THE RIGHT HON. GEORGE NATHANIEL CURZON, BARON KEDLESTON (IRELAND), P.C., G.M.S.I., G.M.I.E., Ex-Viceroy and Governor-General of India.
GEORGE NATHANIEL CURZON, eldest son of the Rev. Alfred Nathaniel Holden Curzon, 4th Baron Scarsdale, and of Blanche, daughter of Joseph Pocklington Senhouse, of Netherhall, Cumberland, was born at Kedleston, Derbyshire, of which parish his father was Rector, on the nth January, 1859. The Curzon family goes back to one Giraline de Curzon. lord of the Manor of Lockinge, in Berkshire, and of Fishhead in Oxfordshire, who came over from France with William the Conqueror and whose name is in the Roll of Battle Abbey. The cider line married into the family of the Earl of Dorset, and became extinct long ago. The second line, the Curzons of Kedleston, have survived and thrown off branches. Among the Curzons of this branch was John Curzon. called “John with the white head,” who was Sheriff of Nottingham in the reign of Henry the Sixth, but it was not until 1641 that the descen¬dant of John Curzon obtained a baronetcy. The son of the first baronet, Sir Nathaniel, which by the way is a familiar Christian name in the family, married into the Penn family, and after a course of Johns and Nathaniels we come to Sir Nathaniel Curzon, who died in 175S leaving two sons, Natha¬niel and Assheton. In 1761, .Sir Nathaniel was created Baron Scarsdale. His brother Assheton became Viscount Curzon in 1802. and his son married the daughter of Earl Howe. He was him¬self created Earl Howe, in *82 r, and this branch of the Curzon family is numerous. The second Baron Scarsdale succeeded in 1804, and married into the Wentworth family. On the death of his first wife he espoused a Flemish lady, Felicite Anne de VVattines. By his first marriage he had a son, the Scarsdale who died unmarried in 1856, and the third Baron peerage then went to the grand-children of his second wife. The eldest son, George Nathaniel, had been killed by a fall from his horse in 1855, and his brother Alfred Nathaniel Holden, a clergyman in Holy Orders, became fourth Baron Scarsdale in 1856.
Lord Curzon is the eldest son of the fourth Baron, and has had nine brothers and sisters. Educated at Eton, and at Balliol College. Oxford, George Nathaniel Curzon at a very early period of his life gave proof of special ability, and setting a political career steadily before him, lost no time in embarking upon a course marked out for official distinction. Balliol has for long been distinguished for the intellectual attainments of its members, and its intellectual influences have spread far beyond any mere academical limits; while the Oxford Union, of which Lord Curzon became President in 1880, has attained a world¬ wide reputation, chiefly on account of the weekly debates held in connexion therewith. This debat¬ing society has been the nursery of many great orators, and during his 'Varsity career Lord Curzon was one of its most powerful speakers. In later years the experience thus gained has proved of immense service, and the vigorous intellect that Lord Curzon brought to the service of India, his debating powers, his ability to clothe his thoughts in fluent and appropriate language, and his capacity to grapple with far- reaching questions which a weaker man would hesitate to enter upon, were doubtless largely due to his early training in the rooms of the Oxford Union Debating Society. On leaving Oxford, Lord Curzon at once entered upon his public duties, and in 1885 he became Assistant Private Secretary to Lord Salisbury. His first attempt to enter Parliament was unsuccessful, as he was defeated by the Liberal candidate in the Southern Division of Derbyshire in the General Election of 1885. In the following year, however, he was returned for the Southport Division of Lancashire by a majority of 461 over Sir G. A. Pilkington, and this Division he continued to represent in the House of Commons, in the Conservative interest, up to the date of his appointment to the Viceroyalty of India.
In 1891 he was appointed Under-Secretary of State for India in succession to Sir John Gorst, and during the remainder of Lord Salisbury’s Administration he was afforded the opportunity of becoming familiar with the details of the India Office, then presided over by Viscount Cross. He had already commenced to travel widely, and his visits to Central Asia. Persia, Afghanistan, the Pamirs. Siam, and Indo-China, resulted in the publication of several books on the political problems of the Far East. He made a special study of Indian frontier problems, and was the first Viceroy of India since Lord Lawrence to realise the responsibilities of Asiatic rule prior to his appointment. Like a great many other statesmen, Mr. Curzon, as he then was, looked upon Russia as always a possible ene.mv, and a Power with which Great Brirain might yet have to fight over Afghanistan or Persia. Twice in the century had Cabul been made the cock-pit of British disaster, and Mr. Curzon was of opinion that it might yet come to he regarded as the citadel of British salvation. Lord Curzons distraction, during his Parliamentary career, was a rlose and conscientious study of the geography of Asia in its political and commercial, as well as its geographical aspects. India, to him, always appeared to be the pivot and centre—not the
