The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1881-04-21
ENGLISH NOBLEMEN
Wherein they differ from
other men.
How YOU can't tell a Lord
on sight.

| The personality of the late Lord Hunt
/ ingtower, whose memory has been revived
/ by the disclosures of ascaUse cele6re conclud-
ed last week, is not likely soon to fade
! from the minds of those who ever enioyed
| the distinguished honor of his society, OF
who even knew him by sight He was
pre-eminently the peer Of the pavement,
and had graduated in almost every art of
| eccentric blackguardism. Much was for
given him by the multitude because sin
ner in purple is only half sinner in broad
cloth. His follies and vices, it was charit-
ably said, were hereditary, and therefore
venial Like the title, they were part of
| the family estate and it would be as UNI
reasonable to condemn the representative
| of an ancient race because he concentrated
| in himself all the failings and iniquities of
| his fOrefathers as because his physiognomv
reproduced the combined features of a
series of family portraits GOut in these days
| is becoming a1ittle common ;and since the re
form bill of 1882 the middle classes have
had the audacity to assert their claims to
share its agonies. But there are still
some valetudinarian eccentricities which
are severely limited to the very highest
society. The members of one noble and
titled house, which has supplied us with
at least two secretaries of state during the
last 20 years, have a hereditary incapacity
for eating roast mutton. One of their
ancestors probably was seized with intern
al pangs, after having dined too copiously
of that dish, in the days of the first
crusade, and his descendants have been I'M
able to tolerate it ever since. The odd
thing is. they can eat, and cOndescend to
like, boiled mutton, especially when served
with caper sauce and turnips. Another
family, which, though not titled, is of an
antiquity greater than the pr0prietors
of most -coronets can boast, in the west
of England, has been famous from father
to son, during several centuries
for its instructive dislike to boiled tongue.
These are historic instances, and they
might be multiplied with endless and enter
tanning variety.
Since the accession of Queen Victoria
absolute dementia has lost much Of the pa
trician reputation which it enjoyed in the
days of George III. But certain peculiar
decisions are still highly aristocratic APP
pendage. Here is a peer who has a strong
conviction that he is endowed with the
gift Of immortality. He has made his will
as a matter of form but he knows quite
well that there will never be any practical
use for the document. On all other sub
Iects than this he is perfectly sane His
lordship in fact, is, except in this particu
lar matter, shrewd, clearheaded, quick
witted man Of the world, who thoroughly
understands the management of his
estates and improvement of his property;
d portion of the arts, and strong advo-
cate of economic reform. His father firm
" believed, and protested on his death-bed,
that he should appear after an
interval of ten years. His grand
father was an apostle of the doctrine
Of the transmigration of souls. In fact,
there has not been one of their lordships
for centuries who has not been remarkable
for the oddity of his notions on all that be-
longs to the limit and the sequel of mum
dane existence.
There is another peer of the realm, who,
following the hereditary usage of his house,
suddenly, and without word of warning,
absents himself-no one knows where, or
how, or why-from his friends and rela-
tives, for a week, a month, or a year. He
has asked a party of friends to dine with
him at the family mansion. The company
| arrive; but his lordship has gone from
home and left no orders That day next
year he takes his place in the upper cham
Der of the legislature as if nothing had
happened There is another peer-very
highly placed, indeed-who like his an
cestors for the last two generations has
a curious weakness for purchasing cold
roast fowls at cook-shops. The
| birds are neatly wrapped up in
brown paper, and he carries them home
under his arm. But perhaps the common
est craze to be met with in the families of
| the nobility is the religious or ecclesiastical.
Each member of the house is little
'.gone" upon some different form of faith.
| One is suddenly received into the congre-
CATION of Plymouth brethren; another pre-
| cipitately fees to the Church of Rome; a
| third has recently embraced the creed of
| Buddhism a fourth is cryptic Mahometan;
fifth an Irvingite and great upon the gift
of tongues; sixth a furious and embit-
tered atheist People smile and look know
| ing when you mention the names of the
representative of this race. 1t is allowed
that they are, severally and individually,
by 10 means fools; but they are, each OF
them, pronounced a little queer. Never
mind; it cannot be helped = it is Sin the
family"