He was "The Invisible Prince," he liked to take men unawares, he enjoyed
a grim joke at their expense, though whether he ever showed signs of
merriment, at least in after life, is not so much in the memories of
those who knew him, as his eccentricities. He is more associated with
the character of an ogre and a cynic who shunned his fellow-men, yet
there are some of his employees still living who give him a good word as
a kind and considerate master.
There have been various reasons put forth to account for his withdrawal
from the society of his peers. It was said that he was smitten with
leprosy, that he had an incurable skin desease; then that his love
affairs had gone awry when he was a young man, with the result that he
became a woman-hater, then a hater of mankind generally.
The Duke was moody and uncertain in his temper. Sometimes he would pass
pedestrians in the park without noticing them; at other times strangers
would be astonished to hear a shabby old ogre break out at them in
profane language because of their intrusion upon his domains, and they
would be still more astonished when making complaints about the conduct
of this disreputable person, to find that it was the Duke himself.
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