On the 13th of January 1787 then we quitted Potzdam, strongly impressed by the beauties of a town apparently fabricated by a modern Cadmus, who, when all the soldiers that he could raise were fallen in battle for his amusement, retired with the five that were left, and built a fine city!

Brandenbourg was our next resting place, and seemed to me to merit a longer stay in it; I saw an old Runick figure in the street, its size colossal, and its composition seemed black basalt; but of this I could obtain no account for want of language, our still recurring torment.—This place seems fuller of inhabitants than the last; but it is so melancholy to have no compensation for the fatigues of a tedious journey! and in these countries information cannot be procured for travellers that do not mean to reside, present letters, &c.; which task we have at this season little taste to renew.

Magdebourg makes a respectable appearance at a distance, from the loftiness of its turrets; one sees them at least four long hours before the roads which lead to it permit one’s approach; and the towers seem to retire before one, like Ulysses’s fictitious country raised to deceive him. Never was I so weary in my life as when we entered Magdebourg, where, instead of going out to see sights as usual, I desired nothing so sincerely as a hot supper and soft bed, which the inns of Germany never fail to afford us in even elegant perfection.

Our linen too, so beautifully, and I will add so unnecessarily fine! The king of Naples probably never saw such sheets and table-cloths as we have been comforted with here, not only at Dresden, but every post since.

Magdebourg seems to have almost all its streets united by bridges; the Elbe divides there into so many branches, and none of them small.

Helmstadt is a little place which affords few images to the mind, and Brunswick to mere passengers, as we were, seemed to yield none but sad ones. The houses all of wood, even to prince Ferdinand’s palace, and painted of a dull olive colour with heavy pensile roofs, giving the town a melancholy look; but we met with young Englishmen who commended the society, and said no place could be gayer than Brunswick. This is among the reports one wishes to be true, and we are led the more willingly to believe them.

Another delight which I enjoyed at this city was, to find that every body in it, and every body passing through it, adored the duchess, whose partial fondness, and tender remembrance of her native country, justly endears her name to every subject of Great Britain. Her chapel is pretty; the garden, where they said she always walked two hours every day, put me in mind of Gray’s-Inn walks twenty or thirty years ago; they were then very like it.

From these scenes of solitude without retirement, and of age without antiquity, I was willing enough to be gone; but they would shew me one curiosity they said, as I seemed to feel particular pleasure in speaking of their charming duchess. We followed, and were shewn her coffin! all in silver, finely carved, chased, engraved, what you will. “Before she is dead!” exclaimed I—“Before she was even married, madam,” replied our Cicerone; “it is the very finest ever made in Brunswick; we had it ready for her against she came home to us, and you see the plate left vacant for her age.” I was glad to drive forward now, and slept at Peina; which, though in itself a miserable place, exhibits one consolatory sight for a Christian—the sight of toleration. Here Romanists, Lutherans, and Calvinists, live all affectionately and quietly together, under the protection of the bishop of Paderborne; and here I first saw the king of England’s livery upon the king of England’s servants since I left home—“And if they are ragged youngsters who wear it,” said I, “they are my fellow-subjects, and glad am I to see them!”

The villages and churches hereabouts resemble those of Merionethshire, only that not a mountain rears its head at all—one vast, wide, barren flat, through which roads that no weather can render better than barely passable brought us at length to Hanover, which stands, as all these cities do in the north of Germany, upon an immense plain, with a thick wood of noble timber trees breaking from time to time the almost boundless void, and relieving the eye, which is fatigued by extent without any object to repose upon, in a manner I can with difficulty comprehend, much less explain; but the sight of a passing waggon, or distant spire, is a felicity seldom found, though continually sought by me, while travelling through these wide wasted countries, where no idea is afforded to the imagination, no image remitted to the mind, but that of two armies encountering each other, to dispute the plunder of some place already unable to feed its few inhabitants.

The horses however are exceedingly beautiful; we were offered a pair of very fine ones for only forty pounds. They would have run such hazards getting home! “There are two ways to chuse out of,” said I; “if we purchase them, we shall repent on it every day till we arrive in London; if we do not, we shall repent on it every day after we get there.” Such is life! we did not buy the cattle.

The cleanliness of the windows, the manner of paving and lighting the streets at Hanover, put us in mind a little of some country towns in the remoter provinces of England; and there seems to be likewise a little glimpse of British manners, dress, &c. breaking through the common and natural fashions of the country. This was very pleasing to us, but I wished the place grander; I do not very well know why, but we had long counted on comforts here as at home, and I had formed expectations of something much more magnificent than we found; though the Duke of York’s residence does give the town an air of cheerfulness it scarce could shew without that advantage; and here are concerts and balls, and efforts at being gay, which may probably succeed sometime. How did all the talk however, and all the pamphlets, and all the lamentations made by old King George’s new subjects, rush into my mind, when I recollected the loud, illiberal, and indecent clamours made from the year 1720 to the year 1750, at least till the alarm given by the Rebellion began to operate, and open people’s eyes to the virtues of the reigning family! for till then, no topic had so completely engrossed both press and conversation, as the misfortunes accruing to poor old England, from their King’s desire of enriching his Electoral dominions, and feeding his favourite Hanoverians with their good guineas, making fat the objects of his partial tenderness with their best treasures—in good time! Such groundless charges remind one of a story the famous French wit Monsieur de Menage tells of his mother and her maid, who, having wasted or sold a pound of butter, laid the theft upon the cat, persisting so violently that it had been all devoured by the rapacious favourite, that Madame de Menage said, “It’s very well; we will weigh the cat, poor thing! and know the truth:” The scales were produced, but puss could be found to weigh only three quarters, after all her depredations.