(First published in The Ringing World, 1 April 1921)
Come with me, away from all this jarring tumult. Come into Fairy Land - even into the Fairy Land of Stedman, where the methods cease from troubling and the Lead Ends are at rest.
But I must first warn you that I do not offer to give you a map of that mystic land, but only to act the humble part of a guide and lead you along the trackway that I have followed as a holiday task.
We must start from the 'Brushwood Pile' of solid fact which has been collected in the past; but do not let that damp your ardour. We will visit strange places - aye, and even reach the Lily Lake - the Lily Lake where islands slide, and - who knows? - perhaps also make our way along the 'Thirty mile ride', to its very last milestone, the one on which is inscribed the mystic motto 'This is all.' and where all the peals come round.
But we must come back to the Brushwood Pile, from which we will take all the Plain Courses of Stedman.
Now I know that the experts say that there are no plain courses of Stedman, and, theoretically they are right, maybe. But who cares? This is Stedman Triples we are dealing with. The same old Stedman that we have known and rung and sworn by all our lives, aye, and maybe, sworn at too, when things went awkward in the slow. And we are going to ring it still and ever call it Stedman. So let us get back to our plain courses.
Here they are. Three hundred and sixty in all, and a nice little pile to handle. Fortunately, however, they arrange themselves nicely into six groups with sixty in each, as follows:
I. 1 2 3 4 5 6 3 8 9 10 11 5 13 14 II. 10 11 4 5 7 5 6 8 14 10 11 12 13 14 III. 10 11 5 7 12 7 5 13 14 10 2 3 8 14 IV. 1 2 6 6 6 3 12 13 9 1 2 6 13 9 V. 10 2 7 12 3 12 7 8 14 1 2 7 8 9 VI. 1 11 12 3 4 4 4 8 9 1 11 4 8 9
I. is the skeleton of Hudson's famous sixty courses. Notice the repetition of the 3 and 5 . It is by substituting 7 and 12 in these places respectively that all the twin bob peals have been composed. I call them the Baby Q sets, and they are equally ready to do their work in any other course where a 3 or a 5 appears.
The other five courses are so cross that, as far as I know, no one has yet been able to bring them to reason. But by a judicious use of bobs and singles, other courses have been produced which are available for peal construction.
Of all these the following is the most useful that I have tried:-
1 - 10 2 3 8 - 11 12 3 4 - 5 6 - 13 9 - 14
These I call Mr Carter's courses, as I believe that he was the first to produce them. Incidentally I may mention that I found them quite independently, and had already put them together into my twenty part peal before I learnt that he had been over the same ground before.
2314567 14 3426175 1 -3461275 10 4137652 2 -4176352 7 -1643752 8 -1637452 11 6715324 12 6752143 3 7264531 4 -7245631 5 2573416 6 -2534716 13 5421367 9 -5413267 4
Notice the repetition of the 3 . The baby Q sets will therefore work. In the specimen course I have introduced a 7 for a 3 when the seventh bell is in the slow, and by this bobbing we have thirty true touches of two courses each, and all called alike.
Now attention, please, for we are going off the old road. Let us examine the five sixes in which the seventh does her slow work.
You see that they come from two different plain courses,
12 3 4 being in VI, and 5 6 in II. If
we call a bob as the seventh comes in we shall have a 4 instead
of a 12 , and then leaving out the bob in the middle of the slow
work we shall return to our original place as: - 4 5 7 5
6 . There are two 5s here. The Baby Q sets will remove the
first, and it now reads: - 4 - 12 - 7 5 6 . Write
them side by side and compare them thus:-
1637452 11 1637452 11 6715324 12 -6714352 4 6752143 3 -6743152 12 7264531 4 -7361452 7 -7245631 5 7315624 5
What do you notice? That all the rows are different! No! no! not that. A boy scout would not have given so soft an answer. Look at 6. She is in the slow with 7 at all the sixes whose characters we have changed.
Hence it follows that if I make this alteration in the calling every time that I find the 6th in the same position (2nd's place) at an 11 all the 4s with the 6th in the slow which were in the third row will move to the first, while all the 12s will drop into the second row.
And what has happened to the third row of the changed part? Instead of a 3 we now have a 7 with the sixth in the slow.
But 3 and 7 are always willing to oblige. The Baby Q sets will
change one into another at a moment's notice. We have only to
look for 3671452, where the 7th is in quick, and its
nine brethren with 6 in the same place, and we shall get rid of
the ten 7s that repeat and put back the ten 3s that we have
dropped. By this process we change the form and the number of the
thirty true round blocks that we had, but the resulting touches
are as true as were the original thirty.
