THE WORLD’S REVOLVER CHAMPION.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume I, Issue 104, 15 April 1911, Page 4 (Supplement)

THE WORLD’S REVOLVER CHAMPION.

YVhei'. Mr Walter Winans, sculptor, author, crack shot, champion breeder of horses and what not, went to America recently, with the pick of his English stables for exhibition at the New York Horse Show, the fact was generuilv overlooked that ib was his first vi-it. to his native land. For although ho was born in Russia fifty-eight years ago, and educated there, his parents wer<> both Anc-ricans. “All my relatives are in Baltimore, Mr. Winans confessed recently. “How camo 1 to be an American who had never seen America? It happened in this wav. Tho Winans were good Pro pstant Dutchmen, and, feeling unsettled in America, my parents went to Russia. where my father and his brother were commissioned by the Russian Government to build railways in that country. They were so employed for many years-.

“So yon see, I lived in Russia, mostIv at St. Petersburg, until I was eighteen. My father’s health broke down, so he knocked off and ilook a London hous*. H" wished to come home, but he was afraid to cross. Not afraid of whales and shinwreeks, and all that sorb of thing, but his heart was s« delicate that he feared he wouldn’t last through the voyage. I was the son of an American citizen, so I had the right to choose whether I would call myself an American, a Russian, or ■>n Englishman. Of course, 1 was American really.” And then Mr. YVinans told an amusing story of how he once went to a throat specialist, who said to him, "This is the sitne trouble all you Americans have. Y'ou catch it from that confounded clima eof yours.” “And,” says Mr. Winans. “I had lived in England twenty years.”

OBSTINATE ENGLISHMEN.

If there is one sport more than another of which Mr. YY’inans is passionately fond, it is boar-hunting, and in connection with it he tells this story as an illustration of the obstinacy of Englishmen. “Boar-lmnting, you know,” ho says, “is a bit dangerous, so you pick the bravest dogs you can find. One day I read of a butcher’s dog that had bitten a man in the leg. and I rent my man to buy him. I had him in Germany and turned him out with Hie rest. He took a boar by the nose, and, upon my soul, ho nearly threw inni. I shot the beast, but the dog wouldn’t let tro The hunstmen threw tho hoar into a wagon and the dog went with him. YVo drove them both to the lodge, and half an hour later the little beggar was still holding on Now. that’s your Englishman. They’re all stubborn.

A MUGWUMP.

While he was in America, an interviewer tried to get Mr. M’inans to confess his politics, and he answered in his characteristic wav, “I am one of those fellows Idiot what-d’ye-call-it — swinging on a gate?” “Do you mean a mugwump? A man who sits on the fence?” “Yes, that’s it. I rather fancy I’m a mugwump.” *