Faites venir mon trompette." Now I dare say in his own country this Major
would not have disdained even the "schwarze Bier" of Brandenburgh.
Scarcely any quarrels, I believe, take place between the English and
French, nor did I hear of any violent fracas but one. In this instance, the
English officers concerned must have been sad, brutal, vulgar fellows.
They, however, after behaving in a most gross insulting manner, were
compelled by some Frenchmen not to eat but to drink their words, and that
out of a vessel not usually employed in drinking. I shall not repeat the
contemptible affair, but it furnished the subject of a caricature.
The English officers in general behave in a handsome and liberal manner,
and their conduct was spoken of in high terms of encomium by very many of
the French themselves. I regret however exceedingly that any of the British
officers should have imbibed the low prejudices and vulgar hatred against
the French, which certain people preach up in England to cover their own
peculations and interested views. A young friend of mine, with whom I was
one day talking on political subjects, said to me: "I cannot help agreeing
with you in many things, but I am staggered when I think that your ideas
and reasoning are so contrary to the ideas in which I have been brought up;
so that I rather avoid entering at all on political questions.
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