N. B. I heartily wish you could have stayed long enough at Manheim to have been seriously and desperately in love with Madame de Taxis; who, I suppose, is a proud, insolent, fine lady, and who would consequently have expected attentions little short of adoration:  nothing would do you more good than such a passion; and I live in hopes that somebody or other will be able to excite such an one in you; your hour may not yet be come, but it will come.  Love has not been unaptly compared to the smallpox which most people have sooner or later.  Iphigenia had a wonderful effect upon Cimon; I wish some Hanover Iphigenia may try her skill upon you.

I recommend to you again, though I have already done it twice or thrice, to speak German, even affectedly, while you are at Hanover; which will show that you prefer that language, and be of more use to you there with somebody, than you can imagine.  When you carry my letters to Monsieur Munchausen and Monsieur Schwiegeldt, address yourself to them in German; the latter speaks French very well, but the former extremely ill.  Show great attention to Madame, Munchausen’s daughter, who is a great favorite; those little trifles please mothers, and sometimes fathers, extremely.  Observe, and you will find, almost universally, that the least things either please or displease most; because they necessarily imply, either a very strong desire of obliging, or an unpardonable indifference about it.  I will give you a ridiculous instance enough of this truth, from my own experience.  When I was Ambassador the first time in Holland, Comte de Wassenaer and his wife, people of the first rank and consideration, had a little boy of about three years old, of whom they were exceedingly fond; in order to make my court to them, I was so too, and used to take the child often upon my lap, and play with him.  One day his nose was very dirty, upon which I took out my handkerchief and wiped it for him; this raised a loud laugh, and they called me a very, handy nurse; but the father and mother were so pleased with it, that to this day it is an anecdote in the family, and I never receive a letter from Comte Wassenaer, but he makes me the compliments ’du morveux gue j’ai mouche autrefois’; who, by the way, I am assured, is now the prettiest young fellow in Holland.  Where one would gain people, remember that nothing is little.  Adieu.

LETTER CLXXI

London, June 26, O. S. 1752.

My dear friend:  As I have reason to fear, from your M last letter of the 18th, N. S., from Manheim, that all, or at least most of my letters to you, since you left Paris, have miscarried; I think it requisite, at all events, to repeat in this the necessary parts of those several letters, as far as they relate to your future motions.