The Sun.
London, England, 1849-12-11 00:00:00

SUN, LONDON,

DEATH OF THE EARL OF CAR-

NARVON.

Henry Jobn George Herbert, third Earl of Car-
nervon, expired yesterday morning, at seven o'clock,
at Highclere Castle, Hampshire. The disease which
has thus fatally terminated is supposed to have been
some affection of the spine.
The deceased Lord attained to considerable dis-
tinction in the course of the few years that his name
was before the world. A successful author, a well-
known traveller, a person of some note in the House
of Commons; even in the House of Lords, under all
the disadvantages of ill-health, he enjoyed a position
more prominent than is usually accorded to those
Peers who do not closely connect themselves with
party or submit to long official training; but when he
bore the title of Lord Porchester he was better
known than since he succeeded to the Earldom.
His father was Henry George, second Earl, and
his mother, Elizabeth Katherine, daughter and
heir of the late Colonel Acland, of Kul-
lerton, in Devonshire. The Noble Lord just
deceased was the eldest son of his father,
and was born at the town mansion of the family in
Grosvenor-square on the Bth of June, 1800 ; he has,
therefore, not lived to complete his .50th year. At
an early age Lord Carnarvon—then bearing the title
of Lord Purchester—went to Eton, where he was
the contemporary of Lord Morpeth, of Mr. Disraeli,
and of other wits, poets, and orators less known to
fame. After quitting Eton he repaired to Christ-
church, Oxford, where he received the university por-
tion of his education ; and in the year 1820 pro-
ceeded to what may be called a fresh course of
instruction by entering upon an extended and well-
devised plan of travel. In Italy he witnessed the
revolutions which took place there during the year
1821 ; not long afterwards he visited the Peninsula,
and, having taken an active part in favour of
Don Carlos, fell into the hands of the opposite
party, with whom he remained fur some time
a prisoner. But his Lordship's travels were not
limited to Spain or Portugal. Through Mo-
rocco • and other parts of Africa. through a
considerable portion of Germany, through the
Mamote country, and Athens his wanderings ex-
tended ; and by those who are familiar with his
.writings, or have enjoyed the advantage of his con-
versation, the animated and picturesque descriptions
abounding in both have long been acknowledged and
admired. But it was not by " travellers' tales" alone
that he won distinction in the world of letters, for he
was a poet and a dramatist. " The Moor," a poem,
and "Don Pedro," a tragedy, have given him a place
in the roll of "Royal and nobleauthors;" his appetite
for fame, however, was not sated with literary suc-
cess, and he had scarcely more than achieved a posi-
tion amongst the writers of the present century when
he took his seat in the House of Commons, where his
career was brief, certainly ; but, by his friends, con-
sidered brilliant. Ilis large expectancies, his ancient
descent, his rank, his youth, his success as an author,
his adventures as a traveller, his sufferings, his cap-
tivity, and "hair-breadth 'scopes," imparted great
interest to the Parliamentary debut of him
who was heir to the Sydneys and the
Herberts, but whose mortal remains will now
prematurely repose amidst their honoured ashes. So
long as health was spared to him, Lord Porchester
in the House of Commons answered the expectations
even of his most partial friends. Amongst the
speeches that he delivered in that Assembly against
the Reform Bill—now the law we live under—there
was one so impressive and efficient that Sir Robert
Peel said he should be perfectly contented to rest the
whole cause at issue upon the arguments contained
in that single speech ; and the cheers which this
opinion elicited from both sides of the House left no
doubt that men of all parties shared the sentiments
entertained towards Lord Porchester by him who
was then the great Conservative leader. Unfortu
nately for his lame as a public man, Lord Porchester
did not retain a seat in the House of Commons long
enough to establish a durable reputation in that
branch of the Legislature. His Lordship's father,
the second Earl, died on the 16th of April, 1833,
and the Noble Lord just deceased became of '
course a member of the Upper House. The
period of his election; "as a Member of the
House of Commons is nearly coincident with that of
his marriage, which took place at Aldingbourne, in
Sussex, on the 4th of August, 1830, when he
espoused Henrietta Anna, eldest daughter of the late
Lord Henry Molyneux Howard, and niece to the late
