ABOUT "BEND DR."

Otago Witness, Issue 3430, 9 December 1919, Page 47

ABOUT "BEND DR."

" A Personal Friend" writes in IJ National News an intimate sketch of H Duke of Westminster, who was receißßJ divorced by the duchess on the desertion and misconduct. He says:— H A tall, dripping figure, covered from to foot with green slirne,. emerged from flj duck-pond into which he and his horse iH landed, and bogged for a cigarette. lliH was my hist introduction to Bend Or. )H had been having a gallop with the OxfdJJ Drag, and he had had one of Ins not infM quent "tosses." IJ Ho was. Lord Belgrade then, and, faiied to assimilate much knowledge Eton except that contained in " llufßH Guide to the Turf," was living with a craiH mer at Woodstock, and endeavouringSgpH pass " Smaljs,'" the very elementary el trance examination for Oxford. nately, he never succeeded in the attempt! the first verb in the Greek vocabulaißJ always baffled him. BJ I seriously think that three years at Qfl ford would have made all the difference ;iflj Bend Or's life. He would have acquirjeßJ range, stability, and vision—Oxford wqiijßJ liave inspired a very sensitive boy with ihBJ fine spirit 'which hangs like incense oveßJ the ancient seat of learaing. BJ However, it was not to be. A little lateßJ the South African war broke out, andhßJ went out as an A.D.C, and did very weJIBJ The .glamour of Africa fascinated him, miM his pidneer instinct led him to buy a gteaßJ tract of country, and to spend a lot of timiß and money there. Not content with a.b|| holding in South Africa, he is a prominehi member of the syndicate which runs af immense tract of land in East Africa, (A which the centre is the town of Mombasa '• Exploration and the development of new countries is Bend Or's real forte, and undoubtedly the happiest days of his life hava been spent on the veldt and in the foresta. He loves the open air, the absence of formality and restraint, the abounding good fellowship. Of all his splendid seats, none appeals td him so much as his hunting box at Mimizan, in the Basque country, on the borders qf France and Spain. He often spends months on end there, shooting and huntings the wild boar. ->■ In the war he did first in' Franco with his armoured cars, in which, he played a most useful part in the retreat! from Mods, and, incidentally, on occasion saved the life of his great Francis Grenfoil, who afterwards, alas!" made the great sacrifice. Then in Egypt. Bend Or's dash to rescuo the prisoners from the Senussi gained ''him a well-do-, served D.S.O. He contracted malaria, followed bv a bad attack of typhoid, irt Egypt, and, though he -managed to get aa far on his way home as Paris, there is ho doubt that he • was - not strong enough for the journey, and he 'lay for weeks between lifa and death. Eventually he pulled* through, and,; though ho was not fit for the fighting line, he insisted on going down to_ Salisbury Plain and learning the intricacies of ->tho tanks. Then he went to Spain at the re-' quest of the Ministry of Information, and, in his own unorthodox way, he did some extraordinarily useful work there. His, personal friendship with the King of P- ' and his delightful personality did, r r.o change the atmosphere of the Court, .which up to then had been in the main distinctly pro-German. The popular conception of Bend Or as a reckless, scatter-brained bon viveur 13 very wide of the mark. He has brains of no mean order, a very acute 'judgment of men and things, a sense of humour which is unfaiiir.JT/ and at times considerable ambition. Though extraordinarily simple and unaffected, he can be very much the errand seigneur when he likes. His dependents adore him, and no man has or deserves stauncher men friends. Once a*- a dinner party a very well-known politician who has worked his own way up from the botiom of thp ladder summed up the present Duke of Westminster in whatt to most r.eople would sound like a paradox J "Bend Or is the greatest victim, of circumstances that I know." he said. "If be hadn't been bcrn with a golden spoon in. his mouth be'd have been a really greaft' man."