In your commerce with women, and indeed with men too, une certaine douceur * is particularly engaging; it is that which conftitutes that character which the French talk of fo much, and fo juftly value; I mean l'amiable. This douceur is not fo easily described as felt. It is the compound refult of different things: a complaifance, a flexibility, but not a fervility of manners: an air of foftnefs in the countenance, gesture, and expreffion; equally, whether you concur or differ with the perfon you converfe with. Obferve thofe carefully who have that douceur which charms you and others; and your own good fenfe will foon enable you to difcover the different ingredients of which it is compofed. You must be more particularly attentive to this douceur, whenever you are obliged to refufe what is afked of you, or to fay what in itself cannot be very agreeable to thofe to whom you fay it. It is then the neceflary gilding of a difagreeable pill. L'aimable confifts in a thousand of thefe little things aggregately. It is the fuavitèr in modo, which I have fo often recommended to you. The refpectable, Mr. Harte affures me, you do not want; and I believe him. Study then carefully, and acquire perfectly the aimable, and you will have every thing.

Abbé Guafco, who is another of your panegyrifts, writes me word, that he has taken you to dinner at Marquis de St. Germain's; where you will be wel come as often as you please, and the oftener the better. Profit of that, upon the principle of travelling in different countries, without changing places. He fays too, that he will take you to the parliament, when any remarkable caufe is to be tried. That is very well; go through the feveral chambers of the parliament, and fee and hear what they are doing; join practice and obfervation to your theoretical knowledge of their rights and privileges. No Englishmen has the leaft notion of them.

I need not recommend you to go to the bottom of the conftitutional and political knowledge of countries;

Suavity of manners,

for Mr. Harte tells me, that you have a peculiar turn that way, and have informed yourself most correctly

of them..

I must now put fome queries to you, as to a juris publici peritust, which I am fure you can anfwer me, and which I own I cannot anfwer myfelf: they are upon a fubject now much talked of.

ift. Are there any particular forms requifite for the election of a king of the Romans, different from those which are neceffary for the election of an emperor?

2dly. Is not a king of the Romans as legally elected by the votes of a majority of the electors, as by twothirds, or by the unanimity of the clectors?

3dly. Is there any particular law, or conftitution of the empire, that diftinguishes, either in matter or in form, the election of a king of the Romans from that of an emperor? And is not the golden bull of Charles the Fourth equally the rule for both?

4thly. Were there not, at a meeting of a certain number of the electors (I have forgotten when) fome rules and limitations agreed upon concerning the election of a king of the Romans? And were thofe reftrictions legal, and did they obtain the force of law?

How happy am I, my dear child, that I can apply to you for knowledge, and with a certainty of being rightly informed? It is knowledge, more than quick, flashy parts, that makes a man of bufinefs. Aman who is mafter of his matter, will, with inferior parts, be too hard in parliament, and indeed any where elfe, for a man of better parts, who knows his fubject but fuperficially: and if to his knowledge he joins eloquence and elocution, he must neceffarily foon be at the head of that affembly: but without thofe two, no knowledge is fufficient.

Lord Huntingdon writes me word he has feen you, and that you have renewed your old fchool-acquaintance. Tell me fairly your opinion of him, and of his friend Lord Stormont; and alfo of the other English people of fathion you meet with. I promife you in

Skilled in the public law of the empire.

Bb

violable fecrecy on my part. You and I muft now write to each other as friends, and without the least referve; there will for the future be a thoufand things in my letters, which I would not have any mortal living but yourself fee or know. Thofe you will eafily diftinguish, and neither fhow nor repeat; and I will do the fame by you.

To come to another fubject, for I have a pleasure in talking over every fubject with you-how deep are you in Italian? Do you understand Ariofto, Taffo, Bocaccio, and Machiavelli? If you do, you know enough of it, and may know all the reft, by reading, when you have time. Little or no bufinefs is written in Italian, except in Italy; and if you know enough of it to understand the few Italian letters that may in time come in your way, and to speak Italian tolerably to thofe very few Italians who fpeak no French, give yourself no farther trouble about that language, till you happen to have full leisure to perfect yourself in it. It is not the fame with regard to German; your speaking and writing that well will particularly distinguish you from every other man in England; and is, moreover, of great ufe to any one who is, as probably you will be, employed in the empire. Therefore, pray cultivate it feduloufly, by writing four or five lines of German every day, and by fpeaking it to every German you meet with.

