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<h2> LETTER CCXII </h2>
<h3> BATH, November 4, 1757 </h3>
<p>MY DEAR FRIEND: The Sons of Britain, like those of Noah, must cover their
parent's shame as well as they can; for to retrieve its honor is now too
late. One would really think that our ministers and generals were all as
drunk as the Patriarch was. However, in your situation, you must not be
Cham; but spread your cloak over our disgrace, as far as it will go. M——t
calls aloud for a public trial; and in that, and that only, the public
agree with him. There will certainly be one, but of what kind is not yet
fixed. Some are for a parliamentary inquiry, others for a martial one;
neither will, in my opinion, discover the true secret; for a secret there
most unquestionably is. Why we stayed six whole days in the island of Aix,
mortal cannot imagine; which time the French employed, as it was obvious
they would, in assembling their troops in the neighborhood of Rochfort,
and making our attempt then really impracticable. The day after we had
taken the island of Aix, your friend, Colonel Wolf, publicly offered to do
the business with five hundred men and three ships only. In all these
complicated political machines there are so many wheels, that it is always
difficult, and sometimes im possible, to guess which of them gives
direction to the whole. Mr. Pitt is convinced that the principal wheels,
or, if you will, the spoke in his wheel, came from Stade. This is certain,
at least that M——t was the man of confidence with that person.
Whatever be the truth of the case, there is, to be sure, hitherto an
'hiatus valde deflendus'.</p>
<p>The meeting of the parliament will certainly be very numerous, were it
only from curiosity: but the majority on the side of the Court will, I
dare say, be a great one. The people of the late Captain-general, however
inclined to oppose, will be obliged to concur. Their commissions, which
they have no desire to lose, will make them tractable; for those
gentlemen, though all men of honor, are of Sosia's mind, 'que le vrai
Amphitrion est celui ou l'on dine'. The Tories and the city have engaged
to support Pitt; the Whigs, the Duke of Newcastle; the independent and the
impartial, as you well know, are not worth mentioning. It is said that the
Duke intends to bring the affair of his Convention into parliament, for
his own justification; I can hardly believe it; as I cannot conceive that
transactions so merely electoral can be proper objects of inquiry or
deliberation for a British parliament; and, therefore, should such a
motion be made, I presume it will be immediately quashed. By the
commission lately given to Sir John Ligonier, of General and
Commander-in-chief of all his Majesty's forces in Great Britain, the door
seems to be not only shut, but bolted, against his Royal Highness's
return; and I have good reason to be convinced that that breach is
irreparable. The reports of changes in the Ministry, I am pretty sure, are
idle and groundless. The Duke of Newcastle and Mr. Pitt really agree very
well; not, I presume, from any sentimental tenderness for each other, but
from a sense that it is their mutual interest: and, as the late
Captain-general's party is now out of the question, I do not see what
should produce the least change.</p>
<p>The visit made lately to Berlin was, I dare say, neither a friendly nor an
inoffensive one. The Austrians always leave behind them pretty lasting
monuments of their visits, or rather visitations: not so much, I believe,
from their thirst of glory, as from their hunger of prey.</p>
<p>This winter, I take for granted, must produce a piece of some kind or
another; a bad one for us, no doubt, and yet perhaps better than we should
get the year after. I suppose the King of Prussia is negotiating with
France, and endeavoring by those means to get out of the scrape with the
loss only of Silesia, and perhaps Halberstadt, by way of indemnification
to Saxony; and, considering all circumstances, he would be well off upon
those terms. But then how is Sweden to be satisfied? Will the Russians
restore Memel? Will France have been at all this expense 'gratis'? Must
there be no acquisition for them in Flanders? I dare say they have
stipulated something of that sort for themselves, by the additional and
secret treaty, which I know they made, last May, with the Queen of
Hungary. Must we give up whatever the French please to desire in America,
besides the cession of Minorca in perpetuity? I fear we must, or else
raise twelve millions more next year, to as little purpose as we did this,
and have consequently a worse peace afterward. I turn my eyes away, as
much as I can, from this miserable prospect; but, as a citizen and member
of society, it recurs to my imagination, notwithstanding all my endeavors
to banish it from my thoughts. I can do myself nor my country no good; but
I feel the wretched situation of both; the state of the latter makes me
better bear that of the former; and, when I am called away from my station
here, I shall think it rather (as Cicero says of Crassus) 'mors donata
quam vita erepta'.</p>
<p>I have often desired, but in vain, the favor of being admitted into your
private apartment at, Hamburg, and of being informed of your private life
there. Your mornings, I hope and believe, are employed in business; but
give me an account of the remainder of the day, which I suppose is, and
ought to be, appropriated to amusements and pleasures. In what houses are
you domestic? Who are so in yours? In short, let me in, and do not be
denied to me.</p>
<p>Here I am, as usual, seeing few people, and hearing fewer; drinking the
waters regularly to a minute, and am something the better for them. I read
a great deal, and vary occasionally my dead company. I converse with grave
folios in the morning, while my head is clearest and my attention
strongest: I take up less severe quartos after dinner; and at night I
choose the mixed company and amusing chit-chat of octavos and duodecimos.
'Ye tire parti de tout ce gue je puis'; that is my philosophy; and I
mitigate, as much as I can, my physical ills by diverting my attention to
other objects.</p>
<p>Here is a report that Admiral Holborne's fleet is destroyed, in a manner,
by a storm: I hope it is not true, in the full extent of the report; but I
believe it has suffered. This would fill up the measure of our
misfortunes. Adieu.</p>
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