Part 54
What can be more beautiful than the open glade, carpeted with the brown leaves of the late autumn, the dark glossy holly leaves and the tall grey columns?
Commercially, too, when in quantity and well grown, it is universally valuable; and the quantity which an acre, well stocked, will produce is very great.
The tree, though the fact is questioned by many old writers, is doubtless indigenous, though not confined to these small islands; for it is found throughout Middle and Southern Europe, Western Asia, and elsewhere.
The beech belongs to the natural order _Amentaceæ_, or _Cupuliferæ_, as some prefer to call it, and to the genus _Fagus_. It is monœcious, leaves simple and deciduous, and its fruit is known as mast. From the mast, or nut, may be extracted a valuable oil, used for culinary purposes, and also a flour or meal, used in some countries as food for man. In this country it is used only as pig food, and it is from this that the term “masting” is derived.
The leaves, enormous in quantity, decay rapidly, and soon become incorporated in the soil, thus providing the food which the tree requires. Beneath this natural carpet the seeds lie, and with the admission of light and air, soon grow and develop. There is no British tree which lends itself so completely to natural reproduction; neither can any artificially planted beech compare with these natural offspring for rapid growth and quality of timber.
It is not necessary to point out to the owners of beech estates the importance of managing the natural thicket from infancy to maturity, because such is known already and recognised; and if an example of sound British forestry be wanted, it is to these areas we should turn. Nevertheless, there are many estates with few or no beeches growing upon them which are naturally suitable to their full development.
Under these conditions it is necessary to resort to artificial stocking, and here lies the difficulty, for the beech is by no means a tree which lends itself to rapid establishment. Whether such is best performed by the sowing of seed, planting of seedlings, or of nursery trees of more advanced age, is a question for foresters. Again, is it well to plant pure and close together, or to plant with Scots pine, larch, or other trees? Opinions vary, and no decisive advice seems requisite.
As a natural seedling the beech will find its way through almost any tangle and force its way to the light, hindered only by the thick canopy of the parent, but as a transplant its vigour is defective.
The beech may be divided into two classes—the beautiful wide-spreading tree of the park, with its branches sweeping the sward; and the tall, straight column, topped with a canopy of lovely green—branchless for, perhaps, fifty feet and more.
It is to the latter that the merchant looks for his supply of timber, and to which the owner looks for his revenue. The former, through its charm, lends to the estate a value by no means inconsiderable; but the latter, under favourable conditions, yields so regular a return that it may be reduced to a yearly revenue. Under proper management there should be a continual cutting and a continuous and progressive growth: there should be no periods of vacancy.
If some of the schemes for the planting of waste lands—many of them wild and impractical—should reach ripeness, it is to be hoped the beech will be planted on soils suitable to its development—and these are calcareous loams resting on a rocky bottom—because there is likely to be a demand at a fair price, this class of timber not being much affected by foreign imports.
Beech reaches a useful and commercial value in from forty to sixty years when growing naturally close together, and under proper and judicious thinning; but if such be left until decay sets in, the value per cubic foot is greatly diminished. Trees will, of course, live and grow for a much longer period; but after, say, eighty years, it is doubtful economy to let them stand.
Another feature in the beech is that when decay once sets in it is rapid in its progress, and the tree dies as a whole. The oak will live for centuries in a decayed and dying condition, but not so the beech; and it is only when the timber is sound that the best price can be obtained. It is, too, a timber which soon stains if exposed, so that conversion should follow cutting.
What is necessary for the successful growing of beech may be summed up in a few words: A suitable soil, close contact, felling when commercially ripe, and speedy conversion.
C. E. CURTIS.
The Hermit Family
Greater excitement was never noticeable on Epsom Downs than on May 22nd, 1867. The public had gone dead for the Two Thousand winner, Vauban. He had won the Newmarket race in great style by two lengths, and he belonged to the popular Duke of Beaufort. Every third man you met declared for Vauban, and in the enormous field of thirty the son of Muscovite was backed down to 6 to 4. The ring naturally fielded heavily, and there were stout partisans of Sir Joseph Hawley’s stable, as the Kentish baronet was known to be exceedingly fond of The Palmer. There was also a strong party behind Van Amburgh, and those who invariably followed the boy in yellow stood Marksman. If he could quite stay home was the question about The Rake, who had broken a blood-vessel, as also had Hermit. But it was altogether a magnificent collection of horses on the Derby day, and amongst others there was the handsome d’Estoarnel, the shapely Julius, the useful Uncas, and the light-coloured bay from France, Dragon.
