George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life Part 13

Mrs. Webb also is not in a good state of health for travelling so far or so fast. I have had a letter from Warner; he has seen the Baron, who was charged, I find, with a commission to you. . . .

I shall write to you from Lyons; but when I shall hear from you the Lord knows, and I want to hear how the children do.

Ma patience et ma perseverance sont inepuisables sur ce qui regarde Mie Mie. Je me croyois tranquillement etabli ici. J'aurai des entretiens avec la mere, qui ne sont pas toujours composes avec du miel. "Helas! Rende mi figlia mia." Voila ou j'en reviens. Adieu.

Ayez un peu de pitie de tous mes embarras, qui ne finissent pas.

(143) See Chapter 1: "In the spring it was arranged that the Marchesa Fragniani should bring Mie Mie to Paris . . ."

(1780,) Sept. 11, Monday morning, 7 o'clock, Matson.--You will receive a long letter from me to-day; and this will come to you on Wednesday; so by these repeated courtesies you will see that I have no repugnance to writing, although you have, and that I am very well pleased to go on in my old way of scribbling, as long as I am convinced that it is agreeable to you. But a line now and then is comfortable, for, as Lady Macbeth says, "the feast grows cold that is not often cheered," or something of that sort; so a correspondence is awkwardly maintained, and is a contradiction in terms when it is on one side only.

At present I am afraid that I shall be particularly tiresome, because, much against my will, they have filled my head with Election matters, and will not allow me a moment's time for anything else. I have no comfort, but that it will be concluded on Thursday, or Friday, but till then, what I shall suffer from folly and impertinence, and from everything that is disagreeable, cannot be described.

There is a party here called the True Blues, who lead Sir A. H. and I (me) about, as if they had purchased us, to show in a fair. They cost me, some years ago, twice two thousand pounds, by opposing me, and now are doing all they can to make me pay four for befriending me; and these people have given Administration such an idea of their own omnipotence that I should have never been forgiven, if I had not yielded to this importunity. I am a.s.sured that it will succeed, and that both Sir A. and myself shall be returned, but my credulity does not extend to that point. It is very probable, indeed, that by this effort I may retain my own seat, which I did not care for, but to attempt the other does as yet appear to me a great piece of extravagance, considering the party which we have to contend with, who have had their secrets well kept, and been very industrious for two years in bringing about this opposition, whereas this scheme of the Tories has not been taken up with any support, but a fortnight ago.

My best and ablest friends here are dead; their survivors supine and superannuated; their connections new Whigs and Reformers, and a.s.sociators; myself grown quite indifferent upon the point; and the princ.i.p.al Tories, such as the Duke of Beaufort, &c., and those who would have been active, if they had been desired to be so half a year ago, never spoke to. Mr. Robinson,(144) in his letters to me, has always spoke in the plural number, our friend and I; so it is a scheme adopted by both, I am to suppose, and a hazardous one it is.

But one Member they will have, I believe, and I wish they had fixed upon any one but me to be their choice.

Sir Andr. goes upon the surest grounds, because I believe that he will be franked to a certain point, and is sure of a seat in another place, if not here. He is really a very agreeable man, and seems to penetrate into the characters of the people he has seen very well.

He entertained me much yesterday with his account of my old friend the Duke of Newcastle. He speaks of you in terms of the highest esteem.

We stole away the day before yesterday from our keepers, to dine here, which was a great relief, but we were jobed (sic) for it at our return. I get here time enough to go to bed, that is about 11 o'clock, and I do not leave this place till about nine, that is till Mie Mie and I have breakfasted together.

We have a committee sitting at what is called the New(?) Inn, which has been built, and never repaired, three hundred years since; and here this swarm of old Jacobites, with no attachment to Government, a.s.sembles, and for half an hour you would be diverted with their different sentiments and proposals. There is one who has a knack at squibbs, as they call it, and he has a table and chair with a pen and ink before him, to write scurrilous papers, and these are sent directly to Mr. Raikes. I wish to G.o.d that it was all at an end.

What sin, to me unknown, Dipped me in this? My father's, or my own?

I am very glad that you have so quietly abandoned a contention for Carlisle. When these things come to us without trouble it is very well; but when they do not, I do not know one earthly thing that makes us amends, and it is not once in a hundred times that you are thanked for it. ...

I am old indeed, as the papers say, and if not trained up in ministerial corruption, I am used to all other corruption whatever, and of that of manners in particular; and the little attention that is paid to what was in my earliest days called common honesty, is now the most uncommon thing in the world. . . .

Let me have the pleasure of hearing that you are going on well in Ireland,(145) for the loss of that I should have in being there with you, which is impossible. Keep yourself, as you can very well do, within your intrenchments, that no one may toss your hat over the walls of the Castle. I dread to think what a wrongheaded people you are to transact business with for the next three years of your life.

But I am less afraid of you from your character, than of another, because I think that you will admit, at setting out, of no degree of familiarity from those you are not well acquainted with. I hope that Eden goes with you. I have a great opinion of his good sense and scavoir faire.

(144) John Robinson (1727-1802), the son of an Appleby tradesman. He grew wealthy by marriage and inheritance, and locally influential.

He became member for Westmoreland in 1764. In 1770 he was appointed Secretary to the Treasury, which office he retained till Lord North's fall in 1782. He was the business manager of the Ministry, and had in his hands the distribution of the party funds and patronage. He was an honest, able, and cool man of affairs, who regarded politics wholly from a business point of view.

(145) Lord Carlisle had this year been appointed Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland.

