<314> au risque d'y être assiégé. Voilà ce que la droite raison et l'honneur devaient vous dicter. Quant à vos fantaisies et vos caprices, sachez que je n'y fais nulle attention, ayant assez à faire avec mes ennemis; ainsi vous vous lasserez plutôt de bouder que moi de m'embarrasser de vos travers. Je suis, mon cher frère, votre fidèle frère et serviteur

Federic.

Nach der Ausfertigung. Eigenhändig.


9303. UNTERREDUNGEN DES KÖNIGS MIT DEM GROSSBRITANNISCHEN MINISTER MITCHELL.

[Dresden, 29. und 30. August 1757.]

Mitchell berichtet an Holdernesse, Dresden 31. August (secret): „My Lord. The Ring of Prussia arrived here last Monday.1 I waited on him immediately and found him in as good spirits2 as if he had returned from a successful expedition; he desired me to come to him the next day,3 when he would talk to me of business.

Yesterday I had a very long conversation with His Prussian Majesty ...

When I pressed His Prussian Majesty to communicate his thoughts of a plan for a general pacification,4 he answered he desired nothing so much as peace, but that it was impossible to propose any plan before the end of the campaign.

I then desired to know if he had yet had leisure to think of proper measures to be taken for carrying on the war with vigour. His answer was nearly the same, that, till this campaign was ended, it was impossible to determine what would be the proper measures for the next.

With regard to his views in Russia, in case of the death of the present Empress,5 he has reason to believe that the Great-Duke and -Dutchess are well inclined towards him;6 and he wishes to live in peace and friendship with them.

As to the Ottoman Porte, he thinks, if they could be brought to act, it might be of the greatest utility;7 and he added that he was


1 29. August.

2 Vergl. S. 311. Anm. 2.

3 In Mitchell's Tagebüchern wird die Unterredung vom 29. August ausführlicher erzählt. Auf diese Unterredung vom 29. bezieht sich offenbar der Hinweis in der königl. Resolution vom 30. August (Nr. 9304). Der König hat am 29. August zu Mitchell, der über die hannoverschen Neutralitätsverhandlungen (vergl. S. 315—318) beunruhigt war, gesagt: „I needed not be so much alarmed; that, though this showed very bad and unfair intentions, yet it must take time, before a thing of that sort could be negotiated between the courts of Vienna and Paris (for at this time we had no suspicion of any negociation but with the court of Vienna); that it might perhaps occasion some jealousy and misunderstanding between them, of which we might profit, if the English ministry still remained firm. He concluded with desiring me to come the next day to him.“ Tagebücher Mitchell's in den Memoirs and papers of Sir Andrew Mitchell; by Bisset. I, 365. 366.:

4 Vergl. S. 229.

5 Vergl. S. 141; Bd. XIV, 557.

6 Vergl. Bd. XIV, 557.

7 Vergl. S. 162. 163; Bd. XIII, 619; XIV, 559.