I 



PRIME MINISTERS 

 AND THEIR RACE-HORSES 



We justly boast 

 At least superior jockeyship, and claim 

 The honour of the Turf as all our own. 



COWPER. 



The recreations and tastes of statesmen have 

 always engaged the interest of the pubHc. Indeed^ 

 it would often seem that it is their desire not so 

 much to serve their country as to amuse it by 

 their pastimes. Temple is more remembered for 

 raising melons at his villa at Sheen than for his 

 embassy to Holland ; and the rash and impetuous 

 Carteret for the Burgundy which flowed so abund- 

 antly at his table than for his consummate know- 

 ledge of Continental politics. Fox is a more 

 familiar figure as the slovenly card-player at 

 Brooks's, and as a gambler at Newmarket, than as 

 a politician who, without principles, was a master 

 of Parliamentary eloquence. Walpole and Glad- 

 stone took a delight in trees, though the latter did 

 not echo the other's appreciation of them — " My 

 flatterers are all mutes." The Gladstone legend 

 will probably survive in an amateur's classical 

 scholarship and some passing exploits in religious 

 controversy rather than in the recollection of any 

 enduring work of statesmanship. Brief, indeed, 



II 



