PERSONAL NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2604, 10 February 1904, Page 71

PERSONAL NOTES.

• — Lord Yallc-tort is the eon of one of !ii= iiaje-ty's eldest fi-ie.id? When Lord Mount Edscumbe bcro his son's present ■•tylo. ho v. a= ono of the "three- cry distinguish' d voupj mm" whom Queen Victoria and Prince Albert eeleotod "to occupy, in monthly rotation, a kind of equerry's place" about tho pcison of the Heir Apparent. Tbo Lord Valletort of thci-e days v.-do evrrj tiling that Pil'iee Albert considered a young" rtiMi ou.nt to be. ''He has been. much on the Continent: is thoroughly good, moral, and accomplished; drays well, and plays, and has ne\er been ab a public school. '' As to this Ja«t qualification, his Royal Highness (the Pali Mall Gazette points out) was rathe* cunors'iy misinformed. Ihe Loid Yallctort of 1858 had been at Hairow. Thj "kind of equerryship," which lastor durmg the Prince's tenure- of the Whit© Lodge, led to a. connection which has lasted dimnt, tho Prince's tcame of the tort became a Lord-in-waiting to the Prince, and the Earl of Mount Edgrunibe v as one of King Edward's Coronation mis^ionere, and one of the earliest of his facets after hie accession.

— Lord 'Wolverton is just close on 40, snd is a most popular poor both as a society man and as a sportsman. As a younger eon ho seemed to have little chance of tho sue-Cfc-Sciou, and spent his life and his limited income m the distant place-* of the earth as a huntc-r of big game, and in 1888 his ■eld.r brother having died unman ied, he succeeded to the title and an income of £50.000 a year. He is a yachti-man, a shot, a lacing man, and a been motonst. Lady Wolverton is the sister of Lord Dudley, and is one of the tallest of our society beauiies. She chares her husband's interest in racing, and s&ldom is absent from tbe best mootmgs. Iwerne Minuter is a large and handsome house, which has no claim to the a.itiquity wLio'i its name seems to promise. It only dates baok about 30 years, having been built by the second Lord Wolverton, who, a.3 Mr George G'.ya, acted as whip to the Liberal party in the House of Commons for several years, and was a great personal friend of Mr Gladstone.

— The late- Baron Julius de Renter was a man of extraordinary courage and determination. Ke camo tc England from Aix la Chapelle, without friends, without capital, without ever a knowledge of the language, and he lived to cover the whole v. or.d with a network of news gatherers. No difficulty could daunt this man, who lived in Finsbury Square-, and worked at No. 1 Royal Exchange till he compelled suoceee. In the early days the telegraph nires were not allowed to cross the frontiers on. the Continent. There was an office each side, with a distance between. Julius de Reuter bought carrier pigeons to bridge it. During the American Civil war news could? uo-t come by cable. If it cam© by mail steamer there would ba no "scoop." Julius de R-euter v, as equal to the occasion, if is despatches from New York came in sealed boxes, whirh were thrown overboard off ihe Irish coast. Special steam yachts picked them up and earned then to Crookhaven. where he had a private wire. Never content to be merely up to date, Le alway* wanted to be a fortnight before time; an 4 when the Duko of Saxe-Coburg and Golaa eventually gavo him his title, in 1871, iib Avas already known as the world's greatest news editor.

— Lord James of Piereford is a retired politician who has gradually drifted into the. life of a country gentleman. He began life as a Radical lawyer, with a great contempt for 'the peerage, and it is even said that he once described the Houso which henow adorns as the resort of feeble-minded aristocrats pnd palsied in&skers. ±t& gathered commousonse, an income, and other desirable things, however, as he went through life, and his prejudices agamst a title were not strong enough to prevent him accepting a wall-earned peerage. The early days of Lord James were dovoted to hi-s practice at the bar and his work in the House of Commons ; but at 5C he found time to learn to shoot, and even before- he entered the Upper House ho had begun to lide a cob. 2s r ow you could not tell him anything he does not know about farming and floriculture, or fox-hunting, or any of the hundred things that go to make up tho life oE a country squiie. Since ho retired from activo political work he h?.<- several times, acted as arbitiator in groat trado disputes, and always with great success, both masters and men tri'Sting to the uttermost in his fairness and impartiality In spite of a somc-whafc serious f&ce, Lord James is an exceedingly genial man, and veiy popular with tho King, whose friend he has been for many yeai*. He is credited with ha\ing "discovered" several of our rising politicians — Mr Asquith among the- number.