It was a tremendous race as they swept round Tattenham Corner; Vauban, Van Amburgh, Marksman, The Palmer, and Hermit were all in it, and shouts in turn proclaimed Van Amburgh and Vauban as the winner by the time they had reached the Bell, when Grimshaw brought out Marksman with a rush. He would win, or he would not; a pink jacket was creeping on him; it was Hermit. The race was a terrible one, but Johnny Daley had timed his effort to a hair’s breadth, and the verdict was by a neck. Owing to the breaking of a blood-vessel ten days before, Hermit’s starting price was 1,000 to 15; Mr. H. Chaplin, it was said, taking £100,000 out of the ring, and that the Marquis of Hastings had lost as much; but figures may have been exaggerated in the excitement of the time, and, at any rate, it was a most popular victory. The great Middle Park Stud was a gainer by it, as it had bred both Hermit and Marksman, the Squire of Blankney expending 1,000 gs. for the possession of the former in his yearling days. Mr. Chaplin has been heard to say that Hermit was his best friend, as, besides the Derby _coup_, he bred him some great winners, made the Blankney Stud, and became the greatest sire of his day.
The writer had a close inspection of Hermit in the winter of 1873, when he had been at the stud some three or four years, and a good two-year-old was much talked of by him in the Rev. Mr. King’s Holy Friar, only beaten once in his seven attempts, and thought to be about the smartest of the season. There was also the speedy Trappist, Per-se, Brenda, St. Agatha and Maravella to give early promise of his stock, and from that time he never looked back. A very impressive horse was Hermit. Perhaps I was rather more taken with Rosicrucian the year before, but that was in June, and the glorious little brown had his summer coat on. When I looked over Hermit it was the end of December, and so there was scarcely the same brightness apparent. He looked then a ruddy chesnut, with no white bar or small streak down his face. A model in head, shoulders, back and loins, and his quarters were very remarkable, so full and thick, and coming down to a noticeable second thigh. This gave him, perhaps, the cobby appearance he had, and made him look smaller than he really was. One would not have thought him more than 15.2, but I believe he was always reckoned to be 15.3. Very beautiful he was, his outline quite perfect, and so blood-like.
His advancement in fame was very rapid, as by the time he was eleven years old he stood very high indeed in the list of winning stallions, and he became absolutely at the head a few years later, and then for several seasons in succession. His son Trappist was considered the speediest of his day until “aged” was appended to his name; and then there was Peter, Devotee, Hermia, Out of Bounds, Trapper, Remorse, and St. Hilda, all of one year, with Charon running as a four-year-old, when he won the Brighton Cup as if he was one of the stoutest horses in England.
That classic races would quickly follow the Blankney champion’s other stud successes was certain enough, and his batch of 1878, when he was just fifteen, brought him into this distinguished order, as the Duchess of Montrose’s Devotion, a daughter of Stockwell’s, seemed to hit exactly with Hermit. Her third produce was by him, foaled in 1878, and as Thebais was destined to win the One Thousand and Oaks of 1881, being unquestionably the best filly of her year. There was then quite a spell of great doings to the credit of the Hermit family, as in 1879 were foaled his daughters Shotover and St. Marguerite, who between them took the Two Thousand, One Thousand and the Derby. A singularly fine mare was Shotover, bred by Mr. Chaplin, and the style in which she won the Derby under Tom Cannon made her a worthy successor in honours to Eleanor and Blink Bonny. St. Marguerite, who beat Shotover in the One Thousand, was still more beautiful. In the Plantation at Newmarket, when saddling for her first race, someone said, “What a beautiful filly!” and Mr. Chaplin replied, “That does not describe her. Has anyone ever seen anything more perfect?”
To follow up the series of great successes, there was dropped, in 1880, a colt afterwards known as St. Blaise, and he was the winner of the Derby in 1883. Another Oaks winner was seen two years afterwards in Lonely, and soon afterwards granddaughters of Hermit swelled the classic rank, as, in 1888, Seabreeze, daughter of St. Marguerite, won the Oaks and St. Leger, and the following season L’Abbesse de Jouarre, a daughter of Trappist, was the heroine of the ladies’ race. Other great winners by Hermit, and their descendants again, have been almost legion. There was Timothy, winner of the Ascot Cup and Alexandra Plate in 1888; Gay Hermit the Royal Hunt Cup in 1887; and Peter ditto seven years before; St. Helena, second in the Oaks to Lonely, and winner of the Coronation Stakes at Ascot; Philosophy, winner of the Great Whitsuntide Plate at Manchester, and many other valuable races; Friar’s Balsam, probably the best of his day; with Marden, Nautilus, Gordon, Raffaello, Ste-Alvere, Grey Friars, Tristan, Queen Adelaide, Melanion, Whisperer, and really a host of others too numerous to mention.
