DIARIES AND CORRESPONDENCE OF JAMES HARRIS, FIRST EARL OF MALMESBURY; CONTAINING AN ACCOUNT OF HIS MISSIONS TO THE COURTS OF MADRID, AND OF HIS SPECIAL MISSIONS TO BERLIN, BRUNSWICK, AND THE FRENCH REPUBLIC. EDITED BY HIS GRANDSON, THE THIRD EARL. VOL. II. LONDON: RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET, 1844. DIARIES AND CORRESPONDENCE. RUSSIA. EXTRACT OF A DESPATCH FROM SIR JAMES HARRIS TO LORD GRANTHAM. Petersburg, 14th, 25th October, 1782. I HAVE very little to trouble your Lordship with in figures. Prince Potemkin is extremely satisfied with his journey, but convinced by experience that his new-built town of Kerson is only proper to be a trading, not a military post, and the idea of reducing it to this seems now resolved on. He saw the deposed Khan on the frontiers of the Crimea for two hours. I understand he thinks very meanly of him, and that he is a wild, injudicious character. The Prince has confirmed the Empress in all her projects, and the steps necessary to their execution are going on with unremitting activity. DESPATCH FROM SIR JAMES HARRIS TO LORD MOUNTSTUART, TURIN. Petersburg, 14th, 25th October, 1782. MY LORD, As this is properly my first ministerial despatch to you, I shall take up my tale ab ovo, and bring it down to the present times. I wish I could boast my mission had, in any proportion, been as successful as it has been fatiguing and eventful. VOL. II. B |