I have a packet of books to fend you by the first opportunity, which, I believe will be Mr. Yorke's return to Paris. The Greek books come from Mr. Harte, and the English ones from your humble fer

vant.

Read them with great attention, as well to the style as to the matter. Style is the drefs of thoughts, and a well dreffed thought, like a well dreffed man, appears to great advantage. Yours.-Adieu.

LETTER CIX.

Bad writing..Signatures....Poulets... Hafte and Hurry...Civility to old acquaintances... Friends.

MY DEAR FRIEND,

London, January the 28th

A BILL for ninety pounds fterling, was brought

me the other day, faid to be drawn upon me by you;I fcrupled paying it at first, not upon account of the fum, but because you had fent me no letter of advice, which is always done in thofe tranfactions; and still more, because I did not perceive that you had figned it. The perfon who prefented it defired me to look again, and that I fhould difcover your name at the bottom; accordingly I looked again, and with the help of my magnifying glafs, did perceive, that what I had first taken only for fomebody's mark, was, in truth, your name, written in the worst and smallest hand I ever faw in my life. I cannot write quite fo ill; however I paid it at a venture, though I would almoft rather lofe the money than that fuch a fignature thould be yours. All gentlemen, and all men of bufinefs, write their names always in the fame way, that their fignature may be fo well known as not to be eafily counterfeited; and they generally fign in rather a larger character than their common hand: whereas your name was in a lefs, and a worse than your common writing. This fuggefted to me the various accidents which may very probably happen to you, while you write fo ill. For instance, if you were to write in fuch a character to the fecretary's office, your letter would immediately be fent to the decypherer, as containing matters of the utmoft fecrecy, not fit to be trufted to the common character. If you were to write fo to an antiquarian, he (knowing you to be a man of learning) would certainly try it by the Runic, Celtic, or Scalvonian alphabet; never fufpecting it to be a modern character. And, if you were to fend a poulett to a fine woman, in fuch a hand, fhe would think that it really

A Love-letter.

came from the poulaillier,+ which, by the bye is the et ymology of the word poulet; for Henry the Fourth of France ufed to fend billets-doux to his miftreffes, by his poulaillier, under the pretence of fending them chickens; which gave the name of poulets to thofe fhort, but expreflive manufcripts. I have often told you, that evey man, who has the ufe of his eyes and of his hand, can write whatever hand he pleafes; and it is plain that you can, fince you write both the Greek and German characters, which you never learned of a wriring-mafter, extremely well, though your common hand, which you learned of a mafter, is an exceeding bad and illiberal one, equally unfit for business or comnon ufe. I do not defire that you fhould write the laboured ftiff character of a writing-mafter a man of bufinefs muft write quick and weil; and that depends fingly upon ufe. I would therefore advife you to get fome very good writing-mafter at Paris, and apply to it for a month only, which will be fuflicient; for, upon my word, the writing of a genteel plain hand of buf cfs is of much more importance than you think. You will fay, it may be, that when you write fo very ill, it is because you are in a hurry to which I anfwer, why are you ever in a hurry? A man of fenfe may be in hafte, but can never be in a hurry, because he knows, that whatever he does in a hurry he must neceffarily do very ill. He may be in hafte to dispatch an affair, but he will take care not to let that hafte hinder his doing it well. Little minds are in a hurry, when the object. proves (as it commonly does) too big for them; they run, they hare, they puzzle, confound, and perplex themfelves; they want to do every thing at once, and never do it at all. But a man of fenfe takes the time, neceffary for doing the thing he is about, well; and his hafte to difpatch a bufinefs only appears by the continuity of his application to it; he purfues it with a cool fteadinefs, and finifhes it before he begins any I own your time is much taken up, and you have a great many different things to do; but remem

other.

A Poulterer.