George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 4, 15th edition.

[435] early in February, Bedford, though a member of the

chap. XIX.} 1762.

cabinet, offered a resolution in the House of Lords against continuing the war in Germany. In the debate Bute did but assume an appearance of opposition, and the question was only evaded and postponed. It was evidently the royal wish to compel Frederic to the hard necessity of ceding territory to Austria. A statement was demanded of him of his idea on the subject of peace, and of his resources for holding out, as a preliminary to the renewal of the subsidy from England. But he rendered no such account, which could have been but an inventory of his weakness. The armies of Russia were encamped in Prussia Proper; to Gallitzin the minister of Russia at London, Bute intimated that England would aid the emperor to retain a part of the conquests made from the king of Prussia, if he would continue to hold him in check. But the chivalric Czar, indignant at the perfidy, inclosed Gallitzin's despatch to Frederic himself,¹ and hastening to reconcile his empire with his illustrious friend, restored all the conquests that had been made from the kingdom to that prince, settled with him a peace including a guaranty of Silesia, and finally transferred a Russian army to his camp. The fact, that Prussia had transformed Russia from an enemy into an ally, while England had a new enemy in Spain, and a dependent in Portugal, gave a plausible reason for discontinuing the grant to Prussia. Still the subsidy was promised; but ‘the condition of the bounty² of this nation,’ wrote Bute, at the king's command, ‘is the employment of it towards ’