I have no news to send you, as things here are extremely quiet; so, good-night.

LETTER CCXX

London, April 25, 1758.

Dear friend:  I am now two letters in your debt, which I think is the first time that ever I was so, in the long course of our correspondence.  But, besides that my head has been very much out of order of late, writing is by no means that easy thing that it was to me formerly.  I find by experience, that the mind and the body are more than married, for they are most intimately united; and when the one suffers, the other sympathizes.  ‘Non sum qualis eram’:  neither my memory nor my invention are now what they formerly were.  It is in a great measure my own fault; I cannot accuse Nature, for I abused her; and it is reasonable I should suffer for it.

I do not like the return of the impression upon your lungs; but the rigor of the cold may probably have brought it upon you, and your lungs not in fault.  Take care to live very cool, and let your diet be rather low.

We have had a second winter here, more severe than the first, at least it seemed so, from a premature summer that we had, for a fortnight, in March; which brought everything forward, only to be destroyed.  I have experienced it at Blackheath, where the promise of fruit was a most flattering one, and all nipped in the bud by frost and snow, in April.  I shall not have a single peach or apricot.

I have nothing to tell you from hence concerning public affairs, but what you read in the newspapers.  This only is extraordinary:  that last week, in the House of Commons, above ten millions were granted, and the whole Hanover army taken into British pay, with but one single negative, which was Mr. Viner’s.

Mr. Pitt gains ground in the closet, and yet does not lose it in the public.  That is new.

Monsieur Kniphausen has dined with me; he is one of the prettiest fellows I have seen; he has, with a great deal of life and fire, ’les manieres d’un honnete homme, et le ton de la Parfaitement bonne compagnie’.  You like him yourself; try to be like him:  it is in your power.

I hear that Mr. Mitchel is to be recalled, notwithstanding the King of Prussia’s instances to keep him.  But why, is a secret that I cannot penetrate.

You will not fail to offer the Landgrave, and the Princess of Hesse (who I find are going home), to be their agent and commissioner at Hamburg.

I cannot comprehend the present state of Russia, nor the motions of their armies.  They change their generals once a week; sometimes they march with rapidity, and now they lie quiet behind the Vistula.  We have a thousand stories here of the interior of that government, none of which I believe.  Some say, that the Great Duke will be set aside.