Last week, a yearling filly sold at auction for an astonishing five million guineas. Unraced and unnamed, the daughter of super-sire Galileo set a new world record for her sex after some furious bidding at Tattersalls in Newmarket. How the ultra-rich spend their money is up to them and we wish her new owner luck.
What is less satisfactory is when the poor are taxed to make the rich wealthier, as is happening with wind farms. The announcement this week that there has been a further surge in the number of wind farms licensed to be built in 2013 has more to do with already wealthy landlords chasing lucrative subsidies-paid for by the Green taxes on everyone's energy bills-than a sensible approach to an energy solution.
* Save 40% when you give Country Life this Christmas
This is the time of year of the harvest festival, a celebration of Nature's plenty. The food brought into the churches is distributed to the needy. The farmers have had a fine year and their drilling of winter wheat has already turned the ploughed fields green. The bracken is turning brown and the acorns are raining down from the oaks. Bonfires are being built-we should throw the legislation permitting these new wind farms on top of them.
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‘‘In the silence, it is the most perfect blue I have ever seen. If my goggles weren’t already overflowing with water I might even weep’: Learning to freedive on the sparkling French Riviera with a five-time World ChampionFive-time freediving World Champion Arthur Guérin-Boëri calls the serene waters of Cap-Ferrat his office. Now, one storied hotel is offering guests a chance to take a deep breath and jump into the deep unknown with him.
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The Hollywood garden designers who turned their hand to a magical corner of SomersetCaisson House's fifteen abandoned locks were part of the draw for Amanda and Phil Honey, who have created this astonishing garden in the grounds of the former headquarters of the Somersetshire Coal Canal Company just outside Bath. Caroline Donald discovers more; photography by Jason Ingram.
