A regular in the sheep lines at the Royal Show was Araminta Aldington, founder of the Jacob Sheep Society. Araminta lives, breathes, dreams, sleeps, shears, feeds, doses and eats her sheep. Her clothes are made from their fleece and it is sometimes hard to tell the shepherdess from her flock. There she would be in her caravan, talking to visitors who had never heard of Jacobs. A flock have run in the park at Chatsworth since they were first documented in 1762 and when Araminta asked me to join the Society, I happily accepted. The breed had always been of interest to a few owners but until Araminta took charge of the Society they were just park ornaments. With her at the helm, I knew it would do well but I had no idea just how successful it would become and how the quality of sheep would improve; Jacobs have long since been erased from the Rare Breeds list. In 1971 I was invited to be the Society’s first president. Our inaugural meeting was held in a room in the old Farmers’ Union building in Knightsbridge. A group of ‘fanciers’ were shuffling around, uncertain quite where to sit and what to do, when the door opened, a man put his head in and said, ‘Are you Watercress?’
Poultry has been important to me since childhood. I thought there should be something alive in the garden at Chatsworth and hens were the answer. Stately Buff Cochins waddled around the greenhouses and when threatened by visiting dogs and toddlers crept under the branches of the yew trees that trailed to the ground. The legs of Buff Cochins are feathered down to the feet and they do not like getting wet, so the flower beds were spared their scratching. They were free to go wherever they liked and must have been the most photographed poultry in the British Isles. Meanwhile more and more pens went up to house various rare breeds of chicken.
I realized that the game larder, rejected as the site for a restaurant, would be a handy place to keep a flock of commercial hens. The feeding of the game larder hens was a daily entertainment for the visitors. Sometimes some of their children helped me to collect the eggs and it was a required expedition for my own grandchildren, who called it ‘The Granny Show’. The new flock had 1,000 acres of park at their disposal but soon congregated around the visitors’ cars, having discovered that the occupants were apt to bring picnics. They became increasingly tame with the car-borne humans, snatching sandwiches and hopping into the cars in the hopes of finding the source of the picnics. All was well until twenty of my dear ones got into a school bus, to the delight of the children. They were not noticed by the staff until they had reached the other side of the bridge, when a teacher shooed them out, expecting them to find their own way home. A fox came in daylight and murdered for fun, as these serial destroyers do. The corpses were photographed, mostly headless with feathers all over the place. I hung the photos in the Farmyard to show the children the nature of this random killer.
The eggs went to the Chatsworth Farm Shop and sold out as soon as they arrived. A television camera came. ‘What do you feed them on?’ the interviewer asked. ‘Pellets, wheat, maize and kitchen scraps,’ I said. The next day a fellow turned up, the double of Hodges, the ARP Warden in Dad’s Army: ‘Is it true you give your hens kitchen scraps?’ he asked me. ‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘Well, it’s against the law and you must stop at once,’ he said. ‘Don’t you think that the food we eat is good enough for them?’ I ventured. He went off, muttering, ‘Next time . . .’ which I suppose meant prison.
I still have a varied flock: Welsummers and enigmatic Burford Browns for their dark brown eggs; pretty, shy, idiotic Light Sussex; even stupider White Leghorns who dash around on long yellow legs; and neat, clever, sociable little Warrens. My Warrens do not know their luck – they had been destined for an intensive poultry farm. The pecking order rules among the flock: there is a general, some colonels, captains galore, and private soldiers who get out of the way of their superiors at feeding time. The carry-on of this all-female cast is as good as a play and, like a play, is repeated, word for word, gesture for gesture, every day – with the odd matinee thrown in. (Alan Bennett and Tom Stoppard please note: you are welcome to come any day for copy.)