Duke of Norfolk. Of this marriage there has been
numerous issue, the eldest of whom, now in the 19th
year of his age, succeeds his father as fourth Earl of
Carnarvon. The period at which the late Lord entered
the House of Lords was one by no means favourable
to the ripe and advancement of a man who, like him,
started from such a "'vantage ground." The politi-
cal condition of the country was excited and alarming ;
great events were in progress ; and if he had remained,
as Lord Porchester, in the Lower House during the
high and palmy days of Conservatism (as well in oppo-
sition as in power), he could not fail to have occupied
an eminent place amongst the orators and statesmen
of that party. But, transferred to the House of
Lords, a different field of action opened to his
view ; one not very favourable to the commence-
ment of a fresh political career in an assembly where
he had acquired no practical experience; which con-
tained for the most part the contemporaries of his
fattier, and which, in all respects, was composed of
elements wterly unlike these that enter into the
formation of a House of Commons. But, apart from
such considerations, the Lords were at that time
reduced to a subdued and restricted position ; little
was left for them to do, and they did that little with-
out much debating. In the discussions on the Muni-
cipal Reform Act, however, Lord Carnarvon took
an active part, and divided their Lordships, as he
had d ne the House of Commons, OR the question of
Parliamentary reform. His labours were, however,
interrupted by occasional ill-health, by frequent
visits to the Continent, as well as by the manifold
duties which devolve on a great landed proprietor,
and the head ofan ancienthouse. Another object which
much occupied his attention was the restoration of
the old family seat, Ilighclere Castle, a work
c.itnmenced in the year 1841, and hardly yet
finished. This was certainly the indulgence
of rather an expensive taste, but the
undertaking has, from its commencement,
been regarded with much interest by antiquaries and
lovers of art. His Lordship was likewise a successful
cultivator on a great scale of the more curious and
beautiful American plants, of which his gardens
contain many of the finest specimens that have ever
been imported to England. In all respects he war,
as an earl should be, a country gentleman upon a
great scale. As a large landed proprietor he seemed
sufficiently jealous of his rights, and in the year
1844 his vindication of his rights gave rise to one of
the most curious actions to be found in the legal
history, at all events of the present century. It was
brought to establish a privilege called " free warren."
This privilege was introduced by our Norman rulers
for the protection of game, and it was one which
gieve the grantee a sole and exclusive right of
killing such game, so far as his warren ex-
tended, provided he prevented others from killing
it. Lord Carnarvon claimed free warren over the
manors of Ilighclere and Burghclere ; the action
was brought against Mr. Villebois, a copyholder in
Burghclere, for shooting game on his own copyholl ;
and it was one of the most extraordinary features of
the case that a grant of the time of Henry 111. was
not deemed sufficiently ancient; but that, from
amongst the muniments of the family, Mr. Parker,
his Lordship's solicitor, found it necessary to produce
evidence of a still earlier date for the purpose of show-
ing that the right of free warren passed to Lord
Carnarvon by ancient prescription, or usage, antece-
dent to the time of Richard I. It is not unworthy of
notice that a decision in favour of such a privilege
would probably have occasioned some discontent in
any county, if the successful suitor had been a man
less popular than Lord Carnarvon, but its effect was
directly the contrary, for intelligence of the event
was received amongst his neighbours and tenantry
with various manifestations of pleasure, perhaps of
triumph, and it may, without the least exaggeration,
be stated that very few even among the most popular
Members of the Upper House will, close their lives
amidst feelings of more general regret than those
which attend the death of Lord Carnarvon.—Times.

SPORTING INTELLIGENCE.
TATTERSALL'S.—YESTERDAY.
MET! OPOLITAN STEEPLECHASE (TO-MORROW).
3 to 1 agst Sir Arthur
4 to 1 agst British Yeoman
5 to 1 agst Vain Hope
The following are the names of the probable starters
and riders:—British Yeoman (.7. Mason)—Sir Arthur
(Ryan)—Chandler (Captain Little)—Hurleston gelding
(Odiver)—Duke of Cornwall (Rackley)—Maria Day
(Frisby)—Vain Hope (Archer)—Sarah Sykes—Young
Lottery (Butler).