OBITUARY.

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 52, 2 March 1908, Page 7

OBITUARY.

• MARQUIS OF LINLITHGOW.

Bjf Telegraph.— Pre«a Aisoclitlon.— Copyright, LONDON, Ist March. The Marquis of Linlithguw died suddenly at Pan, where he was spending the winicr. Tho Marquis of Linlithgow, better known as the Earl of Hopetoun, was tho first Governor-General of the Commonwealth of Australia. Ho was in his forty-eighth yeai, and had had experience of courts and society and official life such as falls to tho lot of few men. Fortune smiled on him from his birth. Born in 1860, ho succeeded his father in 1873, and was educated at Eton. Generally men of this rank go on to uno of tho Universities, but Lord Hopetoun folt an inclination for the army, and when he wao 19 years old he passed at Sandhurst, but for some reason or another he ptirsued his military studies no further. He used them to a certain extent in Iho militia movement, and was gazetted lieutenant of the Lanarkshire Yeomanry in 1380, when ho was 20 years old. Shortly aftor this he seems to have devoted himself more to a political career, in wh;ch his great wealth and position, added to his personal .qualifica • tions, onablod him to take a high place considering his ate. Ho was junior Conservative whip in the Hous* of Lords from 1883 to 1886, in which latter year he married Miss do Moleyns, daughter of Lord Ventry. From 1885 to 1889 Lord Hopetoun was Lord-in-Wait- , ing to the Queon, and ho was Lord High Commissioner to tho General Assembly of the Church of Scotland from 1887 to 1889 In 1889 he was appointed to tho Governurphip of Victoria in succession to Sir Henry (afterwards Lord) Loch. The new Governor fell upon easy times, the times, that is, that immediately preceded tho collapse of tho boom. Iffrjght, pleasant, and debonnair, he mado himself popular with Victorians, though tho physical labour of shaking hands with great numbers of people made the new Governor faint at liia first levee. Lord Hopetoun was appointed Paymaster-Gen-eral almost immediately on his return from Victoria, and he occupied that position until 1898, when he beevmo Lord Chamberlain. From 1900 to J903 ho was Governor-General of Australia ; in 1905 he became Secretary for Scotland. His heir is his son, Earl Hopetoun, born in 1887.