— A very interesting article mi the late Mi Alficd Miles of Baud street, London, who, having started bushices in the Eaymarket with a shop and £10 in cash, died bS jears later, lea\ing a fortune of over £300,000, appears in the Tailor and Cutter. That Mr Miles was i man of thrift and .ndustrj goes without saying; but his mo*t remarkable- quality was hip power of interesting others in his business. He dressed 1 his window with the greatest care, and when he saw a possible- customer attracted thereby ho would go out and talk to him so tactfully that the gazer became a purchaser. He printed handbills, too, and persuaded cabmen tc put them in their vehicles, and in response, to one of these, h© received a call from Lord Ingestre, afterwards Lord Shrewsbury and Tnlbot, and grandfather of the X-'resent peer. Th© friendship shown by his lordship to th© clever tailor played no small part in tho fortunes of the latter. His lordship was quickly mtereste-d in. a. man who was obviously no ordinary tradesman, and» he recommended many customers. Lord Ingeetre was in the habit in later years of leaving with Mr Miles the kic-ys of his private dosk and cupboards, and if ha wanted any papers when he was out of town he wrote to tho tailor to forward them. During his struggling days in the Haymarket, too, Mr Miles often re-eeived a cheque for double the amount of bis account, tho balance being placed to his lordship's credit, and to the end of the latter's life the wealthy tailor always attended personally to the best patror and tlie best friend that he had ever known.

— On Thursday, December 3, John Hamilton Dalrymple, tenth Earl of Stair, padsedl o\ei- to th-e greet majority in tbe eightylifth ye^tf of his age. The deceived nobleman was a nobl-e man who bpd served hia clay and generation well and faithfully in m-my public capacities. Ho was elected M.l' lot Wio;iov,Tv=i-irp> in 18^1, &rr\ continued to icpicscafc the conMuiuncy till 1856. In 1851 he \Vac appointed Lo:d-iie>:i-

tenant of Wigtownshire, and of Ayrehirc in 1870, holding the latter office till 1897. Ho was also Lord High Commissioner to the Church of Scotland from 1869 to 1871. He was Major-general of tho Royal Scottieli Archers, and was at one- time captain in the Ist Wigtown Volunteer ArMllery. In 1884 he was elected Chancellor of tho University ' of Glasgow, and was also a governor of the BAnk of Scotland. The late Qu&en Victoria made him Knight of the Thistle. On his eightieth birthday — let April 1899 — the tenants and feuars on the Stair estates in Wigtownshire and Ayrshire presented hi 3 Lordship with an illuminated address enclosed in a magnificent caskot, and at the same time entertained him at a oake and wine banquet, the company present on that occasion numbering nearly 400. Lord Stair had earned for himeeif a unique reputation, not only for his great abilities and the innumerable public duties which he so faithfully discharged, but also for his innale kindliners of disposition. His death will be mourned as that of a friend by thousands of people in Galloway, Ayrahire, and ekewhere. fio was mairied to a daughter of the Duo de Coigny, who was a leading statesman in tho Court of Franco when the great Napoleon was only a Corsican corporal of artillery. The Duo de Coigny had married the hcirct-9 of the ancient houso of Hamilton of Bargany, in Ayrshire, and the Bargany estate passed into the hands of the Hamilton X)alrymplo family in that way. The doc r a^ed Karl of Stair is sucopeded in the earldom by his eldest son, Viscount Dalrymple, who is at present the Provost of Stranracr.