It is in subsequent generations, though, that the greatness of Hermit has been so solid and remarkable. There is all the Devotion family, the Sailor Prince family, through the mare Hermita by Hermit. This is largely distributed through America, and there has been a return of it into this country—the Amphion family, through Suicide by Hermit; the Gallinules, including Pretty Polly, through Moorhen by Hermit; the Marco line through Novitiate, the Orion branch through Shotover, the Solimans through Albeche, the Father Confessors through the Abbot, the coming produce of Black Sand, the Cesarewitch winner of 1902, and a very likely sire, by Melanion, son of Hermit; the very numerous descents through the daughters of Peter; and then there has been Mark, Torpedo, Retreat, Whitehall, Zealot, Swillington, Southampton and Exile II. In sons there is now, naturally, a dearth, as the old horse has been dead seventeen years, and I have regretted that one of his youngest, Baron Rothschild’s Heaume, died much too early, as he was a beautiful horse, a shade bigger than his sire, but made like him, and in his action the same. It was a pity also that Melanion left these shores when quite in his prime, but still there was much usefulness in many that escaped the foreign buyer. His son Exile II., for instance, got a better horse than himself in Aborigine, the winner of the Ascot Stakes and the Alexandra Plate at the same meeting. The Turf has shown, in fact, that the next generation in male tail has possessed, if anything, more stamina than the immediate sons of Hermit, as, besides Aborigine being stouter than his sire Exile II., there has been Black Sand stouter than Melanion, and Whitefeather a better stayer than Retreat; whilst in the case of Piety, who was out of a Hermit mare, there was possibly nearly the greatest glutton over a distance of all times.
So much, though, for the Turf proper, but there is another arena in which Hermit’s name will be honoured for ever. Many by the Blankney chesnut were very good jumpers and cross-country performers of considerable ability, but with his fee at 250 guineas for many years his offspring were rather too expensive for the jumping game generally. However, such names as Bridget, second in the great hurdle race at Kempton, Anchorite, Stylites, Spinster and Xavier recur to one’s memory, and Mr. J. C. Hill and Mr. Brockton will still declare that there was no safer conveyance over a country than Moorhen. It was through his sons in the next generation, though, that this particular excellence came out, as the best part of Retreat’s stock were his jumpers, if one excepts Alice, a great mare over a distance of ground, and perhaps Whitefeather. There was no greater honour taker though than Father O’Flynn, the gallant winner of the Grand National in 1892, under the popular Captain “Roddy” Owen. At that time also there were four or five first-class steeplechasers by Retreat. One of Hermit’s first sons must have been Ascetic, as he was foaled in 1871, and was out of Lady Alicia, a Melbourne mare, at the time nineteen years old. She had produced a few to run, such as Rapparee, winner of an Ascot Stakes, Ratcatcher, Ribbon, and Ratcatcher’s Daughter. She could run a bit herself, too, among other performances winning the Champagne Stakes at Stockbridge (Bibury Club) as a two-year-old, it being a notable race, as she won by a short head from Saucebox, the winner of the St. Leger in the following year, and Lambs wool, who ran a dead-heat with Saucebox, whilst the fourth, Redemption, was not beaten more than a neck. Lady Alicia also won a race at Egham as a three-year-old. She was a very fine bred mare by Melbourne out of Testy by Venison, her dam Temper by defence, and dropped at the Causton Paddocks; she first of all belonged to Lord John Scott. When turned out of training Mr. W. H. Brook had her for four or five years, and sold her to the Rev. Mr. King (or Mr. Launde, to speak of him in his racing name). This accounts for her being allied to Hermit in her old age, as Mr. King’s well-known establishment was not far from Blankney. The owner of Apology had, therefore, the honour of breeding Ascetic, but he does not appear to have kept him very long, as he was brought out as a two-year-old at Newmarket by a Mr. T. Smith, running but moderately in the Exning Plate at the second spring meeting. This was his only performance in public as a two-year-old, and he was brought out three times the year following, but without gaining any success. He was regarded, however, with a certain amount of respect, as his weight in the Lincolnshire Handicap was 6 st. 12 lb., the winner, The Gunner, also four years old, carrying 6 st. Then he ran in the Stewards’ Cup at Goodwood at 7 st. 4 lb., and also in the Chesterfield Cup at 7 st. 1 lb. He was second in the Champagne Stakes at Brighton, six furlongs, beaten by the Master Fenton filly; with eight others behind him. He ran third also in the Newal Stakes at Lewes, but in all, his performances were nothing remarkable, excepting to show that he was the sort of racehorse that so frequently develops into the high-class sire to get the best of steeplechasers and hunters. Victor’s best distance was thought to be a mile, and under a very light weight, 5 st. 13 lb., as a four-year-old, he spread-eagled a large field for the Royal Hunt Cup at Ascot. Ascetic was thought best of for the six furlongs in the Stewards Cup at Goodwood and about his best race was over the easy six furlongs at Brighton. The sharp quick horse to be into his bridle in a moment, as the saying goes, seems to be the most likely horse to get jumpers.
