The Sport of Our jincestors 



of the favourite covers of the Atherstone (lately better known 

 as Lord Anson's) country, can be reached from it. 



The following description of the Old Club at Melton 

 Mowbray, so called in contradistinction to the New Club, 

 some time since broken up, is given in one of * Nimrod's ' 

 letters in the * Old Sporting Magazine^' about ten years back : — 



' The grand feature at Melton Mowbray is the Old Club, which 

 has been established about thirty-eight years, and owes its birth to 

 the following circumstances : — Those distinguished sportsmen, the 

 late Lord Forester and Lord Delamere (then Messrs. Forester and 

 Cholmondeley), had been living for some years at Loughborough 

 for the purpose of hunting with Mr. Meynell, and removed thence 

 into Melton, where they took a house, and were joined by the late 

 Mr. Smythe Owen, of Condover Hall, Shropshire. As this house, 

 now known as the Old Club House, only contains four best bed- 

 rooms, its members are restricted to that number. But the follow- 

 ing sportsmen have, at different periods, belonged to the club : — 

 The Hon. George Germaine ; Lords Alvanley and Brudenel ; the 

 Hon. Joshua Vanneck, now Lord Huntingfield ; the Hon. Berkeley 

 Craven ; the late Sir Robert Leighton ; the late Mr. Meyler ; 

 Messrs. Brommell, Vansittart, Thomas Assheton Smith, Lindow, 

 Langston, Maxse, Maher, Moore, Sir James Musgrave, and the 

 present Lord Forester — ^the four last-named gentlemen forming 

 the present club. There is something highly respectable in every- 

 thing connected with the Melton Old Club. Not only is some of 

 the best society in England to be met with in their circle, but the 

 members have been remarkable for living together on terms of 

 the strictest harmony and friendship ; and a sort of veneration 

 has been paid by them to the recollection of the former members, 

 as the following anecdotes will prove : — The same plate is now in 

 use which was purchased when the club was established (for there 

 are none of the certamina divitiarum — no ostentatious displays at 

 the table of the Old Club, though everything is as good, of its kind, 



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