The Iron Duke's Life From The Days Of Waterloo

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20094, 14 November 1939, Page 2

The Iron Duke's Life From The Days Of Waterloo

THE great-grandniece of the Duke of Wellington. Miss Muriel Wellesley, is to be congratulated on the sequel volume to “The Man Wellington,” which has just been issued under the title “Wellington in Civil Life: Through the Eyes of Those Who Knew Him.”

She succeeds because she reveals the Iron Duke not with mere adulation and personal pride in . her ancestor, but ' gives the unbiased tributes of flic Duke's contemporaries, and when the verdict is adverse does not hesitate to state it. It can to said, however, that she shows that the Duke was a more kindly and sympathetic man than is generally supposed. The .author tells the story of the Duke’s life from the days of Waterloo to his dentil. “One of the most attractive examples of his integrity." she writes, “was the reproof he administered to his agent, who had done what he considered a good stroke of business for his employer, by purchasing some farmlands below their proper value. “ ‘What do you mean?’ asked the Duke, when the agent informed him of the good bargain he had made.

“The man replied by telling the Duke the sum he had paid for the farm, adding that lie knew it to be worth considerably more.

“ ‘Are you quite sure of that? asked the Duke.

“Quite isure. Your Grace, for 1 have carefully surveyed it.' “ ‘Very well, then pay the gentleman from me the balance* between what you have already given and the real value of the estate. . . . The Next Step Miss Wellesley tells many stories of his kindness, and in particular his; desire to help old soldiers. He was always practical in his sympathy. however, and she includes tlie statement of one of Wellington's visitors who had called to solicit hi.s aid: —

“ ‘When I had finished the old Duke raised his eyes from the floor and looking straight at me said: “It's a very hard case, a very hard case indeed. But now ret me ask you a question. You are going to make a motion in the House of Lords in favour of this gentleman’s claims. Now, suppose you carry your motion, I want to know what vou will do then? Because, added the Duke after a moment's pause —“because through my whole life I have always asked myself,. ‘What’s the next .step?’"

Lady Salisbury on one occasion asked him “if he did not feel a sense of satisfaction in the superiority which he always enjoyed, and the Duke in reply said:— “ ‘Perhaps there is no man now existing who would like to meet me on a field of battle; in that line I am superior. But when the war is over and the troops disbanded, what is your great general' more than anybody else?. ... I am necessarily inferior to every man in his own line. ... I cannot saw or plane like a carpenter, or make shoes like a shoemaker, or understand cultivation like a farmer. Each of these, on his own ground, meets me on terms of superiority. I feel I am but a man.’ His Daily Day

“Both in youth and age he would accomplish in a day what most people would do in a week,” writes Miss Wellesley. ‘llls daily letterwriting alone would have been considered a day's work for the ordinary individual. “And yet he was never flustered or hurried and always seemed to have time in hand. 'But then he had the knack of handling it, and never allowed himself to be run up to the last minute. He once said that he considered his success in life was partly due to always having a quarter of an hour to spare. "How was it, one may ask, that a man with such a busy life never appeared to be in a hurry? "The answer is a very simple ione. The Duke was an early riser. He got up at H o’clock every morning, and by the time ordinary people put in an appearance had done two or three hours’ hard work.

“But what a Spartan habit, enirely precluding any enjoyment of ,

bed! Indeed, the luxury of an early morning snooze must have been quite unknown to Wellington, who once said, ‘When it's time to turn over it’s time to turn out!’. . . Expected Courage as a Matter Of Course "It is characteristic of Wellington," says his' biographer, "lHat lie commented not upon the courage of the heroes of the Birkenhead, but upon their discipline. The Duke never saw any virtue in courage, which he looked upon as a normal constituent of a man. To be possessed of courage was no more extraordinary in his eyes than to have a mouth or a nose

“Lack of courage was to him an abnormality like a physical defect, to be pitied and shielded rather than condemned. He once said when describing courage from the English point of view that ‘it is presumed of everybody 'till he is convicted of not possessing it, and is never talked about in any ordinary instance. ’ ”