100 THE JOCKEY CLUB 1750- 



is more in favour of his membership, perhaps, that 

 he and his two daughters (of whom one married the 

 Earl of Essex and the other Colonel St. John, brother 

 of the ' Bully ' Lord Bolingbroke, a very ' horsey ' 

 and Jockey- Club-like connection) are mentioned as 

 constant visitors at Newmarket and as intimate 

 friends of ' Old Q.,' who was the ' Star ' not only ' of 

 Piccadilly,' but also of the Jockey Club. At least, this 

 Mr. Bladen seems to have been identical with the 

 Colonel Thomas Bladen, or Thomas Bladen, Esq., a 

 Commissioner of Forests and Plantations, whom we 

 meet with in Walpole's 'Letters ' and Jesse's ' Selwyn,' 

 who was M.P. at various times for Old Sarum, Stey- 

 ning, &c., and died in 1780 at the age of eighty-two. 

 He ran races with Aristotle, Essex Lady, and other 

 horses of more or less note (whereof Aristotle, by the 

 Cullen Arabian, was imported into Virginia, and died 

 therein 1775), probably half-bred ; and there was a 

 Bladen stallion, to which he very likely ' belonged.' 



The name of BLAKE covers three separate gentle- 

 men, Messrs. Andrew, Patrick (afterwards Sir 

 Patrick), and Christopher, who were all probably one 

 happy family, whether father and sons, or brothers, 

 or otherwise related, for they all belonged to the 

 Blakes (originally of Bally glasmin Park, Gal way), of 

 Langham Hall, Suffolk. Their membership of the 

 Jockey Club in each case is undoubted, for Andrew 

 (who seems to have died about 1761) ran for a 

 Jockey Club Plate in 1757 and 1758 ; the other two 



