BATH, October 28, 1758.
MY DEAR FRIEND: Your letter has quieted my alarms; for I find by it, that
you are as well recovered as you could be in so short a time. It is your
business now to keep yourself well by scrupulously following Dr.
Middleton’s directions. He seems to be a rational and knowing man. Soap
and steel are, unquestionably, the proper medicines for your case; but as
they are alteratives, you must take them for a very long time, six months
at least; and then drink chalybeate waters. I am fully persuaded, that
this was your original complaint in Carniola, which those ignorant
physicians called, in their jargon, ‘Arthritis vaga’, and treated as
such. But now that the true cause of your illness is discovered, I
flatter myself that, with time and patience on your part, you will be
radically cured; but, I repeat it again, it must be by a long and
uninterrupted course of those alterative medicines above mentioned. They
have no taste; but if they had a bad one, I will not now suppose you such
a child, as to let the frowardness of your palate interfere in the least
with the recovery or enjoyment of health. The latter deserves the utmost
attention of the most rational man; the former is the only proper object
of the care of a dainty, frivolous woman.
The run of luck, which some time ago we were in, seems now to be turned
against us. Oberg is completely routed; his Prussian Majesty was
surprised (which I am surprised at), and had rather the worst of it. I am
in some pain for Prince Ferdinand, as I take it for granted that the
detachment from Marechal de Contade’s army, which enabled Prince Soubize
to beat Oberg, will immediately return to the grand army, and then it
will be infinitely superior.
Nor do I see where Prince Ferdinand can take his winter quarters, unless
he retires to Hanover; and that I do not take to be at present the land
of Canaan. Our second expedition to St. Malo I cannot call so much an
unlucky, as an ill-conducted one; as was also Abercrombie’s affair in
America. ‘Mais il n’y a pas de petite perte qui revient souvent’: and all
these accidents put together make a considerable sum total.
I have found so little good by these waters, that I do not intend to stay
here above a week longer; and then remove my crazy body to London, which
is the most convenient place either to live or die in.
I cannot expect active health anywhere; you may, with common care and
prudence, effect it everywhere; and God grant that you may have it!
Adieu.