Lord Beauchamp(20) trains on well, as they say, but il n'a pas le moyen de plaire. Lord Holl[an]d's criticism upon Beauc[hamp] is not just; he will get nine daughters if he goes on as he does, before me; and I thought once it was a hard-run thing between us.
Poor Lady Bol(ingbroke),(21) quelle triste perspective pour elle! J'en suis veritablement touche. Adieu, my dear Lord, pour aujourd'hui. God preserve you from boars of any kind, but one, which is the writer of a long letter; for mine to you cannot be short, or ever long enough to tell you how sincerely and affectionately I am your Lordship's.
(1) Writing from Matson.
(2) Of Gloucester.
(3) Selwyn rivalled Walpole as an ardent admirer of Mme. de Sevigne (1626-1696) through her "Letters"; he read them assiduously, and passionately collected any information relating to her; prizing the smallest object that had once been hers as a precious relic.
(4) Lady Sarah Bunbury (1745-1826), youngest daughter of Charles Lennox, second Duke of Richmond; great granddaughter of Charles II.; sister to Lady Holland, Lady Louisa Conolly, and Lady Emily, Duchess of Leinster; divorced from her first husband, Sir Charles Bunbury, the well-known racing baronet, in 1776; married, for the second time, George Napier, sixth son of Francis, fifth Lord Napier, in 1702; mother of the distinguished soldiers, Sir Charles James Napier, Sir George Thomas Napier, and Sir William Francis Napier, the historian of the Peninsular War. Constitutional reasons alone prevented George III. from marrying her; he settled 1,000 pounds a year on her at Napier's death in 1807. She was quite blind when she died.
(5) Charles, whenever the name occurs, refers to Charles James Fox (1749-1806). He entered Parliament at nineteen; at twenty was made a Lord of the Admiralty; in 1773 a Commissioner of the Treasury; in 1782 Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in the Rockingham Ministry; in 1783 he became again Secretary of State in the memorable Coalition Ministry formed by himself and Lord North under the nominal premiership of the Duke of Portland. When the Whigs at length returned to power in 1806 he was again Secretary for Foreign Affairs in Lord Grenville's Ministry of all the Talents, and died in office. No statesman so little in office ever obtained so great influence in Parliament and in the country.
(6) Wilmot, fourth Viscount Lisbourne.
(7) George James Williams, commonly known as Gilly Williams (1716-1805), son of William Peere Williams, an eminent lawyer; uncle by marriage to Lord North; appointed Receiver-General of Excise in 1774. It was he of whom it was said that he was wittiest among the witty and gayest among the gay, and his society was much sought after. He and Edgecumbe, with Selwyn, met at Strawberry Hill at stated periods, forming the famous group—Walpole's "out-of-town party."
(8) Lord Charles Spencer (1740-1820); second son of third Duke of Marlborough; M.P. for Oxfordshire 1761-1784, and again 1796-1801; filled from time to time several minor political offices.