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 charms of the Medicean Venus. With her, after performing the last offices of friendship for Churchill at Boulogne, he travelled in Italy, spending part of the carnival of 1765 with Winckelmann at Rome, and three months (April to June) at Naples. There he became intimate with James Boswell.

During his stay in Italy, Wilkes trifled with a projected ‘History of England’ (see infra), and an edition of the works of Churchill, who had made him his literary executor. Deserted by his mistress, he recrossed the Alps in July, passing a day (24 July) at the Grande Chartreuse, where he recorded his favourable impression of the monks in the visitors' book. At the monastery he fell in with Lord Abingdon [see, fourth ], with whom he visited Voltaire at Ferney. In the autumn he returned to Paris, and established himself in the Rue des Saints Pères. French society was uncongenial to him, and he felt the pressure of pecuniary embarrassment. His pen brought him in little. His habits were extravagant; his daughter's education, which he would on no account neglect, was expensive; and in anticipation of his outlawry he had settled his entire property upon her. He was largely beholden to Lord Temple and the Rockingham whigs for the means of subsistence. He also appears to have received occasional subventions from the French government (Walpoliana, i. 2;, Mémoires sur la Chevalière D'Eon, p. 186). On the return of the whigs to power he had hopes of obtaining a pardon and a pension or place; but a visit to London in May 1766 disillusioned him, and he returned to Paris. There, on Chatham's accession to power, he was encouraged by Colonel Fitzroy, brother of the Duke of Grafton, to rely upon Grafton's interest in the administration of which he was the nominal head. He therefore revisited London towards the close of October and sounded Grafton, by whom he was bidden write to Chatham. In Chatham, however, Wilkes had no faith, and he was, moreover, too proud to solicit a favour from one by whom he believed himself to have been neglected in the past. He accordingly wrote to Grafton (1 Nov.). Grafton, by Chatham's advice, ignored his letter, and Wilkes returned to Paris. There he relieved his mind in a lengthy epistle to Grafton (12 Dec.), which was published in pamphlet form both in London and in Paris, and was reprinted in Berlin. He continued to reside in Paris during the greater portion of 1767, working in a desultory way at his history. The sole result of these labours was an ‘Introduction to the History of England, from the Revolution to the Accession of the Brunswick Line,’ published at London in 1768, 4to. The edition of Churchill was abandoned [see ]. Meanwhile, impatience and impecuniosity determined him to end his exile at all costs, and in December he set out once more for England. He travelled by way of Holland, made a short stay at Leyden, and reached London on 6 Feb. 1768. He hired a house at the corner of Prince's Court in the immediate vicinity of his former residence in Great George Street, Westminster, and, being ignored by the government, addressed himself to the king. The course he took must have been intended as an affront; for instead of presenting a petition he made his application for pardon by a letter, which his servant handed in at Buckingham House (4 March). Of the letter no notice was taken. At the subsequent general election he appeared on the hustings as a candidate for the city of London, of which his friends had purchased for him the freedom. He failed to carry that seat, but was returned (28 March) for Middlesex by an immense majority. He then surrendered to his outlawry in the court of king's bench, and after a formal arrest was committed by Lord Mansfield to the king's bench prison (27 April). Between the court and the gaol he was rescued by the mob, but contrived to slip off and continue the journey. From his cell he issued (5 May) a spirited address to his constituents, and for some days his sympathisers congregated in increasing multitude in the vicinity of the gaol (St. George's Fields). On 10 May the mob was dispersed by a detachment of footguards, not without loss of life. The troops were publicly thanked by the secretary at war (Lord Barrington). On 8 June Wilkes's outlawry was reversed by Lord Mansfield on a technical point, but the prior convictions were affirmed, and on 18 June he was sentenced to one year and ten months' imprisonment, exclusive of the time he had already spent in gaol, fined 1,000l., and required on his discharge to enter into recognisances in 1,000l. with two sureties in 500l. each for his good behaviour for seven years. Against this sentence Wilkes appealed by writ of error to the House of Lords. He also presented to the House of Commons (14 Nov.) through Sir Joseph Mawbey [q. v.] a petition which not only traversed the same ground as the writ of error, but entered at large into the merits of his case. He was strongly advised by Grafton to abandon the petition, but he had now declared war à outrance against the government, and he was not the man to hesitate. He therefore pressed forward the