George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life

by George Augustus Selwyn

(146) Page 314.

(147) Dr. John Warner (1736-1800) was the son of a clergyman and educated at Trinity College, Cambridge. He took orders, but had a literary and social, rather than theological, bent. He was a confidential friend of Selwyn's, and after his death wrote a defence of him in regard to witnessing executions.

(148) Edmund Burke (1729-1797). The only political office that the great publicist ever held was that of Paymaster of the Forces for a few months under Lord Rockingham and the Coalition Government.

(1781,) Feb. 11, Sunday morning, Cleveland Court.—I received your letter of the 5th, yesterday, in the afternoon, and another of the same date from Dr. Ekins, at the same time the day before: why they did not come together, I know not. But so it has happened, I believe more than once before, since my connections with Ireland, which I wish to God were at an end. There is one indeed which will plague me, while I live, and that is an annuity upon Mr. Gore's estate, which I must sue for as regularly as it becomes due.

I was prevented from writing to you yesterday by I do not know how much disagreeable occupation. I had a Drum, and that began early; I was to prepare for it, I was to be served in ambigu, and it was to be the easiest, most agreeable, best understood thing in the world. It was to my apprehension the very antipode of this. I do not know how my company felt, but I was not at my ease a moment. I had a Commerce table, and one of Whist. My company were Middletons,(149) Bostons,(150) Townshends, and Selwyns.

March came to the door at eleven, but hearing that supper was served, and almost over, and perhaps hearing of the company too, he went away; they were all good kind of people, and who I dare say had conversation enough in their own families, but although we were all related, we had not one word to say to one another. There was Mr. Methuen, Lady Boston's father, who seems to be a shrewd entertaining man, if he was where he found himself at home. The cook, the housekeeper, and Maitre Jacques all exerted themselves, and did their parts tolerably well, but rien n'a pu me mettre a mon aise, and the more I tried to be at home, the more I was desoriente; so I believe I shall try some other kind of party for the future; otherwise I may say que le jeu ne vaut pas la chandelle. But now for your letter.

George's subject is not the first in course, but it has taken the first place in my thoughts. I do assure you that I am not his puff. What I tell you of his reading is literally true; but it is not reading that expresses it, for I could have said as much if he had read nothing but the History of Cinder Breech and that kind of biography. He read with me English History, and stopped for information, and showed an uncommon thirst for it. He asked me as many questions in the History of George 1st concerning the South Sea Scheme, the prosecution of Lord Macclesfield, and the Barrier Treaty, as another boy would have asked me about Robinson Crusoe. He likes other books too, and it is agreeable to hear him talk of them. For which reason I should be glad, if you approved of it, that he had a choice of books, to a certain amount —a little library—as many as would fill a small bookcase. Mr. Raikes tells me that he is remarkably careful of his books, and therefore was not displeased that those which you gave him I had well bound, and that it was a fair edition. An early love of books will produce a desire to read, which amusements may suppress for a time, but is a constant resource against ennui. I have been years without looking in a book, and God knows in my long life how few I have read; but when it has happened that I could, par force, do nothing else, I have collected together a number, began a piece of history, and have thought at last the day too short, because I wanted to read more; and this I attribute to having once read, although it was but a very little. Rollin was the first author I read by choice. . . .

I am in hopes that your kindness to Storer will take place; il en est digne, soyez en assure, sur ma parole. I never doubted, I was quite persuaded indeed, that you would do what you have done, and properly too. I have been told that he is to have this place, but I have not seen him much lately. I hope that he will dine here to-morrow, or on Tuesday, when all the Gregg family comes, and it may be, Dr. Warner. Your letter to Hare was sent to him by the post of the day that I received it, and you will have had information of it, I doubt not, by this time. He was not that day in town. You desired it to be sent, without loss of time. I therefore lost none. But unluckily he was on the road, although nobody knew it; he must have received it a few days after, so I suppose by this time he has acknowledged to you the receipt of it. I shall send your letter to Dr. Warner to-day, and invite him to meet Mr. Gregg's family at dinner here on Tuesday. . . .I believe him to be a perfectly honest man; he is uncommonly humane and friendly, and most actively so. But he has such a flow of spirits, and so much the ton de ce monde qu'il a frequente, that, had I been to have chose a profession for him, it should not have been that of the Church. There is more buckram in that, professionally, than he can digest, or submit to. The Archbishop, who has been applied to in his favour, by the late Mr. Townshend, said he was too lively, but it was the worst he could say of him. Lord Besborough served him once essentially, and esteems him. The family of Mr. Hoare, the banker, has assisted him, and so he has been able to support his mother and his nearest relations, whom his father, with a great deal of literary merit, had left beggars. I have given you this succinct history of my doctor, whom you have enlisted into your corps. I was once before obliged to write his character for Lord Ossory, when he settled himself in Bedfordshire, and Lord Ossory has found it true in all particulars.

The K(ing) has told my friend M. that Lord Cadogan(151) wants to sell his house at Caversham, for why, I know not. Lord Walpole's eldest son is to marry Lady Cadogan's sister. Churchill, du cote du falbala, ne reussit pas mal; his sons, I am afraid, one of them at least, has (have) not managed so well. But I would myself sooner have been married to (a) Buckhorse, than to that (A)Esop Lord C. The Zarina repents of her bargain, and, it is said, will give no more than 20,000 for the pictures.(152) If that is not accepted, Lord Orford make (may) take them back. He gets an estate of near 10,000 pounds a year by his mother's death. Her will is all wrote in her own hand, and not one word, even her own name, rightly spelt.

(149) George, fourth Viscount Middleton (1754-1836); son of George, third viscount, and Albinia, daughter of the Hon. Thomas Townshend. He married first, in 1778, Lady Frances Pelham, daughter of Thomas, first Earl of Chichester, who died in 1783.