"I leave here two works going on: a new edition of my Essays, all of which you have seen, except one, 'Of the Protestant Succession,' where I treat that subject as coolly and indifferently as I would the dispute between Cæsar and Pompey. The conclusion shows me a Whig, but a very sceptical one. Some people would frighten me with the consequences that may attend this candour, considering my present station; but I own I cannot apprehend any thing.
"The other work is the 'Philosophical Essays,' which you dissuaded me from printing. I won't justify the prudence of this step, any other way than by expressing my indifference about all the consequences that may follow. I will expect to hear from you; as you may from me. Remember me to Mrs. Home, and believe me to be yours most sincerely.
"P.S.—We set out on Friday next for Harwich."[239:1]
Of his second appointment under General St. Clair, on the duties of which he entered at the beginning of the year 1748, Hume thus speaks in his "own life," after having mentioned the descent on the coast of France,—
"Next year, to wit, 1747, I received an invitation
from the General to attend him in the same station in his military embassy to the courts of Vienna and Turin. I then wore the uniform of an officer, and was introduced at these courts as aid-de-camp to the General, along with Sir Harry Erskine and Captain Grant, now General Grant. These two years were almost the only interruptions which my studies have received during the course of my life. I passed them agreeably, and in good company; and my appointments, with my frugality, had made me reach a fortune, which I called independent, though most of my friends were inclined to smile when I said so: in short, I was now master of near a thousand pounds."
We fortunately possess a more detailed account of his adventures and observations on this occasion, in a pretty minute journal which he transmitted to his brother, for the amusement of his family at home.[240:1] It requires no farther introduction, and is as follows:—
"Hague, 3d March, 1748, N. S.
"Dear Brother,—I have taken a fancy, for your amusement, to write a sort of journal of our travels, and to send you the whole from Turin, by a messenger whom we are to despatch from thence. I shall endeavour to find little snatches of leisure in the several towns through which we shall pass, and shall give you an account of the appearances of things, more than of our own adventures. The former may be some entertainment, but the other will in all probability contain little diversity, at least for some time.
"We set out from Harwich the day I wrote you