A brief examination of his intellectual pursuits reveals that Edgar Prestage was quite a notable scholar and author. The following are only a couple of examples of the story of his life.

From: King's College London Archives Services - Summary Guide

Prestage, Edgar (1869-1951) Professor of Portuguese. Administrative/Biographical history: Born in Manchester, 1869; his interest in Portugal arose from reading adventure stories, particularly of Vasco da Gama's voyage to India; while at school at Radley, began to study Portuguese; converted to Roman Catholicism, 1886; first visited Portugal, 1891 second class in modern history, Balliol College Oxford, 1891; admitted in 1896 and practised as a solicitor in his father's firm, Allen, Prestage & Whitfield, at Manchester until 1907; often visited Lisbon, mainly for historical research, and befriended several prominent Portuguese scholars, 1891-1906; elected to the Portuguese Royal Academy of Sciences; in Lisbon, introduced to the salon of Dona Maria Amália Vaz de Carvalho, a distinguished writer and widow of the Brazilian poet Gonçalves Crespo, whose daughter he married, 1907; later lived in Lisbon; pursued research in the Portuguese state and private libraries; a monarchist, never reconciled to the republican regime until the advent of Dr Salazar; press officer at the British legation in Lisbon, 1917-1918; Camoens Professor of Portuguese, King's College London, 1923-1936; engaged in little teaching and mostly in research, arranging periodical public lectures on Portuguese themes; delivered the Norman MacColl lectures at Cambridge, 1933; lecture on the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance to the Royal Historical Society, 1934; elected Fellow of the British Academy, 1940; Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society; grand officer of the Order of São Tiago; corresponding member of the Lisbon Academy of Sciences, the Portuguese Academy of History, and the Lisbon Geographical Society; in his later years, concerned with spiritual matters rather than work; died in London, 1951.

From "The Luso Pages" - Manchester's Portugese Connections; Edgar Prestage, (1869-1951)
Edgar Prestage was Britain's first Professor of Portuguese. He was born in Upper Brook Street, Manchester and became the first Lecturer in Portuguese at any higher education institution outside the Portuguese- speaking world when he was appointed as Special Lecturer in Portuguese Literature at Owens College, Manchester, the forerunner of the University of Manchester. Prestage lived for many years in Bowdon, Cheshire and practised as a solicitor in his father's firm in Princess Street, Manchester.

His interest in Portuguese was awakened at school, at Radley College, in Oxfordshire. Never reluctant to approach the famous men of his day, he corresponded with Sir Richard Burton and a number of celebrated Portuguese writers, including Teófilo Braga and Batalha Reis. In 1909 and 1914, before emigrating to Portugal he sold much of his library to the John Rylands Library, Manchester, where it remains today. In 1908 he married Cristina, the neurotic daughter of the mulatto Brazilian poet, Gonçalves Crespo and his wife, the famous literary critic, Maria Amália Vaz de Carvalho. Cristina committed suicide in 1918 and, ultimately, Prestage returned to England, where he became the country's first Professor of Portuguese, at King's College, London.