circa 1890. Point Lenana (4,985m), the third highest peak, on
Mount Kenya was named after him by
Halford Mackinder. Lenana is shown with Sir Arthur Hardinge, wearing spectacles, on his left. Hardinge entered the
Foreign Office in 1880, and had his first posting as a Junior Agent of the British Foreign Office, at
Madrid,
Spain, in 1883, under Ambassador
Robert Morier. He acted as a Secretary to the Foreign Minister
Lord Salisbury in 1885, and when Robert Morier was appointed Ambassador to Saint Petersburg, Russia, he went there as his personal aide. In 1887, he went to
Istanbul,
Turkey, under
Sir William White, moving in 1890 to
Bucharest,
Romania. He accompanied the
Russian Tsarevich on his trip to India 1890–91, and was then acting Consul-General in
Cairo,
Egypt, in 1891, under
Sir Evelyn Baring. In 1894 he was appointed Consul General to
Zanzibar being promoted to Colonial Head, 1895–1900, at the
British East Africa Protectorate, overseeing there the construction of the
Uganda Railway and the crushing of an Arabic ethnic rebellion. In October 1900 he was appointed Consul-General in
Persia, a post which was later upgraded to
Minister. Staying in
Teheran until 1906, he stressed the importance of stopping Tsarist
Russia on courting the political favours of the Persian government . Concern by King
Edward VII prompted him to accept the position as
Minister to Belgium 1906–1911, and later as
Minister to Portugal 1911–1913, and
Ambassador to Spain, 1913–1919, a neutral country in
World War I. He was frequently visited at
Madrid and
Barcelona by the notorious literary widow and sister to the famous General
José Millán Astray, who was running some sort of World War I espionage network in both places and took thus opportunities to read and transcribe faithfully his diplomatic notes. He retired in 1920, aged 61. He became the author of several books, including
Life of Lord Carnarvon (1925) and two volumes of autobiography,
A Diplomatist in Europe (1927) and
A Diplomatist in the East. A supporter of
right-wing politics, he joined the
British Fascists. He died in
Mortlake and was buried in the churchyard of St. Peter,
Fordcombe, Kent. ==Family==