“But how very pleasant to me was your honest and naive confession of the joy your heart felt at hearing her admired!  It is, indeed, most extraordinary that a certain person who has great taste—­would he had as much nature!—­should not see her with very different eyes from what he does.  I can never forget that naive expression of Mme. de Sevigne, ‘Je ne sais comment Von fait de ne pas aimer sa fille?’”

* The Duke of Queens berry.

But Selwyn was never quite free from the fear that she should be taken from him.  In January, 1781, he writes to Lord Carlisle:—­

“From Milan things are well; at least, no menaces from thence of any sort, and I am assured, by one who is the most intimate friend of the Emperor’s minister there, that he was much more likely to approve than to disapprove of Mie Mie’s being with me, knowing as he does the turn and character of the mother.”

The relationship from this time was more settled, and as Mie Mie grew into womanhood she became to Selwyn a delightful and affectionate companion.

Selwyn was a universal friend; he was equally at home with politicians, dilettanti, and children; he was a man of such consistent good nature, so unaffectedly kind-hearted, that every one, statesman, gambler, or schoolboy, liked to be in his company.  Yet among Selwyn’s many friends and acquaintances two groups are remarkable.  The first was formed of men of his own age—­Walpole, Edgecumbe, Gilly Williams, and Lord March comprise what may be called the Strawberry Hill group.  It was at Walpole’s famous villa that they liked best to meet, and it is by Reynolds that Walpole’s “out-of-town party” has been handed down to us.** They were an odd coterie—­cultivated, artificial, gossiping.  None of them ever married; to do so seemed to have been unfashionable, if not unpopular; and when we see the results of many marriages among their friends, they were best, perhaps, as bachelors.  They considered themselves free to act as they pleased; and this freedom became notorious by the life-long dissipation of March, and by the free living of Edgecumbe, who died at forty-five after a life misspent at the gaming-table.  That he possessed a bright mind and ingenious wit is proved by his verses and by the estimate of his friends.  The amusing coat of arms which the friends designed for White’s Club was painted by him, while he was one of the first to recognise the genius of Reynolds.

** The group of Selwyn, Edgecumbe, and Williams which was painted for Horace Walpole in 1781, and subsequently became the property of the late Lord Taunton, now belongs to his daughter, the Hon. Mrs. Edward Stanley, and is at Quantock Lodge, Bridgwater.  It is a charming and interesting picture.  A replica by Sir J. Reynolds, the property of Lord Cadogan, is at Chelsea House.