It was a very singular affair, the generals on both sides slain, and on both sides the second in command wounded; in short, very near what battles should be, in which only the principals ought to suffer. If their army has not ammunition and spirit enough to fall again upon ours before Amherst comes up, all North America is ours!
Poetic justice could not have been executed with more rigour than it has been on the perjury, treachery, and usurpations of the French. I hope Mr.-Pitt will not leave them at the next treaty an opportunity of committing so many national crimes again. How they or we can make a peace, I don't see; can we give all back, or they give all up? No, they must come hither; they have nothing left for @it but to conquer us.
Don't think it is from forgetting to tell you particulars, that I tell you none; I am here, and don't know one but what you will see in the Gazette, and by which it appears that the victory was owing to the impracticability, as the French thought, and to desperate resolution on our side. What a scene! an army in the night dragging itself up a precipice by stumps of trees to assault a town and attack an army strongly entrenched and double in numbers!
Adieu ! I think I shall not write to you again this twelvemonth; for, like Alexander, we have no more worlds left to conquer.
P. S. Monsieur Thurot is said to be sailed with his tiny squadron —but can the lords of America be afraid of half a dozen canoes ? Mr. Chute is sitting by me, and says, nobody is more obliged to Mr. Pitt than you are: he has raised you from a very comfortable situation to hold your head above the Capitol.
517 Letter 340 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Oct. 21, 1759.
Your pictures shall be sent as soon as any of us go to London, but I think that will not be till the Parliament meets. Can we easily leave the remains of such a year as this? It is still all gold. I have not dined or gone to bed by a fire till the day before yesterday. Instead of the glorious and ever-memorable year 1759, as the newspapers call it, I call it this ever-warm and victorious year. We have not had more conquest than fine weather: one would think we had plundered East and West Indies of sunshine. Our bells are worn threadbare with ringing for victories. I believe it will require ten votes of the House of Commons before the people will believe it is the Duke of Newcastle that has done this, and not Mr. Pitt. One thing is very fatiguing—all the world is made knights or generals. Adieu I don't know a word of news less than the conquest of America. Adieu! yours ever.
P ' S. You shall hear from me again if we take Mexico or China before Christmas.
P. S. I had sealed my letter, but break it open again, having forgot to tell you that Mr. Cowslade has the pictures of Lord and Lady Cutts, and is willing to sell them.
518 Letter 341 To The Earl Of Strafford. Strawberry Hill, October 30th, 1759.