates, and as a rule, he is a most undesirable immigrant, who quickly degenerates into a drunkard, gambler, and loafer, if nothing '■■ worse. Not long ago the magistrates oi a small town m South Australia had before them, Avithin a few days, three counts, a Russian prince, the" son of an : ex-British Cabinet Minister, and threo ; cadets of English noble families —all charged with drunkenness and disorderly j conduct. ', In Melbourne I had pointed out to me a cabciriver who m. England Avas knoAvn as Lord , the younger s on of a weilknoAvn marquess, and the conductor of a tram-car who, as the s on of an Irish baron 7 was entitled to call himself . "Honourable." !