370 RACING CAREER OF SIR W. H. GREGORY. 



Lieutenants who ruled Ireland in succession ; and 

 his great experience of the country gave him 

 unusual influence. " It was said of him, and with 

 truth, that ' Gregory was the dry-nurse of young- 

 English statesmen.' Although I was but a small 

 boy at the time to which I now refer, I well re- 

 member many of the guests who frequented my 

 grandfather's dinner - table, for his house was 

 hospitable and his Sneyd's claret of the best. I 

 have the liveliest recollection of the style of con- 

 versation, of the profound distrust and hatred of 

 the Roman Catholic religion, and of the chorus of 

 invective against O'Connell, whom I was taught 

 to regard as an incarnation of the principle of 

 evil/' 



In 1842 Mr West, the Conservative member for 

 Dublin, died suddenly, and young Mr William 

 'Gregory, whose father, Mr Robert Gregory, was 

 then dead, was invited to stand in opposition to 

 Lord Morpeth, who was vigorously supported by 

 O'Connell. It would have been difficult for a 

 young man not yet twenty-five to encounter a 

 more formidable opponent. Lord Morpeth had 

 recently been Chief Secretary for Ireland, and a 

 more amiable*, blameless, and respected statesman 

 it would have been impossible to name. He was 

 travelling in America when Mr West died, and 

 had lost his seat for the West Hiding not long 

 before. His absence from the House of Commons 

 was universally regarded as a national loss. More- 



