1773 THE SIES 89 



Ascham in 1763. He is credited with having done a 

 very sporting thing in 1758, when he bought Mirza 

 (after winning one of the Jockey Club Plates) for 

 1,500 guineas from Mr. Fulke Greville and offered to 

 back the horse for 10,000 guineas (and allow 4 lb.) 

 against the redoubtable Snap (sire of Goldfinder, 

 Angelica, &c.) ; but the latter ' being on his way to 

 the North,' where he was to retire to the stud, ' the 

 challenge was not accepted ' by the ' Northumberland 

 confederacy ' (Messrs. Swinburne and Shafto, brothers, 

 all members of the Jockey Club). 



Sir William Middleton, Baronet, of Belsay Castle, 

 Northumberland, was one of the great ' Northern 

 lights ' of the Turf, though he was beaten with the 

 famous Whistlejacket (bred by him, but sold in 1756 

 to Lord Rockingham) by the Duke of Ancaster with 

 Spectator for a Jockey Club Plate in 1756. Sir 

 William is understood to have died s.p. in 1757, and 

 to have been succeeded by his brother (John Lam- 

 bert), who died in 1768, and was succeeded by his 

 son (the hero of Minden, where he was desperately 

 wounded). Sir William is said to have been M.P. for 

 Northumberland from 1722 to 1757, the year of his 

 death. He owned the Bartlet's Childers mare that 

 bred Squirrel (alias Surly), Midge, Thwackum (alias 

 Scipio), and Camilla, all by a son of Bay Bolton, and 

 Miss Belsea (Belsay). The Bartlet's Childers mare's 

 dam was sister to the two famous True Blues. 



Sir John Moore, Baronet, of Fawley Court, Berks, 



