1.S51 



JACK MYTTON. 207 



Hotel, Piccadilly, at half-past seven ou the following 

 inornino-. The distaiiee was ninety-seven miles, and 

 included eighteen toll-gates, and was performed in the 

 middle of a February night, on a road with which he was 

 not acquainted, without any change of his dress. 



Jack M}i;ton, of Halston*, Shropshire, hunted often at 

 Ijcamington, and was a celebrated sporting character and a 

 very daring rider. There is a well known poi-trait of him 

 at a meet of hounds, riding his hunter over a large sunk 

 fence out of the garden of the house into the field where 

 the hounds met.f He used often not to go to bed until he 

 had been out at daylight on a wijiter morning to wait for 

 wildfowl, and when snow was on the ground he did this 

 with a night-shii-t put on over his clothes, so that he could 

 be seen as little as possible. 



General Wallington was ])ersuaded by the " young 

 bloods " of Leamington to ride in a steeplechase. 

 He ordered his new colours down from London. He 

 arrayed himself in them before the " cheval glass," and 

 said to his valet : " Thomas, about this time to-morrow 

 you will be joining in the cry all dow^i the course, ' The 

 General wins ! the General wins ! ' " One of the " young 

 bloods " knocked him head over heels at the first fence. 



A meeting was held in lSo3 for the purpose of con- 

 sidering the best method of disposing of a subscription 

 liberally presented by some gentlemen resident during the 

 hunting season at Leamington to the Warwickshire 

 hounds, the following gentlemen being members of the 

 committee : E. Sheldon, J. Naper, J. Eussell, J. M. 



* I know Halst(5ii well, ami luive often dined there in the late Mr. Wright's tinic. 

 Jack Mj'tton's ghost is supposed to he heard walking somewhere near the lodge gate 

 which opens into the Ellesmere Road. I never believed much in this, as Jack IMytton 

 was more of a rider and a driver than a walker. I tested the ghost theory, and believe 

 that the superstition has arisen from a peculiar echo which sounds in the semi-circular 

 wall on each side of the entrance gate. — W. R. V. 



+ A friend of mine once told me at Halston that lie had run the very railings to 

 ground, over which, in the well-kn">wn print j^ublishel in the life of Jack Mytton by 

 Nimrod, he is depictel as flying with his arm in a sling. They were not in their 

 original position, as they had been supplanted by others of a later date, but he found 

 the original railings, represented in Aiken's picture, put away round some odd corner 

 of the house.— W, R. V. 



