A Social Sensation

Feilding Star, Volume VII, Issue 48, 1 October 1885, Page 3

A Social Sensation

♦ HOMERIC COMBAT BETWEEN AN EAEL AND A B.UIOSET. For the last week all fashionable London has been talking of the mysterious fracas in the Park between Sir George Chetwynd and Lord Lonsdale Sir George is a great racing man. He married tne widow of the hist Marquis of Hastings, the unfortunate young plunger of whose meteor-like career on the turf so much has been said and written. The Marchioness, it will be remembered, threw over Mr Chaplin p. for young Hastings. Chaplin was not, people say, very fond of her, but he didn't like being made a fool of, and he showed it. Within eighteen months the now Cabinet Minister was more than revenged. All the world knows how the young Marquis laid a large fortune against his rival's Derby favotite Hermit, how the horse went hopelessly wrong, how he started at forlorn odds, and how, to the surprise of everybody, he won. Lord Wilton was standing by Lord Hastings on the stewards' stand that bitter, snowy afternoon. He scanned the field with his opera-glass as the thirty runners swept round Tattenham Corner. "What's that next the rails, Hastings ?" he cried. " Hermit," was the quiet reply. Then a minute or so later, as Vauban, the hope of Danebury and the horse he had backed to win a great stake, compounded amidst yells of delight from the Ring, the young Marquis lowered his glasses. "Either Hermit or Marksman will win ; I'll back Marksman for a thousand," he cried. " Done," said Lord Wilton. " Hermit wins" ; and so he did by a neck. The -Marquis was practically a ruined man, but going Back to town on the joach that evening he was gayest of the gay. When young Hastings died his widow professed herself inconsolable, but in a very few months wedded Sir George Chetwynd, then, as now, one of the best-looking men in London. He it was who, conjoined with Lord Lonsdale, ten days ago afforded strollers in Hyde Park and riders in the Row the great social scandal sensation of the season. The scene occurred at noon—an hour when the daily crowd of fashionables and sight-seers in the Park is at the thickest. The Drive was crammed with vehicles, the Row alive with equestrians, and between the two on the broad walk surged backwards and forwards a stream of well-dressed pedestrians, divided by rows of chairs placed under the trees and mostly used by on-lookers. Upon one of these chairs, in the midst of a coterie of friends, sat Sir George Chetwynd. To him up comes Lord Lonsdale, stalwart and athletic. A few whispered words pass, then the peer calls the baronet a profane name, and, whisking his cane, delivers a swinging cut full across the latter's shoulder. Sir George, though evidently surprised at the assault, sprang to his feet vritli commendable agility, and having given the noble earl time to get his " maulyß" into position, planted a well-directed blow full in the left eye. A brutal light followed, in which fists and sticks were both employed, the aristocratic combatants poking and belaboring one another with the fury and energy of a couple of belligerent costermongers. Fully five minutes did the battle rage, no one liking to interfere, and the police being conspicuous by their absence. Then Mr Cecil Howard came up and, promptly insisting on a temporary cessation of hostilities, 6aw the ireful adversaries walked off in different directions. Dhe cause of the quarrel is Baid to be a wonderful portrait on china of Mrs Langtry, which both gentlemen ' much desired to purchase. Sir George absolutely obtained it from Mr Downey, the artist photograper. Unfortunately the hatter avers he thought he j was selling it to Lord Lonsdale. Hinc Wee lacrhiHß. His lordship says he believed the baronet had impersonated him in order te get the much coveted plaque. Bad as the quarrel was, it must have been quickly made up, for at Goodwood on Cup Day the two quondam adversaries were arm-in-arm together everywhere, the observed of all observers. Tanpom inutantur, et nos mutamur in illis. A few years ago such a public fracas as the foregoing: must have ended with a duel. Neither would have dared to allow it "feszle out," lamely explained by a preposterous cock-and-bull story no one believes. The* Jersey Lily's name was incautiously mentioned during the row by one of the belligerents, consequently she was connected with it in fifty ways long, before Sir George Chetwynd, at his club, volunteered a semi-public explanation.