Border Collies are said to be the cleverest dogs in the world and mine was certainly the cleverest dog I ever had. His mother belonged to a Chatsworth shepherd and he was born in a shed at Dunsa, the farm buildings nearest to Edensor. The puppies in the litter were all spoken for except one and the shepherd agreed to let me have him. I soon understood that Collies are different from other breeds. They yearn to work but not all come up to the necessary standard to be of use to shepherds. I realized that I needed lessons before I could co-operate with Collie (his name as well as his breed). My tutor was Chris Furness, trainer of many winners at sheepdog trials. Chris came to give me one-to-one tutorials (or one-to-two in this case) but it was soon evident that I was more in need of teaching than my dog.
The first lesson showed the strength of instinct in a Collie, whose ancestors have been bred to work sheep for generations. We were in a paddock with thirty ewes. Collie was getting excited and was eyeing the sheep in a threatening way so I had him on a lead. ‘Let him go,’ said Chris. Heart in mouth, I did as I was told and off to my right went Collie. He knew to get behind the sheep and obeyed my shout of ‘Lie Down’ (which we had already practised in the sheep-free garden at Chatsworth). The ewes trotted past us and Collie stayed prone, watching their every move. His behaviour during that first lesson gave me confidence and we went on practising the orders, ‘Come Bye’ (for go to the right) and ‘Away’ (for go to the left). I never mastered the whistle with two fingers stuck in the mouth, so I cheated and bought a little metal one. I lived in terror of swallowing it but never dared say so. The rapport between handler and dog is uncanny and after a while Collie often anticipated the command I was about to give. The tone of voice is enough to tell the dog when he has overstepped the mark; I was not immediately forgiven when I ticked off the headstrong but touchy workman and Collie sulked.
When the International Sheepdog Trials were held in the park at Chatsworth, I took Collie to watch. The poor dog sat intently, paws on the chair in front, so longing to join in that I had to wind his lead round and round my hand to hold him. He hated the clapping (sheepdogs’ ears are super-sensitive and can hear commands and whistles over long distances) and he did not appreciate the stands full of onlookers, friends and relations of the competitors, to whom the outcome meant so much. Collie and I never became proficient enough to enter a trial, but we had fun at home. I was sitting in my car in a stationary queue one day, waiting to cross the bridge in front of Chatsworth. Visitors are polite to the cattle and sheep that get in their way on the drive and I realized that there were some sheep standing in front of us. They could not go forwards because of the fence and cattle grid, and would not turn back because there were pedestrians on the bridge. I got out of the car and Collie was off in a flash, doing his job of bringing them back. The visitors were entertained by this unexpected cabaret turn that enabled them to reach the house. After Collie, I always wanted a sheepdog by my side, but Andrew thought the rounding up of children in the garden was not a good idea as the nipped ankle of a child (going in what Collie thought was the wrong direction) was a bit too much for the mothers of our young visitors. So I have never had another of these canine geniuses.
In 1995, to my joy and amazement, I was invited to be president of the Royal Agricultural Society of England. Had I been told in my caravan years that this honour would come my way, I would never have believed it. The distinguished members of the Council, who could teach good manners to all and sundry, allowed me hours in the Poultry Tent, the Sheep Pens, the Rare Breeds Survival Trust stand, the Shetland Pony lines and other treats. I had one small triumph as president: persuading those illustrious gentlemen to ride on the miniature railway around the showground. I have some photos of them, in bowler hats, of course, knees up to their chins, pretending to enjoy this new experience. The last Royal Show has now taken place and it is sad that it is all over. I have no doubt, however, that good will arise from the ashes and that the Stoneleigh site will be put to use
for excellence in everything to do with the land, albeit in a different form.
