My dear friend:  I have your letter of the 9th now before me, and condole with you upon the present solitude and inaction of Hamburg.  You are now shrunk from the dignity and importance of a consummate minister, to be but, as it were, a common man.  But this has, at one time or another, been the case of most great men; who have not always had equal opportunities of exerting their talents.  The greatest must submit to the capriciousness of fortune; though they can, better than others, improve the favorable moments.  For instance, who could have thought, two years ago, that you would have been the Atlas of the Northern Pole; but the Good Genius of the North ordered it so; and now that you have set that part of the globe right, you return to ‘otium cum dignitate’.  But to be serious:  now that you cannot have much office business to do, I could tell you what to do, that would employ you, I should think, both usefully and agreeably.  I mean, that you should write short memoirs of that busy scene, in which you have been enough concerned, since your arrival at Hamburg, to be able to put together authentic facts and anecdotes.  I do not know whether you will give yourself the trouble to do it or not; but I do know, that if you will, ‘olim hcec meminisse juvabit’.  I would have them short, but correct as to facts and dates.

I have told Alt, in the strongest manner, your lamentations for the loss of the House of Cassel, ‘et il en fera rapport a son Serenissime Maitre’.  When you are quite idle (as probably you may be, some time this summer), why should you not ask leave to make a tour to Cassel for a week? which would certainly be granted you from hence, and which would be looked upon as a ‘bon procede’ at Cassel.

The King of Prussia is probably, by this time, at the gates of Vienna, making the Queen of Hungary really do what Monsieur de Bellisle only threatened; sign a peace upon the ramparts of her capital.  If she is obstinate, and will not, she must fly either to Presburg or to Inspruck, and Vienna must fall.  But I think he will offer her reasonable conditions enough for herself; and I suppose, that, in that case, Caunitz will be reasonable enough to advise her to accept of them.  What turn would the war take then?  Would the French and Russians carry it on without her?  The King of Prussia, and the Prince of Brunswick, would soon sweep them out of Germany.  By this time, too, I believe, the French are entertained in America with the loss of Cape Breton; and, in consequence of that, Quebec; for we have a force there equal to both those undertakings, and officers there, now, that will execute what Lord L------never would so much as attempt.  His appointments were too considerable to let him do anything that might possibly put an end to the war.  Lord Howe, upon seeing plainly that he was resolved to do nothing, had asked leave to return, as well as Lord Charles Hay.