George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life. George Augustus Selwyn
and has been very ill. Our Minister,(79) as you call him, goes on very well, but he is now a widower a second time; his Lady set out for Paris last Saturday. I hope he will not be undermined. The King will never have a servant that will please the public more. I dine with him often a petit convert at March's. I am not desirous that my friends should become ministers; but if they are ministers, it is fair to wish they may become one's friends. He is yours very cordially, I'm persuaded. He always asks very kindly after you, and seems uneasy that the Order has not yet reached you. He said the other day at dinner, aun ton tres patetique, "I shall be much disappointed if in four or five years Lord Carlisle does not give a very good account of himself." Ministre, ou non ministre, qui tient des propos pareils, n'aura pas grande difficulte a me contenter sur le reste. I have abandoned him to-day for Lady Sarah, at which you will be neither surprised, [n]or offended. He dines at March's, and I in the Privy Garden.
The D[uke] and D[uches]s of Rich[mon]d are in town. A young man whose name I cannot recollect asked me very kindly after you yesterday, at the H[ouse] of C[ommons]; he used to sit by your bedside of a morning in King Street; he is tall and thin.
Dr. Musgrave, the Provost of Oriel College in Oxf[or]d, cut his throat in bed the other day; he was ill, but he had taken to heart a mistake which he had madeabout a letter of Sir J. Dolben's, who is to be member for the University the remainder of this Parliament. A dispute with the Fellows, as they tell me, arose in consequence of it, and this seized the poor man's brains. He was reckoned very passionate, but d'ailleurs a good kind of man. I knew his person and his elder brother, Sir Philip, formerly very well. There is a stagnation of news just at this moment, but as soon as any preferments, peerages, or changes of any kind are known for certain, I will send you word of them.
I dined at the D[uchess]'s or Duke's, which you please, of Northumberland's(80) on Saturday; you are a great favourite of her Grace's. She told me of I don't know how many sheets which you had wrote to Lady Carlisle, giving an account of your travels. All the company almost were of Yorkshire, or of the North; Lord and Lady Ravensw[orth], Sir M. Ridley and his father, the Punch Delaval, Lord Tankerville, &c. Her Grace goes soon to Paris, but has as yet fixed no day.
A disagreeable report has prevailed lately, but I believe without the least foundation, that Crew has lost a monstrous sum to Menil. Almack's thrives, but no great events there. I have ordered the M[arquis] of Kildare to be put up at the young club, at White's. If little Harry is come to town, he shall write to you; others should write to you if I could make them, but I am afraid those wishes are more of a courtier than a friend. I should be sorry and ashamed, by endeavouring to flatter your inclination, if I lost your good opinion, which without flattery I value much.
I sat the other morning with Miss Blake; Lady S[arah], and Sir Ch[arle]s were rode out, and I did not see them. She told me a letter was come from Charles, and there is a rendezvous she said, somewhere, but she could not recollect where. She thought you intended to meet Charles and their family at Spa the end of the summer; if so, I shall not despair of seeing you many months sooner than I can otherwise expect it. I shall know to-day at dinner more particularly about it. Lord March thanks you for your frequent and kind mention of him.
My new chaise comes home the week after next. I shall defer making a chariot for some time. I may, perhaps, ask your opinion about a friensh [French?] equipage. March's great room is gilding, and when finished he is to give a dinner to Lady Sarah, and a concert to a great many more. I will finish this au sortir de table.
Tuesday night.—I dined at Sir Charles's. Harry came to town this morning with his French friend and Academist. He has promised me to write to you next post. Lady Sarah says that if you are not satisfied about the St. Andrew, Hemmins is to blame, not her. She could not get him to come near her; and the day it was finished, which was the day before it went away, she never saw it.
Charles, I find, is to meet you in April at Rome; and Lady Sarah the latter end of the summer to meet him at Spa. You do not return to Nice. I do not count much upon hearing from you, but by accident, when you proceed further into Italy.