In due course the clever Irish breeders secured Ascetic, and for a great number of years his home was at Mr. John M. Purdon’s, Cloneymore, Athboy, co. Meath. From this quarter he proved himself to be a second Victor, or even more, as the latter never got a Grand National winner, and four of these events have been credited to sons of Ascetic. Those who have looked over Cloister will have retained the impression, as I have done, that he was one of the grandest hunters ever seen. I saw him take one of his victories at Aintree, but it was not the most important, as he won, or was placed eight times over the course, and it was in the autumn, when he won the Sefton, that I saw him. Standing over 16 hands, with tremendous power everywhere, wonderful in front of the saddle, with quite Leicestershire shoulders, and immense depth through the girth. Had he a lean loin, or was it that his back ribs and big quarters made it look light? I thought him one of the best-looking horses I had ever seen, and what a performer! His second victory in the Grand National was certainly the greatest performance ever heard of, as, against a good field he galloped everything down when carrying 12 st. 7 lb., giving the second horse, who finished forty lengths off, 31 lbs. To have got a dual winner of the Grand National is a great boast, but Ascetic has done a deal more. In 1903 there was another Grand National hero to take the posthumous honour for Ascetic, and a very great horse, no doubt, is Mr. John Morrison’s Drumcree; there being this to note also in his victory, that he beat, amongst others, a grandson of Ascetic’s in Drumcree by Royal Meath, one of the most beautiful of Ascetic’s sons, and a brilliant performer over a country. This year comes more honour to the memory of Ascetic (the old horse died in August, 1897), as Ascetic’s Silver won his Grand National in quite the Cloister style, and the third Aunt May was a daughter. Then there has been Roman Oak who did about everything but win a Grand National, Royal Meath, West Meath, Breemont Oak, Æsthetic, Hermit, Midnight, Noiseless, Leinster, Fairland, winner of the Great Lancashire Steeplechase, Hidden Mystery, Aunt May, Nickel Jack, and a host of others to make up over a hundred steeplechase winners, so it is said.
There are other Hermit sires that have had this extraordinary gift of getting jumpers, though perhaps in less degrees. Cassock got some very good ones, and so has St. Honorat, Nautilus, Bookworm, Bold Marshall, Edward the Confessor, The Abbot, Hawkstone, and Peter, but Ascetic and Retreat brought in the Grand National records. It must not be forgotten, also, that the hunters by the sons of Hermit have been quite unique. If any one enquires about Birdsall or Malton, as to how the best hunters have been bred of late in Yorkshire, they will hear nothing but praise of the Gordons, and the Whisperers, Marks and Homilies have all done their meed of good in hunting quarters. It would seem that Hermit’s mission in life was to create an extraordinary family to be the very mainstay of sport in every branch that has anything at all to do with horses. It is estimated that three millions have been won by Hermit and his descendants, and yet it is barely forty years since the scene at Epsom was enacted. One recalls the suspense and excitement of the crowd, the yellow in apparent command; then like a flash there is a pink streak, as it were, closing, and the little interval, scarcely perceptible to any but the judge, has made all the difference. Other Derbies have followed in its wake—Ascot Cups, Goodwood Cups, many Oaks, St. Legers, Alexandra Plates and Grand Nationals, have shaken the very sporting world in widespread interest, and the thread of it all is from Hermit.
G. S. LOWE.
Sport at the Universities.
So far Cambridge leads in the great fight for all-round sporting supremacy this year. Twelve Inter-’Varsity competitions have been already decided, Cambridge boasting seven victories, and Oxford five. Ten contests were brought off during Lent Term, just past, and during that period honours were “easy.” Both Universities won five events. The Light Blues started well by winning the Association football and hockey matches during February. Oxford, however, were unfortunate in losing several of their best men either at the eleventh hour or during the actual fray. But for bad mishaps to O. T. Norris (the Oxford captain) and other Dark Blues, Cambridge would hardly have won the “Soccer” match by 3 goals to 1. They would probably have won the hockey match in any case, yet the enforced absence of Messrs. Round and Butterworth made all the difference to Oxford’s play. At boxing and fencing and billiards Oxford asserted superiority early in March. In the first-named competition their victory was most pronounced (7 events to 1), and some really fine science was shown both with the gloves and the foils. Although played at Cambridge, the Dark Blues repeated their 1905 billiards triumph by 2 games to 1, but shortly afterwards Cambridge beat their rivals somewhat easily at lacrosse by 10 goals to 3.