OVERSEAS DIGNITIES

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 127, 3 June 1929, Page 10

OVERSEAS DIGNITIES

LORD INCHCAPE AN EARL

THE KING'S PHYSICIANS

(Received 3rd June, 10 a.m.) LONDON, 2nd June. The_ Birthday Honours include the following:— .EARLDOM. VISCOUNT INCHCAPE OP STRATHNOWER. The new Earl is a prominent figure m the mercantile shipping world of the Empire—probably the leading figure. He was born at Arbroath, Forfarshire, in 1852, and was educated there and at I Elgin. In 1874 he joined the firm of < Messrs. Macldnnon, Mackenzie, and Co. at Calcutta, of which firm he ultimately became senior partner. He became a member of the Legislative Council of the Viceroy of India in 1891, and a member 'of the Council of India in 1897 As Sir James Mackay he negotiated a commercial treaty with China on behalf of England, for which he was created G.C.M.G., ,and in 1911 he was raised' to the Peerage as Baron Inchcape. He has served on many Royal Commissions and Committees, particularly in reference to Indian and shipping matters. As chairman of the P. and O. Steam Navigation Company and a_ director of the Suez Canal Company his genius for organisation has become apparent, and the British Government has sought his assistance on several occasions. After the war he took over and sold the Government's standardised ships, realising for the Exchequer a total of £35,000,000 at the trivial cost to the Government of £850. He also helped to sell a number of other Gov-

eminent war stores, including war craft used in Mesopotamia, which realised £1,080,000.