This I call a Giant Q set, and it deserves its name, for it alters 20 courses instead of 4 as the Baby Q sets do.
There are six Giant Q sets in all - one for each of the working bells. Let us use the one that we have already examined, with the sixth in the slow.
Oh here we are, I told you so. Here we are at the Lily Lakes, where the Islands slide. Four and twenty Islands! Four and twenty round blocks, all ready to slide, and the Baby Q sets still ready to push them about.
Let us try how we can push them into one long line to form the thirty mile ride - the peal that we are seeking to put together.
A B C D E F
2314567 4263157 6412357 3214657 3126457 4621357
3426175 2345671 4265173 2435176 1635274 6145273
-3461275 -2356471 -4251673 -2451376 -1652374 -6152473
4137652 3627514 2147536 4127563 6217543 1267534
-4176352P 3671245 -2175436 -4175263P -6275143 -1275634
-1643752P 6134752 -1524736 -1542763P -2561743 -2516734
-1637452 -6147352 -1547236 -1527463 -2517643 -2567134
-6714352 1765423 5713462B 5716234 5724136B 5723641
-6743152 1752634 5736124B 5763142 5743261B 5734216
-7361452 7213546 7652341 7354621 7356412 7451362
7315624 -7235146 -7623541 -7346521 -7364512 -7413562
3572146 2574361 6374215 3672415 3471625 4376125
-3521746 -2543761 -6342715 -3624715 -3416725 -4361725
5134267 5326417 3261457 6431257 4632157 3142657
-5142367 -5364217 -3214657 -6412357 -4621357 -3126457
But first let us notice their nature. A and B are five-part touches and have been so shaped by the Giant Q set. There are two other five-part touches like them, which can be produced by transposing 2 with 3 and 4 with 1 at the course end.
This gives us four round blocks containing twenty courses. C, D, E and F are as they were and all the other courses can be had by transposing them from the course ends of A. So we have four five-course touches and twenty two-part touches.
Now set the Baby Q sets to work and all will soon be done. First of all I notice a bad blot in A. There is a six bob set. However, the Baby Q sets can soon deal with that; we will leave out the first two of the set. This allows the sixth to go on up behind, and we find ourselves in column D, and by leaving out the two corresponding bobs there we shall be able to return again. The two places are marked P in the courses. We have now introduced two 5s instead of two 7s; these must be found and bobbed out. They come up in C and E, and I have marked them B to show that two bobs must be introduced at these two rows.
Making these alterations every time that we come into these positions we find that the whole twenty-two round blocks affected become gather themselves together and become two long five-part round blocks each called alike.
231456 2 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 12 14
a. 641235 - - - - -
d. 312645 - - - - - - - - -
b. 462135 - - - - - - -
d. 321465 - - - - - - - - -
e. 514236 - - - - - - -
And the whole peal is now in four round blocks: these two five-parts, and the two shown in B. Remains to put them together.
Turning to B, we find that of the two 3s in each course only one can be replaced by a 7. The other is involved in the Giant Q set and must not be changed.
Alter, then, the calling of the following Baby Q sets.
3417526o 4713526e 3467251o 4763251e
The extras will join one of the two Bs on to one of the long parts and the omits will join the two long parts together. Thus the peal is in two parts, and an obliging S at 11 in the first course will join the two together. Let me give a table of course ends of the callings used, and by lettering them we shall save much space in writing it out.
231456 2 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 12 14 a 641235 - - - - - b 541326 - - - - - - - c 614325 - - - - - - - d 514236 - - - - - - - - - e 614325 - - - - - - - f 612435 - - - - -
231456 251643 S 145632 4f 641235 S 426315 2d 316254 4a 462135 c 321465 d 514236 e 624513 a | 145623 d | 265413 b | A 154263 d | 342516 e | 652431 a 123564 c 435216 e 213546 4A 653214 a 132654 d 562314 b 423651 c 563241 b 432561 d 125346 e 231456 2A
The first of the two courses marked S is produced by
2 6 10 (11S) 13 17
and the second by
2 4 6 (8S) 9 11
There is 'The thirty mile ride'. What do you think of it? May you reach the last milestone as safely in the tower as I have done on paper. And so the schoolmaster bids you all adieu, and returns to his boys.
E. B. J.
This page created by Philip Saddleton
Last updated 29/08/96