BEFORE the first world war - and in some cases, for a long time after as well - the English aristocracy enjoyed the good life, attended to by the many servants at their beck and call.

Mr Edward G. Hill, of Wemsley Grove, Tonge Moor, has sent me this photograph of how some of those servants looked - and he has a particular interest, because his father was one of them.

He writes: 'His list of references read like Who's Who, having been either butler or footman during his rise up the ranks, having been put into domestic service by his own father, who was butler at Alnwick Castle, the ancestral home of the Dukes of Northumberland. My father started as a mere bootboy at the age of 12.

'He was once with King Edward V11 and Queen Alexandra. Every titled family bedecked their footmen in magnificent uniforms, and they all differed. This picture shows the uniform worn by the footmen in the Earl of Lonsdale's staff at Lowther Castle, where the 14th Earl enjoyed the luxury of good living far greater than his Sovereign.

'His Lordship's colours were yellow, and his horse and carriage panels, and his special railway carriage, were painted yellow. Thus the colour was the most prominent of the breeches worn by the footmen.

'My father was head footman, and is seen in the photograph flanked by the younger men. My father once told me that he wore two white wigs, one for daytime. Each had to be dusted with French chalk daily to keep fresh.

'The outcome of the war broke the backs of most of the grandeur of these big houses, with huge taxes and death duties; men drifted from their former serfdom, and the magnificent uniforms disappeared forever except for those in Royal service.'