THE DUKE'S PEDESTRIAN POWERS. 21 



cultivating it for me, could you not do the same 

 for yourself? " On receiving an affirmative reply, 

 the Duke inquired how much capital the farmer 

 needed for his purpose, and advanced the sum at 

 once, with the happiest results. 



I have already said that his Grace was an 

 excellent pedestrian, and delighted in walking. 

 In one of the letters written by Lord George 

 Bentinck to Mr Croker in 1846, his Lordship 

 remarks that he " believes his father, then eighty 

 years old, was still equal to a ten-mile walk." 

 I remember being at Harcourt House, Cavendish 

 Square, on one occasion, when his Grace announced 

 his intention of walking to some place a long way 

 off. To this his two daughters, Lady Charlotte 

 Bentinck, afterwards Viscountess Ossington, and 

 Lady Lucy, now the Dowager Lady Howard de 

 Walden, vehemently objected, and begged their 

 father to order his carriage to the door. His Grace 

 scornfully repudiated the idea that the distance 

 was too long for him to accomplish on foot, and 

 offered there and then to run either of the young 

 ladies round the garden behind Harcourt House. 

 The challenge was accepted by Lady Charlotte, 

 and after an exciting race she won, as it were, 

 cleverly by a head, to her own great delight. 



There is not one member of this noble family to 

 whom I do not personally owe a deep debt of 

 gratitude. Hearing of my only son's dangerous 

 illness in 1887, Lady Ossington (who has since 



