AN AGED STATESMAN. DEATH OF LORD RIPON.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 10, 12 July 1909, Page 7

AN AGED STATESMAN. DEATH OF LORD RIPON.

LONG PUBLIC CAREER. (By Telrgrapl:.— Piess Association.— Copyright.) , LONDON, 10th July. j The Marquis of Ripon, who last year j retired from the office of Lord i-I'ivy Seal in the Liberal Cabinet, is dead, aged 81. The cause of death was heart failure. SKETCH OF THE LATE MARQUIS'S LIFE ; VARIED POLITICAL SERVICE. A political career which began in 1849, and lasted uith brief intervals up till 1908— almost sixty years — is a record which has been equalled by few public men in the British Empire. This is the record of the deceased statesman. He was first attached to a special mission to Brussels in 1849. Three years later he was elected member for Hull, and in 1859 he was appointed Under-Secre-tary for War in the Liberal Ministry, ; and afterwards he was transferred to \ the India Office in the same position. He attained Cabinet rink in 1863, first as War. Secretary, and afterwards as Secretary for India, and continued a member of Libera l Governments down to 1873. On the return of Mr. Gladstone to power in 1880, Lord Ripon was appointed Governor-General of India. His policy in that office caused much -controversy in Indian official circles. Speaking generally, it was directed towards extending the rights of natives and — in certain "directions — limiting tho privileges of Europeans. It may be doubted whether there ever was a Viceroy so unpopular among Anglo-Indians or so popular among natives. His departure in 1884 was made the occasion of extraordinary demonstrations by the Hindu population of Bengal and Bombay. He continued to serve in tho various Liberal Cabinets down to last year, when he resigned on account of his advanced age. Lord Ripon was, installed as Grand Master of the English Freemasons in 1871, in succession to Lord Zetland. In the autumn of 1874 the Grand Lodge received notice that tho Marquis had resigned the office, no reason being assigned For the step taken. A few days later, however, it transpired that his Lordship had joined the Roman Catholic Church, which prohibits membership of secret societies. Tlie conversion caused much discussion in political circles, and was supposed to be prejudicial to his public career. Mr. Gladstone, however, showed himself superior to sectarian bias, and on his return to office in 1880 bestowed on the Marquis the highest office in the gift of the Crown. In an interesting character sketch in the Review of Reviews a few months ago, the writer said : — Lord Ripon may be regarded as the pioneer and precursor of the Socialist movement in Great Britain. Many who wero in 1850 associated with him have passed away. He can hardly bo regarded as a disciple of Maurice or of Kingsley. It was the humanitarian idealism of 1848 which turned his attention to the social question, and mado him an eager and willing recruit of the gallant little band of Christian Socialists, to whose zeal is owing much that is best in modern England. Thomas Hughes, author of "Tom Brown's School Days," was an early friend, and" together with Maurice, Lud^ low, Kingsley, and others of that school Lord Ripon did his best to support the cause of tile disinherited and disfranchised masses of the people. When ho was twenty-four years of ago a great strike broke out in which the brunt of the battle fell upon the amalgamated Engineers. Lord Ripon — then Earl de Grey — then was a young man with an allowance. Being convinced that the strikers were waging a battle for the right, the indispensable right of combination, he boldly espoused the cause- of the men, subscribed to their fund, and brought upon himself the grave condemnation of those of his own class who considered that "young de Grey was very ill-advised in throwing in his lot with these strikers." The only mark of social obloquy which ho incurred for this first expression of his sympathies with the toilers was that he was blackballed when he was proposed as a member of the Travellers' Club. It is only fair to add that in after years, without any solicitation on his part, the Travellers'. Club unanimously elected him to its membership. '• As an administrator, whether at Down-ing-street, Whitehall, or Pall Mall, Lord Ripon came less prominently before the public than he did in the services which he rendered to Greater Britain. His name will ever bo associated with the first great triumph in the cause of arbitration. It was he who, in 1871, was despatched with a commission, of which Sir Stafford Norlhcole was also a member, to Washington for the purpose of negotiating the treaty under which the Alabama claims were sent before the Tribunal at Geneva for the benefit of both nations. Lord Ripon always maintains that the honour of that great act of statesmanship belongs to Mr. Gladstone, that he was only the executive instrument who carried out Mr. Gladstone's instructions. Lord Ripon's defect, however, has ever been rather an excess of modesty than a desire to advertise his own achievements. But without enquiring too closely into the nicety of distribution of praise due to the different actors in that great achievement of pacific diplomacy, it suffices to say that Lord Ripon's name will ever be honourably associated with an act which is one of the landmarks in the progress of humanity.