THE STANWICK, OR ORIGINAL DUCHESS. 4! 



of the pure blood, begot any calves which denoted in their features 

 or color any other breed than the pure Short-horn. His stock had 

 capacious chests, prominent bosoms, thick, mossy coats, mellow skins, 

 with a great deal of fine flesh, spread equally over the whole carcass, 

 and were either red and white, yellow roans, or white."* 



It is said that in the year 1784, after coming into possession of 

 Hubback (or Fawcett's bull), Charles Colling picked up several good 

 cows, .among them some got by Fawcett's bull ; but one of the most 

 noted, as afterwards known in her descendants, was the " Stanwick 

 cow" (the original of the "Duchess" tribe), which in June, 1784, 

 was driven from the Stanwick estate of the Duke of Northumber- 

 land^ in Yorkshire, to be sold in the Darlington market, and Colling 

 being present when the cow was driven in, took an especial fancy to 

 her fair qualities, and bought her at the low price of ^13 ($65). 

 " She was a massive, short-legged beast, breast near the ground, a great 

 grower, with wide back, and of a beautiful yellowish-red flaked 

 color." J Colling called her Duchess. She was got by J. Brown's red 

 bull (97), and no further, pedigree of her was known. She was bred 

 to Hubback, and through the produce of that coupling descended 

 the since famous (through Mr. Bates' breeding on the female side) 

 " Duchess " tribe of Short-horns. 



During the two seasons that Charles Colling possessed Hubback 

 we may suppose that he made diligent use of him in his herd, but we 

 do not learn that the bull m*de a strong impression of his value, or he 

 would not so soon have parted with him. At all events, the merits of 

 his stock were not fully appreciated until some time after he had dis- 

 posed of him, and Colling had become in possession, through other 

 parties, of cows of his get anterior to his own use of the bull. 



* Thornton's Circular. 



t We have since heard it asserted that the u Stanwick " cow was not from the Stanwick estate, 

 but from the neighboring one of Aldbrough, also belonging to the Northumberland domain ; but 

 it matters little which of the farms produced the cow. She was of the Northumberland Short- 

 horn blood, unquestionably. 



% Mr. Bates. 



The Stanwick estate was said to have then been in the occupancy of Earl Percy, a son of Sir 

 Hugh Smithson, before related as being raised to the peerage with the title of Duke of North- 

 umberland, under the Percy succession. This Earl Percy held a commission in the British army, 

 and was one of the party who attacked the American Provincial troops at Lexington, Mass., in 

 qhe beginning of our Revolutionary War, and was for some years absent from home. He after- 

 wards succeeded his father to the estates and title of second Duke of Northumberland. The 

 late Mr. Smithson, of England, who bequeathed the generous donation of $500,000 to found our 

 National "Smithsonian Institution," at Washington, was a natural son of that second Duke of 

 Northumberland, and grandson to Sir Hugh Smithson, the first Duke, previously mentioned. In 

 his inimitable poem, u Alnwick Castle," our American Halleck alludes to Earl Percy, as having 



" Fought for King George at Lexington, 

 A major of dragoons." 



