ARISTOCRACY IN MOURNING.

Press, Volume LI, Issue 15219, 5 March 1915, Page 8

ARISTOCRACY IN MOURNING.

HOW BRITISH HOUSES ARE

AFFECTED.

A striking feature on the opening day of the meeting of the House of Lords was the dress of the peeresses in the side galleries (writes Sir Henry Lucy in the "Sydney Morning Herald"). On ordinary 'field nights these ladies come down in their gayest garments, garlanding the galleries with rich variety of colour. On this occasion, they were with a single exception bonneted and frocked in black. The exception was a lady whose mourning was relieved by a lofty tuft of white feathers, an. apparition startling among the prevailing gloom. Among the British aristocracy there are tew homes ■where German shot or shell lias not created a vacant place. With occasional divagation among American heiresses, or stars of the London stage, the peerage habitually intermarry, in ordinary times record of a death, in a r.oble house places half a dozen others in mourning. "When not a week passes without news of the death atthe front of the heir to a'peerage"or a younger son; the prevalence is- naturally extended.

, The caeo of the aged Duke of Atholl is peculiarly sad. At the outbreak of the war, two of his sons went to the front. In the first fortnight the elder disappeared. His name figured among the long list of wounded and missiug, and he has not since been heard of. Shortly after the second son was wounded, but, escaping capture, he was invalided home. As soon as he recovered , he went but to the war again. He had not been there a fortnight when he was reported among the missing. Last week the sorrowing family were cheered by receipt of a note iv which he reported himself a prisoner unweunded. After one of the daily fights at close quarters ho was attempting to make his way back to his regiment, walked iuto a German trench and was straightaway pastured. Nor does this'complete the sad story of a single home. A daughter of the house is married to a distinguished officer, who holds the post of commandant at the Hytho School of Musketry.-one of the prizes of army service. When the war broke out he went out on ac- , .tiveservico. Within a fortnight of as- | suming command of his regiment, it.i was, whilst gallantly advancing to. repel an assault by the Germans, almost annihilated by shell-fire. A shrapnel exploding behind the colonel hit him in the back; crippling, both arms. After lying for a month in the hospital at lie was. with infinite care, brought to London, where he t%\v lies in a nursing home in all probability maimed for life, his active career in the - profession he loves and adorns closed. This is a single instance of the shattering of a family circle typical of the multitudinous score-mounting up against the man responsible for this stupendous war.