London, February 13, O. S. 1748

Dear boy:  your last letter gave me a very satisfactory account of your manner of employing your time at Leipsig.  Go on so but for two years more, and, I promise you, that you will outgo all the people of your age and time.  I thank you for your explanation of the ‘Schriftsassen’, and ‘Amptsassen’; and pray let me know the meaning of the ‘Landsassen’.  I am very willing that you should take a Saxon servant, who speaks nothing but German, which will be a sure way of keeping up your German, after you leave Germany.  But then, I would neither have that man, nor him whom you have already, put out of livery; which makes them both impertinent and useless.  I am sure, that as soon as you shall have taken the other servant, your present man will press extremely to be out of livery, and valet de chambre; which is as much as to say, that he will curl your hair and shave you, but not condescend to do anything else.  I therefore advise you, never to have a servant out of livery; and, though you may not always think proper to carry the servant who dresses you abroad in the rain and dirt, behind a coach or before a chair, yet keep it in your power to do so, if you please, by keeping him in livery.

I have seen Monsieur and Madame Flemming, who gave me a very good account of you, and of your manners, which to tell you the plain truth, were what I doubted of the most.  She told me, that you were easy, and not ashamed:  which is a great deal for an Englishman at your age.

I set out for Bath to-morrow, for a month; only to be better than well, and enjoy, in, quiet, the liberty which I have acquired by the resignation of the seals.  You shall hear from me more at large from thence; and now good night to you.

LETTER XXIX

Bath, February 18, O. S. 1748.

Dear boy:  The first use that I made of my liberty was to come here, where I arrived yesterday.  My health, though not fundamentally bad yet, for want of proper attention of late, wanted some repairs, which these waters never fail giving it.  I shall drink them a month, and return to London, there to enjoy the comforts of social life, instead of groaning under the load of business.  I have given the description of the life that I propose to lead for the future, in this motto, which I have put up in the frize of my library in my new house:—­

     Nunc veterum libris, nunc somno, et inertibus horis
     Ducere sollicitae jucunda oblivia vitas.

I must observe to you upon this occasion, that the uninterrupted satisfaction which I expect to find in that library, will be chiefly owing to my having employed some part of my life well at your age.  I wish I had employed it better, and my satisfaction would now be complete; but, however, I planted while young, that degree of knowledge which is now my refuge and my shelter.  Make your plantations still more