THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



373 



perieuce, to proclaim him quite equul to the First llub- 

 back ; but the author of the " Herd Book" was not a 

 man to speak against his convictions, and not one step 

 would he stir. 



In the following year, Mr. Kates saw the merits of 

 the Princess or St. Albans tribe (who had recovered the 

 quality which Jupiter lost), so keenly at Mason's sale, 

 that he determined, if possible, to get his new cross 

 from it. At that time St. Albans, who went direct to 

 Favourite and Hubback, missing the dreaded Punch, was 

 about fifteen years old, and he had been let for three 

 years into Northumberland. Mason had got him in a 

 sly way at first for £20, through a butcher, whom he 

 sent as his agent ; and when Mr. Wood was at Chilton 

 three years after, and only caught a glimpse of his head, 

 he exclaimed " Why there's my old Prince ; he 

 toas bought to kill ;" and sure enough it was Prince^ but 

 cannonized in life as '' St. Albans !" 



How to bring about his long-cherished combination 

 of the Princess of Barmpton, and the Duchess of 

 Ketton blood, was now the problem which puzzled the 

 lord of Kirkleavinglon, and which Belvedere so happily 

 solved. Oddly enough, this bull had been living only 

 ten miles off" him, and for two long years his friend 

 Mr. Atkinson Greenwell had urged him to go and look 

 at him. One day he did condescend to drive over, and 

 strange as the coincidence may seem, the moment he in 

 his turn only glanced at his head through a square hole, 

 he knew that it was the blood he was seeking ; and he 

 said to himself, " Thoti art mine if money 'II b%iyL 

 thee." And buy him he did, then and there, for ^^50, 

 which he drew in notes from his pocket, and permission to 

 " send cows to the bull while he lives." The man 

 demurred when the money was paid, and said rather 

 sorrowfully to a friend afterwards, " / might as well 

 have had a hundred from Tommy Bates; he was so 

 very keen of him," 



The Waterloo and Wild Eyes were fresh additions 

 about the era of Belvedere, from whose cross with 

 Red Rose 9th came Cambridge Rose 1st ; and so well 

 did it nick, that Belvedere was put on her in turn. At 

 the sale, however, this tribe was reduced to Cambridge 

 Rose 5th, and her two calves by Third Duke of York. 

 The 6 th is still to remain as a memento at Cobham, 

 where she has so well kept up the line in female tail ; 

 while the 7th just took the opposite line in Mr. 

 Bolden's herd. The great triumph of Belvedere was 

 still to come from another cross with his own daughter. 

 Duchess (34), who beat Necklace at York. She had 

 broken her fore-leg, and Mr. Bates was within an ace of 

 selling her to the Americans, but luckily Mr. Whitaker 

 got him off it ; and she lived to produce the Duke of 

 Northumberland, a few months after. With the ex- 

 ception of this mighty roan, she never bred any but 

 red and whites, and Mr. Bates was determined to try 

 the eftect of a third Belvedere cross with his prize 

 yearling at Oxford, who was own sister to the Duke of 

 Northumberland, if she had not been prematurely choked 

 with a turnip. To the eye of a well-known authority on 

 these matters, " Duhe" looked a very delicate calf at five 

 months ; but his owner, strong in the faith of the double 



Favourite cross in Comet, which he had here striven to 

 emulate, drew himself proudly up, and said, "Well/ 

 Sir, I have the greatest hopes of him." After all his 

 honours, he came to no very glorious end, as he had 

 been kept low for the purpose of being put on Cleve- 

 land Lad's stock, and he died fairly maw-bound from 

 the effects of some mouldy hay ; leaving the 2nd Duko, 

 of Oxford as the inheritor of his honours. 



The Oxford tribe sprung from a cow by Matchem, 

 supposed by St. Albans, whom Mr. Bates accidentally 

 bought after Mason's sale. He did not admire his 

 choice, and when she had bred a calf to Duke of Cleve- 

 land, who ripened into the Oxford premium cow, she 

 was packed ofF to Darlington. Mr. Bates's lucky star 

 was in the ascendant that market day, as no one would 

 bid within i,'2 of the .£11, which he had set on her, 

 and she afterwards calved Cleveland Lad, Cleveland 2nd 

 (the sire of Grand Duke), and Oxford 2nd, all to Short- 

 tail by Belvedere. Her Oxford premium cow was 

 deficient in girth and gaudy behind, and in fact her 

 owner was so ashamed of her in that point, that 

 when she was beaten by Bracelet at Berwick, he hung 

 not "a calf-skin" but a horse rug " on those recreant 

 limbs," and vowed he would show her no more. Failure 

 as she might be, there was no mistake as to the cross 

 between the Duke of Northumberland and her half- 

 sister Oxford 2nd, resulting as it did in that fine bull, 

 2nd Duke of Oxford, who was put on the Duchess tribe, 

 and got five out of the eight plums on the Kirkleavington 

 day. 



Mr. Bates had two very favourite maxims — one that 

 he " could find forty men fit to be a Premier, for one fit 

 to judge Shorthorns;" and the other that there was 

 " no place for Shorthorns, like the Valley of the 

 Wharfe." The late Mr. Whitaker, and Mr. Fawkes, of 

 Farnley, have proved this to the full ; but it was left to 

 Captain Gunter to found a second Kirkleavington on 

 its banks, and to vow that eternal allegiance to the 

 Duchesses and the Oxfords which their great founder had 

 done. His Wetherby Grange estate is well adapted 

 for its new colony, which moved there in the August of 

 1857, from Earl's Court near Kensington. It consists 

 of 600 acres on both sides of the river, 400 of which 

 are kept in grass. The house once belonged to " Kit 

 Wilson," the owner of Comus and the father of the 

 Turf, and some of his horses were trained in the Park. 

 Woods, sacred, in the terms of the time-honoured toast, 

 to " The Bramham Moor and 25 couple," flank it on 

 one side, and overhang the river as it steals along to- 

 wards Thorp Arch ; and the Captain was just returning 

 in his pink, from " the run of the season," as we en- 

 tered the foldyard with his steward, Mr. Knowles. 



It was at Tortworth that the latter confirmed the 

 rich experience he had gained under Mr. Thomas Mason 

 at Broughton, anditwas thence that hegathered the germs 

 of that herd which he has so ably helped to found for his 

 new master. Tortworth, on August 24th 1853, was a veri- 

 table Bunker's Hill removed. England was pitted against 

 America once more — the guineas of the old country 

 against the "almighty dollars" of the new. Messrs. 

 Morris and Becar bid by their agent ; but Mr. Thorne 

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