I lost my nerve out hunting when I was nineteen. A new horse turned out to be one of the clumsy few more likely to fall at an obstacle than clear it. Two days on this crasher was enough and to my lasting sorrow I have never been out hunting on a horse since. I am, however, still passionate about field sports. The march organized by the Countryside Alliance to demonstrate against the banning of fox-hunting and other field sports was the highlight of 1997. Chatsworth provided a bus to take gamekeepers, river bailiffs, foresters, gardeners, office staff, cleaners and other field-sports supporters who wished to join in this unique outing. Some had only ventured to London once or twice in their lives; one had never set foot so far south before or seen a motorway service station. Our land agent, Roger Wardle, who went with the Chatsworth group, told me that when they got on the tube at Wembley, the train was empty. It started to fill as they drew closer to Central London and a passenger, staring at this noisy, hairy, tweedy crowd, turned to Roger and said, ‘Who are all these people? Gay Rights?’ The Chatsworth party enjoyed the march and the company of men and women of like mind, but were thankful not to live in such a squashed-up place.
Sadly, Sophy and I, who had set off from Chesterfield Street, never found them. Perhaps this was not surprising as some three-quarters of a million people from rural England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland had flocked to London to show the strength of their feelings. Talk about a cross-section: farriers and fishermen, dukes and drainers, all marching for the freedom to enjoy the sports of their forefathers. There were velvet-capped huntsmen and whippers-in from all over the country, from the Quorn to the Blencathra (John Peel’s Lake District pack), from the Devon and Somerset Stag Hounds to the Banwen (the South Wales miners’ pack) – picking up the Duke of Beaufort’s on the way. All accents mixed – a merry crowd on a serious mission. Sophy and I crossed Park Lane into Hyde Park where there was a stand for the speakers. We were in time to hear Baroness Mallalieu, the Labour life peeress who adores hunting, give her impassioned speech: ‘Hunting is our music. It is our poetry. It is our art. It is our pleasure. It is where many of our best friendships are made. It is our community. It is our whole way of life.’ She understands.
Sophy carried a banner saying, ‘I’M READY TO GO TO JAIL’. Another slogan spotted was, ‘EAT BRITISH LAMB, 50,000 FOXES CAN’T BE WRONG’. We left Hyde Park for Piccadilly where we paused to collect a badge from David Hockney that said, ‘END BOSSINESS SOON’. Sound advice indeed. With Piccadilly Circus and the Haymarket behind us, we turned right into Trafalgar Square and down Whitehall where for centuries groups of demonstrators from every conceivable minority have marched for justice or recognition. In spite of the passionate feelings of the marchers that day, there was no trouble with the police. When we reached Downing Street (which was well fortified against us) I pointed out the sign to the Welshmen who had become our companions. They stopped as if shot and started shouting insults at the Prime Minister to awaken the dead – but not Mr Blair, he had gone to ground.
Parliament Square, where the tall, handsome keepers from Keir suddenly appeared, was so full of people we could hardly move. Having, we hoped, made our point, Sophy and I walked home through St James’s Park, past the Horseguards, up the Duke of York’s Steps and into Pall Mall. The famous gentlemen’s clubs had opened their doors, even to women, and were handing out sandwiches to anyone who asked for them. Then we had a stroke of luck. One of the Hambro family was walking with us up St James’s Street and said, ‘Where are you going to have lunch?’ and we joined him at Wilton’s, a haven after the excitement and the long walk.
One incident from the march remains in my mind. Emma (my grandson Eddie Tennant’s wife) was born and brought up in Northumberland where she went out hunting from an early age. She was detailed by the organizers to stand at the top of the moving stairs of the tube station to meet the demonstrators from Northumbria. The first person to emerge was astonished to see ‘Our Emma’. ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘I thought London was a big place and the first person I see is you.’ No doubt there were many such stories, but one that particularly pleased the organizers was that this vast crowd left no litter.
Writing was an interest that came unexpectedly into my life. I wonder what my sister Nancy would have made of the efforts of the ‘nine-year-old’ (the mental age beyond which she said I never developed) whose fist, according to her, was incapable of holding a pen. There would no doubt have been a torrent of scorn, but I think she would have liked some of the jokes sprinkled in my books. I am often asked where my sisters’ and my urge to write comes from. I cannot answer, unless it is from our grandfathers. Grandfather Redesdale wrote half a dozen books, including Tales of Old Japan, an anthology of short stories that is still in print a century or more after it was first published. Grandfather Bowles was not only the founder of The Lady and Vanity Fair, he was also a prolific author on many subjects.
