CHANGING TASTES

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19683, 28 December 1933, Page 12

CHANGING TASTES

COCKTAIL-CIGARETTE VGE PASSING MELBOURNE. December 11. Henry George Alan Percy, ninth Duke of Northumberland and 21 last July, who is in Melbourne on a world tour before settling down to the duties of his 100.000-acre Northumberland estate, expresses a novel outlook on life refreshing after the reactions of the earlier post-war generations. He is not averse to a cigarette or a cocktail, but he believes the young Englishmen and Englishwomen who were babies at the outbreak of the Great War are, as a whole, not interested in an excess of those delights.

“The war generation and their immediate successors are supposed to have whipped things up a bit,” he said today, after his arrival in the Strathaird, “but my generation is mostly too busy —either in looking after what it’s got or looking for something to look after!” He is accompanied by Lieut.-Colonel Henslowe. formerly of the Indian Army. They will go on to Sydney to-morrow in the Strathaird, then to New Zealand for some fishing, and home again by way of China, Japan, and America. He said that his limited knowledge of Australia debarred him from any critical comment, but he was impressed with the virility and independence in outlook of Australians, which was best evidenced by the striking manner in which they had tackled the financial problems of their country. “Although I have not yet taken my seat in the House of Lords, I am making a cursory survey of conditions in various parts of the Empire I am visiting,” said the Duke, “and, so far, Australia has been a revelation to me.

“It is my intenton to plan- a return visit as soon as my engagements permit, and then I hope to make an extended stay to see the whole of the country and to enjoy some of the fishing and hunting available. “At Perth and Adelaide the courtesy and hospitality of every section of the people I came in contact with was amazing, and the life, in general, is pleasing by reason of the feeling of equality that everybody appears to possess.” Since leaving England, the Duke and Lieut.-Col. Henslowe have been big game-hunting in Africa, where they bagged two lions and a water buffalo, but there the Duke contracted blackwater fever. The Duke is the joint master with his mother of the Percy Hounds, in Northumberland, where his country seat is at Alnwick, the home of the Percy family, which dates back to the 12th century. His town house is at Syon Park. Brentford, but recently the grounds were subdivided, and he now onl3’ retains the house. More than six feet in height, sandyhaired, and light blue-eyed, with pointed features, the young Duke, who at court ranks after the royal family,

some great officers of State, and several senior dukes, has a shyly affable address.