THE JOCKEY CLUB IN THE DAYS OF CHARLES JAMES FOX. 



235 



under most trying circumstances, towards Lady Sarah. "Why should not I ?" said 

 he, " you know I'm not apt to bear malice." It is quite possible that he was more 

 attracted by the Turf than by the prospect of continual homage, even to the most 

 beautiful woman in England. To Lady Susan Fox-Strangways, her constant friend, 

 who afterwards became Lady Susan O'Brien, Lady Sarah writes from Barton in 

 October, 1762 : "I must now tell you about Newmarket while it is in my head. 

 . . . . The Duke [of Cumberland] won two matches, and the Duke of Grafton 

 a plate with a vile horse. Magpie ran and was beat. I saw him and his horses in 

 the morning, 'tis a dear soul ; I lost my money." Ten days afterwards she writes 



." (1770- ? ) 



again : " Lord Ossory [John Fitzpatrick, second Earl of Upper Ossory] is with us, 

 and went to the assembly, he is an agreeable, sensible man, and I like him vastly. 



. . . I danced with Lord Petre, and he is a nasty toad You need not 



have envied me, for my devil of a horse is as lame as a dog, and Mr. B. has been 

 coursing, hunting, and doing every pleasant thing upon earth, and poor me sat 

 fretting and fuming at home with Lady Rosse." This looks like " the little rift." 

 But she refused to acknowledge it, and on October i6th, 1763, she writes again from 

 Barton to the same confidante : " Pray now, who the devil would not be happy with 

 a pretty place, a good house, good horses, greyhounds, etc., for hunting, so near 

 Newmarket, what company we please in the house, and ,2,000 a year to spend 



