The New International Encyclopædia/Selwyn, George Augustus (wit)

SELWYN, George Augustus (1719-91). An English wit. From his mother, a woman of the bedchamber to Queen Caroline, described as “of much vivacity and pretty,” he seems to have derived his wit. He studied at Eton with Gray and Walpole, and thence proceeded to Hart Hall, Oxford, from which, after very irregular attendance, he withdrew without a degree, to escape expulsion for drinking from a chalice at a wine party (1745). In 1747 he entered Parliament, where he sat, a silent member usually asleep, till 1780. In the meantime he had succeeded to the family estates (1751), and had obtained several sinecures, as registrar of the Court of Chancery in Barbados and surveyor-general of the works. He became a member of the leading London clubs, where he was known as “Bosky.” Many witticisms have been fathered upon Selwyn, some of which are probably not authentic. Selwyn's jokes have long since lost their piquancy. The man and the manner made them. One may be cited. When Lord Forley crossed over the Channel to escape his creditors, Selwyn remarked that it was “a passover not much relished by the Jews.” A peculiar trait of the humorist was a passion for witnessing executions of famous criminals. He died in London. Consult: J. H. Jesse, Selwyn and His Contemporaries (London, 1843; new ed., 1882); and Roscoe and Clergue, Selwyn, His Letters and His Life (ib., 1899).