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THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



which Mr. Quartly picked from his herd for Mr. Farqu- 

 harson at nineteen months each, and found in due time 

 at the head of their Christmas class, one at each place, 

 in the self-same year. 



We had cast one look from the garden plateau over 

 the busy water-meadow beneath, and the windings of 

 MoUand Wood, and then following Mr. Quartly and 

 his one-armed herdsman, whose hook never cools in its 

 labours, we were introduced to Napoleon's two sons, 

 King of the Bretons and Lord of Kerry, which were 

 first and second in the yearling class at Canterbury. 

 Writers had sneered at the whole of the Devon classes 

 there, as gradually approaching the vanishing point in 

 size ; and Mr. Quartly had not scrupled to accept the 

 sneer in its integrity, and christen his bulls in keeping 

 with it. " The King" is from Milkmaid, and " The 

 Lord" from Primrose, both of the Curly family ; and 

 it is remarkable that while the Devonshire men at Can- 

 terbury held with the winner, the Somersetshire breeders, 

 with the exception of Mr. Hole, should have given the 

 first prize to ''The Lord." "The King" is a more 

 stylish-looking animal than " The Lord," who carries 

 a great amount of flesh, has enormous substance, and 

 remarkably fine rumps, and is very deep in his flanks. 

 There was, however, a Devonshire demurrer to his 

 head, which has the horns set on a little too much back. 

 He has gone to Mr. Palmer's, of Stoke Climsland, in 

 Cornwall, to take the place of Warrior (half-brother to 

 " The King," and winner of the senior bull prize at 

 Canterbury), who returns forthwith to Molland. The 

 latter is to be crossed with Napoleon heifers, with a 

 view to improving the fore-quarters, which constituted 

 the greatest fault in their sire. 



A walk down an ash-shaded lane, brought us to Church 

 Close, where the cows of the herd mustered nineteen 

 strong. Out of these, a dozen were never in a show-yard, 

 and the other seven were all first or second Royal winners. 

 Graceful and Sylph, as they lay together, invited a gentle 

 kick-up, that they might fight their Salisbury battle 

 over again, which Graceful's quality decided in her 

 favour. The Bath and West of England also gave her 

 a first as an in-calf heifer, but Mr. Turner beat her at 

 Lincoln, with one by Earl of Exeter. There, too, was 

 Graceful's daughter Gaiety, the smutty-faced Honey- 

 moon (1403), who is not breeding, Dolly Varden (142)— 

 herself the second yearling heifer at Exeter, and dam of 

 the second yearling heifer at Carlisle, and the first 

 in-calf heifer at Chelmsford— Duchess of Chester (1299)> 

 whose coronet was not given her for nothing- and 

 Stately (1058), who has lost two out of her four calves, 

 since she headed the Royal in-calf heifers in '55, 

 and the cow-class in '56. The dappled Hebe (769), who 

 is only one cross off from the Picture family, had a fine 

 head and hind-quarters, which no one could overlook 

 in a crowd. Curly (1248), and Colly (1222), never left 

 that pleasant valley on the slippery paths of show-yard 

 ambition ; but Primrose (977) (granddaughter to Pretty 

 Maid, grandniece to Hundred Guinea), was first 



yearling heifer at the Gloucester Royal; and Bertha 

 (1179), the granddaughter of Beauty (21) (who took a 

 first prize at the Exeter Royal), came back with her own 

 first from the Canterbury cow-class, beating Turner's 

 Vaudine for the head prize, as Duchess of Chester had 

 done both at Chester and Warwick. If Sylph (434) 

 had no such honour to boast, she had the domestic 

 triumph of being the grandam of a Salisbury first-prize 

 winner from Lily (1446) when she was only four-and- 

 a-half. Twenty- five yearling heifers and steers in one 

 field, with Stateley's and Graceful's and Sylph's 

 among them, and nearly all by Napoleon, formed 

 another strong instalment of the herd, which at 

 present can count about eighty. Mr. Quartly con- 

 siders it a poor year that does not bring its 

 twenty calves, but during the seven that he used 

 Napoleon, his chances were, for two seasons in succes- 

 sion, very seriously jeopardised. Sure as this bull was 

 at the beginning and end of the season, he was quite 

 fallow for three months in the middle of it, and then 

 eight calves dated from one forenoon. Still, he has 

 fully earned his right to be regarded as the very Touch- 

 stone of Devonshire stock, and latterly gave no audiences 

 under five guineas. He will be nine years old this 

 grass, and has improved, like wine, with age, as the 

 only fifteen of his calves shown took first prizes last 

 year, and Mr. Mogridge's famous prize-heifer was his 

 great granddaughter, through Duke of Sussex (406). 

 This feat is a worthy parallel to the Warwick Royal one, 

 when fifteen out of the seventeen Devon prizes fell to 

 the Quartly blood. Napoleon was a most distinguished 

 member of the prize-ring in his day, and if the judges at 

 the Lincoln Royal once placed him in the yearling class 

 below the rank he held at the Bath and West of England, 

 he regained his premier honours next year, in the castle 

 meadows at " Merrie Carlisle." It is not Mr. James 

 Quartly's intention to exhibit at Leeds this year. Sylph, 

 Duchess of Chester, Primrose, Gaiety, and Placid have 

 all had bull-calves since our visit, principally by the 

 Duke of Chester and Napoleon; and Colly, Bertha, 

 Famous, and Topsy have swelled the heifer list. 

 Graceful has, we regret to say, lost her Napoleon heifer, 

 and Hebe, Milkmaid, Stately, &c., have still to calve. 



The aforesaid lane of ashes, which are most frequently 

 converted into hurdles, joins the farm of James Quartly 

 with that of his brother John's at Great Champson, and 

 thither we rode once more, to pause for a few minutes 

 among the relics of the herd in the Mead Park. Nearly 

 all the three dozen had gone to their new homes, except 

 the massive Brown (1196) from Beauty (29). Seventeen 

 females of all ages were left, and although Pretty Maid 

 (367) (the dam of the Duke of Chester), which had 

 slipped and broken two of her pelvis bones, has since 

 died, two heifer and two bull calves from Pink, Hand- 

 some, Playful, and Lovely (all four Royal winners), and 

 a heifer calf from Florence have duly arrived, so that 

 with King of the Bretons and Warrior handy at Molland, 

 the Great Champson herd runs no risk of being vriped out. 