Sir R. Rich died last night only, so I can know nothing of his preferments yet. Dr. Smith, the Master of Trinity, is also dead, and Dr. Hinchliff asks for his Headship. Lady Sarah was melancholy about Stee (81); she hears that his lethargy increases, and thinks it probable her sister may lose both her husband and son in a very short time; that is a disagreeable perspective. They all desired to be remembered to you. Adieu, my dear Lord, pour aujourd'hui. I have no chance of hearing from you by this post, the letters having come yesterday; so God bless you. I am ever most sincerely and affectionately yours.
(76) Richard Rigby (1722–1788). A prominent politician, he was for many years Paymaster of the Forces; but was a coarse, hard-drinking place-man.
(77) Horace Walpole (1717–1797) was the fourth and youngest son of Sir Robert Walpole. He was Selwyn's lifelong friend. His biographers place him at Eton with Selwyn, the two Conways, George and Charles Montagu, the poet Gray, Richard West, and Thomas Ashton. On leaving Cambridge he made the continental tour with Gray, but after two years of travel together they disagreed and separated for the homeward journey. In 1747 he bought Strawberry Hill, which he transformed into his Gothic Castle, ornamenting the interior with objects of beauty or curiosity. In 1757 he set up his private printing press, where he brought out Gray's poems and other interesting English and French publications, beside his own productions, which culminated in "The Castle of Otranto," a departure in fiction beginning the modern romantic revival. In 1765 he visited Paris, where he went much into society, and when his celebrated friendship with Mme. du Deffand began. He helped to embitter Rousseau against Hume by the mock letter from Frederick the Great offering him an asylum in Germany. In 1789, nine years after Mme. du Deffand's death, he met the two sisters, Agnes and Mary Berry, who came to live near him at little Strawberry, which he left them at his death. He succeeded his nephew as fourth Lord Orford in 1791, but he preferred the name which he had made more widely known, and signed himself "Horace Walpole, uncle of the late Earl of Orford." The celebrated letters begin as early as 1735 and extend to 1797. Walpole never married.
(78) "Historic Doubts on Richard the Third."
(79) The Duke of Grafton.
(80) Hugh, second Duke of Northumberland (1742–1817).
(81) Stephen Fox.
[1768,] Feb. 16, Tuesday morning, Newmarket.—I have just finished a long letter, which, when I came to sand, I have, par distraction, covered all over with ink. I came down here on Saturday with March to meet the Duke of Grafton, who by the by only stayed here that night, and then went to Bury, so that I have scarce seen him.
We are at Vernon's house, that is, dinner and supper; which he has bought of Lord Godolphin(82) [for] 4000. Here has been Sir J. More, Bully, and Polly Jones, Vernon's Polly, Mr. Stoneheir,(83) who came with the D[uke] of G[rafton], Sir Charles Bunbury and little Harry, and Mr. Richmond has been here also to lay out Vernon's gardens. Sir Charles has held us a Pharo bank of a night which has cost him 200 pound, a sum, I imagine, not so easily spared at this juncture by him.
March promised that I should be in London again today, but you know his irresolution, and the little opposition which I can give to what he desires; but it is a great sacrifice for me, for you have been so good in writing to me since I left you, that there is not a week that I am absolutely without my hopes of hearing from you, although, when I left you, I should have been glad to have compounded for once a month; and I'm the more impatient to know what accounts are come by Monday night's post, from what you told me of the gripe, and that you could not go to the French Amb[assado]r's Ball. Harry tells me that he wrote to you, as you ordered him.
Lady S[arah] is in town, and I suppose very happy with the thoughts of a Mascarade which we are to have at Almack's next Monday sevennight, unless in the interim some violent opposition comes from the Bishops. Harry has had here with him a son of Lord Carysfort's(84) from Cambridge. Bully's affair ends with the Session; as soon as that is concluded, he will be in respect of matrimony absolutely evinculated.
There has been an Almack since I wrote, but no events.
At the other shop, a great deal of deep play, where I believe Ossory has been a great sufferer; the D[uke] of Roxb[urgh](85) is become a very