vi REMINISCENCES OF A HUNTSMAN 



the attempt to remove the slur on his mother's reputation, is a 

 thoroughly creditable feature in a career that otherwise fell 

 somewhat short of brilliancy. His conduct will appear all the 

 more disinterested when it is remembered that by supporting the 

 claim to legitimacy made by Colonel Berkeley, the eldest of the 

 six sons, he was endeavouring to interpose four lives, those of the 

 other brothers, instead of only one, between himself and the title 

 and estates. All the brothers, except the eldest, who claimed to 

 be heir to the peerage, and the fifth, whom the decree of the 

 House of Lords had constituted the heir, determined to enter 

 Parliament, the better to support the cause that was to clear 

 their mother's fame. Three of them actually succeeded in being 

 elected in 1831 and 1832, Grantley being returned for West 

 Gloucestershire, a seat which, although unsuccessful in his 

 immediate object, he held for twenty years, in defiance of the 

 powerful and costly opposition of the fifth son, to whom Grantley 

 was heir-presumptive. 



He soon became a well-known, if somewhat eccentric member 

 of society. He published a romance called Berkeley Castle in 

 1836, and the unfavourable review it received in Eraser's Maga- 

 zine was the cause of the unpleasant proceedings referred to at 

 page 315 of the present work. The circumstances are briefly 

 narrated in the Dictionary of National Biography. Accompanied 

 by his brother Craven, Berkeley called on Fraser, a bookseller 

 who published the magazine, at his shop in Regent Street, and 

 demanded the name of the writer of the objectionable article. 

 Eraser refused to reveal it, on which Grantley knocked him down, 

 and thrashed him cruelly with the handle of a hunting whip. 

 No doubt there had been undue provocation in the article, as 

 was proved by Berkeley subsequently obtaining a verdict in an 

 action for libel against Fraser, though the damages were fixed at 

 only 40s. But it was a cowardly assault by two powerful men, 



