THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



19] 



calf ill 1850, won the Dublin Challenge Cup for her 

 new owner; and Victrix by Royal Buck, and a heifer 

 calf for which they lately refused 300 guineas from 

 Lady Pigot, are also out of her. So much for past 

 glories. It remains now for us, in the steady prosecu- 

 tion of our task of visiting the leading herds of England, 

 and reporting them without any regard to ideal prece- 

 dence, but just as they full in our way, to make our 

 first halt at Warlaby, and record what we saw there. 



ClIAl'TER II. 

 THE WARLABY HERD. 



The country between Killerby and Warlaby, which 

 lie about seven miles apart, is not much calculated to 

 interest a stranger to the North Riding ; and least of 

 all when he traverses it under the half-raw, half-wet 

 atmosphere of a January sky. The route lies through 

 Ainderby, famed in the annals of the " Stud Book " 

 as the place where the mighty Velocipede " com- 

 manded all Yorkshire " for two seasons, after his 

 faulty sinew had defied John Scott's art ; and the faded 

 sign, which still creaks over its public house door, shows 

 that the village were duly mindful of the honour of 

 his stay. The range of the Hambleton hills, where he 

 won his fatal trial against The Colonel, before the St. 

 Leger, rise bleak and bare on the left ; and when they 

 stand out, on a clear day, Warlaby seems, from the 

 distance, to nestle almost in a hollow beneath their 

 shade. A glimpse of Sir Samuel, arrayed in a hu;^e 

 anti-gate-opeuing head-gear, and grazing amid the 

 cows on the pasture of Banniston Hill, which looked 

 as green as if it was summer, first told us that, leaving 

 Velocipede's, we had reached the Crown Prince's 

 dominions at last; and two or three hundred yards 

 more, down a now leafless lane, brought us to Mr. 

 Booth's door. 



The Warlaby land lies close round the house, and 

 consists of 310 acres, about half of which is in tillage, 

 and half in pasture ; and ever since Mr. Booth came 

 there, he has had the luck wholly to escape the pleuro- 

 pneumonia, and to lose only one cow from the "mouth 

 and foot" disease. The latter was most fitful and stealthy 

 in its attack. Mr. Booth had no idea of it till a special 

 messenger arrived, post haste, at the Thirsk Show- 

 yard, a few hours after he had left home ; and 

 while the cows only separated by a lane from the in- 

 valids escaped altogether, it seized others full a quar- 

 ter of a mile away. The herd, including the bulls not 

 at home, consists at present of about eighty head ; and 

 from fifteen to twenty calves are dropped every year. 

 Mr. Booth had twenty-six bulls, of which sixteen were 

 by Crown Prince, out at hire last season, at all prices 

 from 100 gs. to 250 gs. ; and an eminent Yorkshire 

 breeder bid 300 gs. for Crown Prince in vain. Some 

 go at eleven months ; and the season now lasts for a 

 year, instead of nine months, as formerly. Tlio ex- 

 pense of their sending and return is shared between the 

 letter and the hirer ; and in spite of the perpetual 

 shiftings, very few accidents occur. Misfortune, how- 

 ever, vented itself on the renowned Buckingham, as he 



and his uttcndunt wore burnt to a cinder on the i^tcanl- 

 boat as they drew near to Ireland. The man whom 

 Mr. Barnes had sent specially to fetch him was last 

 seen holding on to the head of his bull, whose death- 

 bellow fairly echoed along the shore ; and although lie 

 was besought to leave him, he preferred to die at his 

 post. The Monk, by Leonidas, who goes back la 

 direct succession to the famous Halnaby, has not 

 revisited Warlaby for seven years. The Hon. Noel 

 Ilill had him for two seasons, and then he went to 

 Mr. Kearney's, of Ireland, for four more. Mr. Booth's 

 business with the sister-isle is by no means of recent 

 date, as he sent them bulls from his Studley Herd; 

 and at present Messrs. Barnes and Clialloner, of 

 Co. Meath, give him 250 gs. for Harbinger, who is 

 the ninth they have had from the two brothers in suc- 

 cession. Vanguard was away at Mr. Torr's for seven 

 seasons, as successor to Leonard and Baron Warlaby, 

 who spent five in those quarters; and Hopewell has 

 anived back from Aylesby, after a six-season absence, 

 four of which he spent in the " happy pastures" of 

 Meath, where he has left a host of Royal winners. 

 He was rejected, along with the whole of the bull 

 class, as being of " no merit," at the Norwich 

 Royal ; whereas one of his companions in the ring was 

 sold soon after for 150 gs., while he himself has pro- 

 duced about 1 ,000 gs. for seven seasons' hire. Royalty 

 is also among Mr. Booth's customers. The Prince 

 Consort hired Prince Alfred, in 1855—57, for his 

 Home Farm ; and then he crossed the Channel for a 

 season to the Emperor of the French, and Fitzclarence, 

 by Clarence, out of Nectarine Blossom, was installed 

 at Windsor in his stead. 



When we had learnt these details, the sun shone out 

 at last, and beckoned us into the pasture ; but we were 

 not to be denied one glance round the room, and hear- 

 ing a few words to the illustrious herd members, dead 

 and living, which lent life to its walls. Above the side- 

 board, on which rested the massive North Lancashire 

 Challenge Cups which they won at Burnley, for the 

 best female and male in the yard (Colonel Towneley, 

 the donor, declining to compete) hung Bridesmaid and 

 Windsor, and a small engraving of Faith, by Rasp- 

 berry, divides them. Slie might well hold the post of 

 honour, as, crossed with Leonard, she produced Hope ; 

 and from Hope and Buckingham came the renowned 

 Charity, who was never beaten, except as a calf, by one of 

 the same herd. Her greatest Royal triumph was when, 

 as a three-year old, in 1849, she was placed A 1 in the 

 cow class at Norwich ; and she bred her first calf, in 

 the shape of Crown Prince, that modern Comet of War- 

 laby. Mautalini, the winner of ten prizes, hangs on the 

 adjoining wall. From her sprang the twins Polka and 

 Pelerine ; and it is from the latter that Rose of Athel- 

 stane traces her descent, through Rose of Summer and 

 Rose of Autumn. 



The third oil-painting in the room is a large one of a 

 somewhat coarse roan bull, Navigator. He lived and 

 died in days when agricultural shows were quite in their 

 infancy; but he was the winner when Mr. Richard 

 Booth's uncle, Major Bower of VVelbam, (who sold Sir 



