for the ensuing Year'. The rules of the society could only be changed by the unanimous vote of at least thirty members. The annual subscription was to be two guineas, to be paid 'to Almack for the House'. Almack was to take in all the London and some foreign newspapers; dinner (at eight shillings) was 'to be allways upon the Table' at a quarter past four o'clock and supper (at six shillings) at 'a Quarter before Eleven'; a bottle of port cost half a crown. Almack was to order the food 'without any directions from any body', and members might 'speak for any Dish, cheap or Dear', but the prices were not to exceed those at the Smyrna coffee house. Members' friends could only be entertained in the first room facing the street on the ground floor, where they could have 'tea, coffee or chocolate, but no Meat or Wine nor can there be any Gaming or Cards in that Room'. Gambling amongst the members was to be limited to a maximum of nine guineas per rubber or session. Eighty-eight gentlemen, none of whom appears to have been a member of White's, paid subscriptions for 1762, and the appointment of thirteen managers for the period February 1763 to February 1764 is recorded. In March 1764 this club appears to have been superseded by or to have divided itself into two separate societies. The reason for this rearrangement is not known, but it may have been connected with members' differing political affiliations, or with the desire of some of them to gamble more heavily than the rules of 1762 permitted. So far as Almack himself was concerned, the change was clearly an important one, for in the autumn of 1764 he did not renew his tavern licence, and in August, The Gentleman's Magazine reported that 'Almack's is no longer to be used as a public tavern but is to be set apart for the reception of a set of gentlemen, who are to meet after the manner of the minority at Wildman's. These societies, 'tis believed, will endeavour to distinguish themselves by their zeal for the public good.' One of these two societies would go on to become Brooks's. Until 1778 it met in Almack's former tavern (No. 49) in Pall Mall. During the whole of this period, Almack was the proprietor, the subscriptions were paid to him and the club