I began writing at Uncle Harold’s bidding. He was looking at the Handbook of Chatsworth and Hardwick, written in 1844 by the Bachelor Duke, and said, ‘You ought to write down what has happened to the house and garden since.’ So I did. I enjoyed the work, in spite of the fact that Andrew did not like the idea. He would have done it brilliantly himself and perhaps thought that Uncle Harold should have asked him and not me. As it was, he retreated from the scene, which made things tricky for me. My mentor and editor was Richard Garnett, whose patience and all-seeing eye meant everything to me. The House: A Portrait of Chatsworth was published in 1982 as a bumper guide to Chatsworth. I described how we lived in the house, which looks so grand and is so friendly, and included extracts from the Handbook, with a lot of family history and old jokes thrown in. Sales were extraordinary and for one heady week it topped the Evening Standard best-seller list.
I felt a bit more confident after this and realized that there was a captive market for books about Chatsworth and the family in ‘my’ shops. The Estate: A View from Chatsworth came about because I was conscious that people thought Chatsworth – the house, park and garden – was the full extent of the Cavendish family’s land ownership in Derbyshire. I wanted to give a larger view and wrote about the farms, woods and other properties that constitute the background to Chatsworth. I loved doing Chatsworth: The House (the sequel to The House: A Portrait of Chatsworth). It is a large book, profusely illustrated with Simon Upton’s remarkable photographs, and because Chatsworth is so big and varied I found plenty of new ground to cover. The record of the interior of the house as it looked in the last decade of the twentieth century is already an historic document as the changes that are now being made to it are far-reaching. For the same reason, I am pleased that I wrote The Garden at Chatsworth, a record of Andrew’s and my years in charge.
Pens and pads of ruled paper were in my basket during my last twenty years at Chatsworth. Often lost for days on end, the basket would eventually be discovered by a seat in the garden or camouflaged in a seldom-visited attic room filled with jettisoned furniture. These hazards made progress slow. Deadlines frightened me because something unexpected might turn up and the lined pages of the notebook remain blank.
Writing the weekly Diary and other articles for the Spectator was good fun, and for six months I did a regular piece for the Telegraph, mainly about life in the country. I was flattered to be asked. Another magazine commissioned an article of 1,000 words – about what I forget – and I duly handed it in on time. The editor telephoned and, after beating about the bush a bit, said, ‘Could you add a few more words please?’ I said I could, but that I had produced the required number. ‘Yes, I know,’ he said, with embarrassment, ‘but they are all so short we have got a lot of space left.’
I enjoyed doing these occasional articles; it did not seem to matter what was noted down and some pieces found a more permanent home in Counting My Chickens and Home to Roost. Readers often wrote to me, pulling me up for mistakes or saying that something I had written reminded them of
their own experience. Do not believe it when people say that letter writing is finished (although having an address so easy to remember perhaps encouraged it in my case). Writing becomes a habit. Although my eyes are failing, I still go about with a pen in my hand. I wish I could type and use the internet, but that is beyond me now.
I became an Elvis fan by chance. In 1977 I was looking for a television programme on a different subject when I pressed the wrong button and there was the phenomenon. I was riveted by what I saw and heard. I knew about him, of course, but thought he was just another American pop star. Now I understood why he was the most famous man in the world. It was too late to see and hear him in the flesh but some years later I went to a clever resurrection of him in an arena in Manchester, where members of his band, including some of his girl backing singers, the Sweet Inspirations, and the pianist who played such wonderful introductions to the songs, were performing. The girls in their black dresses, covered in sparkles of every description, had grown into ample reincarnations of their earlier selves. In the middle of the stage was a vast screen and there was Elvis singing his best-loved songs, his incredible voice ringing out into the huge arena. The audience went wild, among them many Elvis impersonators, beautifully turned out in the sequinned jumpsuits we all knew so well.
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