CHAPTER 4. 1781 THE DISASTERS IN AMERICA

A drum at Selwyn's--George, Lord Morpeth--Dr. Warner--Sale of the Houghton pictures--The House of Commons--Pitt's first speech--Selwyn unwell--Play at Brooks's--London gaieties--Fox and his new clothes --Gambling--The bailiffs in Fox's house--"Fish" Crawford--Montem at Eton--Mie Mie's education--Second speech of Pitt--Lord North--A Court Ball--Society and politics--The Emperor of Austria --Conversation with Fox--Personal feelings--American affairs--Lord North and Mr. Robinson--State of politics--London Society.

The year 1781 will remain memorable as that in which the connection of England with her American Colonies was finally broken. The surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown on October 19th impressed the Government with the futility of a contest which the country had already realised, and which would have at once caused a change of administration if the House of Commons had been truly representative of the opinion of the country; "a sense of past error," wrote the Duke of Grafton in his autobiography, "and a conviction that the American war might terminate in further destruction to our armies, began from this time rapidly to insinuate itself into the minds of men. Their discourse was quite changed, though the majorities in Parliament were still ready to support the American war, while all the world was representing it to be the height of madness and folly."(146) But though the country was oppressed by taxation, and disgusted at the want of success of its armies, society in St. James's Street took the national disasters with perfect composure. It troubled itself more about the nightly losses of money at the card-tables of Brooks's than of soldiers on the Delaware.

It lived in the same kind of fatalism as the House of Commons and the King, who, with characteristic obstinacy, refused to bow to the force of events, and kept in office, but not in power, a minister who did not believe in the policy which he was compelled to support in Parliament.

From contemporaries the cardinal events of history are obscured by the course of their ordinary social or political life. To us, who can see them so large and momentous, it appears strange that they do not fill a greater place in the public mind of the period. Selwyn constantly hearing of the course of the vital conflict between England and her Colonies, fills his correspondence with details of the day, mingling remarks on facts which have become historical with the latest story of the clubs.

1781, Feb. 1, Thursday morning, Cleveland Court.--. . . I saw Lord Gower yesterday morning; he is grown very corpulent, and his face fuller of humour than I ever saw it. While this humour keeps out he will be well, but when it returns I am afraid the consequences will be fatal to him. . . .

We dined at March's yesterday. Boothby, James, Williams, Offley, Lord W. Gordon, Dr. Warner,(147) and myself. The place of rendezvous for the morning is I believe, the Park, and it is a reconnoitring party too.

Where the Prince sups, and lies, and with whom, are the chief objects of the politics of a certain cla.s.s of people. All agree that at present the agreement between him and the King is perfect. The speculation is only how long it is likely to last. His Royal Highness stoops as yet to very low game. In some respects it may be better. You will have heard of Captain Waldgrave's success with the two Dutch ships, and the French merchantman, if I am right.

To-day is to be one of violent attack upon Lord Sandwich and Palliser.

Charles makes the motion. We shall have a great deal of abuse, and reply and declamation from Bourk(148) (Burke), and vociferation from Lord Mahon, and perhaps a long day; and I must go down early, because I was yesterday when the House was called a defaulter; so I shall dine there, and after dinner I will collect upon paper what I hear of the transactions of the day.

I read yesterday in the P(ublic) Advertiser an account of your box at the play. I am not knowing enough in what is called humour, to be sure, if that was such, and pure invention, or not. I hear that you did not produce yourself enough, but retired too much within the box, which did not please the Irish, who do not so well comprehend what it is to be out of countenance. I wish to know if Lady C(arlisle) will find for Caroline masters to her satisfaction, and a country house. I have not seen as yet Lord Fitzwilliam, or had any answer about the pictures.

Eden they tell me calls too soon for coffee. But upon the whole, the reports concerning you, and your Court, and your ministers, &c. is [are] good. I do not expect this business in which you are engaged to be quite couleur de rose. I hope you will preserve your health, and the peace of your mind, your temper, and your fortune. I am in no pain about anything else.

Lord W(---) had yesterday an air more egare than usual; he is enlaidi, et mal vetu, et enfin il avait plus l'air de pendard que son frere.

Vous pouvez bien vous imaginer que nous n'avons pas parle de corde, pas meme celle du mariage. The Marechal de Rich(e)lieu was told that the mob intended to have hung me, but que je m'en suis tire comme un loial chevalier. This was their notion in Paris of the mob which insulted me at Gloucester.

(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 G.o.d 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 a.s.sure 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 amus.e.m.e.nts may suppress for a time, but is a constant resource against ennui. I have been years without looking in a book, and G.o.d 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 a.s.sure, 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 n.o.body 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. h.o.a.re, the banker, has a.s.sisted 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.

(150) Frederick, second Baron Boston (1749-1825), son of Sir William, first Baron Boston and Albinia, daughter of Henry Selwyn. He married, in 1775, Christiana, only daughter of'Paul Methuen.

(151) Charles Sloane, third Baron and first Earl Cadogan (1728-1807).

The house at Caversham Park was destroyed by fire in 1850 and re-built.

(152) The gallery of pictures at Houghton, collected by Sir Robert Walpole, was, with some reservations, sold by the third Lord Orford, to the Empress Catharine of Russia in 1779. "Private news we have none, but what I have long been bidden to expect the completion of the sale of the pictures at Houghton to the Czarina" (Letters of Walpole, vol.

vii. p. 234.) The date of the sale and of Selwyn's gossiping allusion are not reconcilable.