Page:Eight Friends of the Great - WP Courtney.djvu/78

 58 In 1790 William Huskisson, the grand-nephew of Gem, was staying with him in Paris for the purpose of studying medicine. He was introduced by Warner to lord Gower and a glowing account was given of his merits. Huskisson was quickly appointed to the post of private secretary to the ambassador, abandoned the study of medicine and went to live in the house of his official master. Thus began a friend- ship of 40 years, which proved of the highest use to Huskisson in his subsequent career. Hayley tried to use .Warner's influence in the French capital for his literary advantage. He began in January 179 1 the composition in the French language of a comedy in five acts " les prejuges abolis " which he hoped that his friend might be able to get on the boards of the theatre francais, but it was never produced. Warner's affection for Selwyn led him in the following April to write to his old friend John Nichols for insertion in the Gentleman's Magazine a long letter stating that from his friendship with Selwyn for forty years — this must be an exaggeration — he could contradict the current belief propagated in the pleasantries of Sir Charles Hanbury Williams and lord Chesterfield, that Selwyn delighted in attending executions. He had never in his life attended but one and that rather accidentally from its lying in his way than from design. A subsequent communication from P. T., the initials of the notorious Philip Thicknesse, stated that the solitary execution was that of Damiens who was broken on the wheel in March 1757 for attempting to assassinate Louis XV. Later in life Warner seems to have receded from this statement. Francis Grose, the Falstaff among antiquaries, records in his " Olio " the doubt of Warner whether Selwyn " ever purposely went to three executions in his life." That a love of the gruesome existed in Selwyn's mind is above dispute. It was in the month of August 1791 that Thicknesse met