A SPENDTHRIFT DUKE.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1168, 6 October 1882, Page 1 (Supplement)

A SPENDTHRIFT DUKE.

A NOTABLE SALE. The present month (write* a la.lv correspondent of the Australasian ’’ from London) will be rendered memorable in the annals of social events by the sale, in London, of the greater part of tho magnificent contents of Hamilton Palace. The ruin to which the inheritor of the great name and the splendid estate of Hamilton has brought himself by the unbridled pursuit of pleasure is one of the scandals of the time. The Duke adds another to the list, unhappily a long one, of

those young noblemen of our day who have done their best to justify and confirm the disapproval with which public opinion is growingly inclined to regard class privileges and the distribution of wealth after a fashion that renders possible the kind of lives these persons lead. Christie and Manson’s sale-rooms have been aptly termed “the great re-distributing office”'—

to them, it seems, do all the great collections come at last. It was but the other day that the Duke of Marlborough’s books followed the Blenheim gems to tho hammer : a few days more and we shall be crowding to see the Beckford and Hamilton libraries at one sale-room, and at

another, objects of historical interest and association with thedead-and-gone grandeur of a great name, such as it is impossible to contemplate unmoved. The hand of a spendthrift has rifled the stately “palace” of Hamilton, and soon all the “ soulless things ” that ought to have spoken with tongues to the young man who became their possessor in his boyhood will be scattered over Europe. Tt is said the palace itself will be sold, or at best shut up, and that the duke will never visit it again. The illustrated catalogue of the sale will be published at a guinea. It will include “ pictures by the first masters, rare sculptures, ancient vases, cabinets of the most curious and costly workmanship, a library' of world-wide celebrity ” Among the art treasures of Hamilton Palace there are several pictures with which we have been made acquainted by the series of Winter Exhibitions or Old Masters at Burlington House. One of the finest of Hobbema's works is among these, and fl|freseo by Botticelli, which was so much talked of when the Duke lent It for exhibition, and which, I fancy, gave rise to tho Botticelli cant, that

has prevailed among the “ (esthetes ” ever since, This fresco, with its frame, weighs six tons. It will probably bring a largo price. But the picture of pictures, the “ Daniel in the T.ion's Den,” by Rubens, a canvas measuring 10ft. lOin. by 7ft. Gin. is in every sense the “biggest thing” in this collection. Its authenticity is be yond a doubt, for it was presented io the Duke of Hamilton by King Charles the First, and has been in the palace ever since. Several historical portraits are not to be sold. This reserved list includes Zuccliero’s Earl of Darnley, Velasquez’s Charles the Fifth, Vandyke’s best portrait of Charles the First, and David's Napoleon tho First; also a very fine fulllength portrait of William Feilding, first Earl of Denbigh, by Vandyke The earl’s daughter was the first Duchess of Hamilton. A more striking example of the vanity of human wishes and the futility of human plans than is presented by the “ smash up ’’ at Hamilton Palace it would not bo easy to find. Tho grandfather of the prodigal young man who has brought all this ruin about made large additions to tho palace and improved the grounds around it. The “ Daily News "says of him: “He it was who married Beckford's daughter, and he evidently had the instincts of a constructor and a collector. H e has left ample evidence of this in the perfect condition of everything. Ho must have desired that the palace of Hamilton should be a monument of the greatness of his family that would go down to posteriiy with all his richness and splendor. At a vast cost he constructed a magnificent mausoleum ; it is 120 feet high, and is one of the sights of the place. The bodies of his ancestors, thirteen

I in number, were moved into in vaults, and in an nncic’d Fovuiian sareo-nliao-uv of Sveniic marble, covered I with Im reglvidiics. Im bim - m f rope -eLef us hopes tlinr tho rest of the dead is not troubled hr tho deeds of Heir descendant's The five statues which form the chief adornment of the great hall of Hamilton Palaeo are to bo sold. These statues, cast in bronze from the originals, are the Apollo Belvedere. Diana. Antinous, a Hercules. and the Gladiator. Tt will Tie interesting to follow the fate of these o-rcat works of art, probable to be divided after their long companionship: for there are few, even of the palaeo halls of our greatest nobility, that could afford snaee for them all Several objects of historical interest are, it is said, not io be sold. Ono of these is a silver box in which, love-letters and presents used to be conveyed between Marie Stuart and Lord Darnley. Tt now contains a cold ring with a sapphire set in it. wh’ch was sent to the then head of the House of Hamilton bv the nnhanpv Queen on the eve of her death. Another is Queen Elizabeth's cradle : a third is a terrible reminder of stern times and stern deeds. Tt is the gun with which Hamilton of Bothwellhangh shot the Regent Murray at Linlithgow.