Lord William was the life and soul of Simla, and exceedingly popular with everybody. One of his most charming traits, and one which I admired much, was his gentle, polite manner to natives. Once young Englishmen arriving from home considered it fine and grand to be rude and rough to natives when they were stupid, and made mistakes, which very often arose from their own ignorance of the language, and therefore being unable to express themselves intelligibly; I have heard a young subaltern saying he had saddled his pony, when what he wished to say was the syce was to do so, the young man’s grammar being defective, for which the natives had to suffer. Lord William was most particular in giving his orders to see they were understood, and gave them in a clear polite way which was most refreshing; naturally the natives loved him, would do anything for “Lord Brasspot Sahib.”
Many of his friends said he was a great loss to the Service. Once when a great friend of his was walking round Jakko (the only decent road round on one side of Simla, a sort of continuation of the Mall) with General Sir George Chesney, who wrote that clever book _The Battle of Dorking_, Lord William rode by at a gallop, taking his hat off to Sir George in a way quite peculiar to himself; it always seemed to imply so much, respect, affection, compliment, pleasure at seeing you, and everything else of the kind, leaving each individual feeling comfortable and pleased. As he passed, Sir George, who was walking with one of the members of the staff and as already stated an old friend of Lord William’s, turned to his companion remarking, “There goes a leader of men. Instead of being Military Secretary to the Viceroy he ought to be commanding a cavalry brigade; he would be unequalled at that work, always supposing he was not turned out of the service for disobedience to orders.”
Another friend, a clever lady of that time at Simla, speaking of Lord William’s character generally, said, “It is not Bill’s cleverness or quickness to grasp the situation, but what he has got in an eminent degree is what Solomon had. I have always thought that Solomon’s great wisdom was much exaggerated, and that what he really had in pre-eminence, and Bill has too, is tact, doing the right thing at the right time. For instance ... it was not Solomon’s great knowledge that bamboozled the Queen of Sheba, but knowing when she wanted a foot-stool!”