Product Description
Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: MEMOIR Sir Gerald Herbert Portal was the second son of Mr. Melville Portal of Laverstoke, and of Lady Charlotte Elliot, daughter of the second Earl of Minto. He was born on the 13th of March 1858, and had therefore not completed his 36th year when a life so remarkable not only for its promise, but also for its actual achievement, came to its untimely close. The handsome face and knightly bearing of the two brothers, Raymond and Gerald Portal, were typical of their family's origin in that southern school of chivalry, where French and English vied in feats of arms under the banners of King John and the Black Prince, in the days when lances were broken in the tilt-yards of Aquitaine. Either of the two brothers, indeed, might well have seemed to recall in form and features the goodly presence of that Raymond de Portal who rode with Bertram! du Guesclin to avenge the death of the Queen of Castile in 1336, and of whose martial deeds the troubadours made songs. He was educated at Eton in the house of Mr. Marindin, with a number of brilliant young contemporaries, who have already distinguished themselves in various branches of the public service. It is interesting to remark, that already in these youthful days those who watched his early development had discerned many of the characteristics which were especially noticeable in his after life : a courage, namely, in carrying through to the end whatever he had set himself to do, a gift for organisation, a power of influencing others, and of winning the best sort of popularity, together with a rapid perception of a favourable opportunity and a capacity for bestowing all his pains on the work in hand. To quote a concrete instance: there occurred in those days an opportunity for lower boys who displayed any aptitude for bowling to obtain,...
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
