160.: From WILLIAM STRAHAN - Adam Smith, Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 6 Correspondence of Adam Smith [1740]
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Correspondence of Adam Smith, ed. E. C. Mossner and I. S. Ross, vol. VI of the Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1987).
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160.
From WILLIAM STRAHAN
- Address: Dr Adam Smith, Kirkaldy, N.B.
MS., RSE viii. 48 (marked ‘copy’); J. A. Cochrane, Dr Johnson’s Printer: The Life of William Strachan (London, 1964), 138, 202 (in part).
London, 10 June 1776
Dear Sir
I am favoured with yours. You rightly consider writing to Mr Cadell or to me as the same, when you write about Business. Your Bill shall be duly honoured, and Mr Cadell will write you particularly about the Sale of your Book in a few Days.
I am very glad to hear you are in perfect Health, and that your worthy Parent is as well as can be expected. I beg you will remember me to her with great Respect. Pray do you think she will be able to accompany you to London about the End of the Summer?
Sir John Pringle had a Letter from Mr Hume a few Days ago, and I had one today, by which I am sorry to find all the good Symptoms that attended his first Tryal of the Bath Water are now vanished. His Distemper has returned with its usual Violence; So he intends to leave that Place, and try Buxton. I expect him in Town every Hour in his way thither. You cannot think how much Concern I feel for his present Situation, tho’ he himself writes with Magnanimity and Resignation. Some Particulars he has communicated, and some Directions he has given about his Works, in case of his Death, which shall be duly attended to and religiously observed. You already know all, for I need not say more of this to you till I see you. My Instructions are to keep an entire Silence upon the Subject to every body else.
Along with this melancholy Account of our most valuable Friend, I have the Satisfaction to acquaint you, from the best Authority, that General Carlton having received some Succours about the 9th of May by two of our Men of War (I forget their Names) made a Sally from Quebec with a thousand Men, before whom the Besiegers, thrice their Number, fled with the utmost Precipitation without making the least Resistance, leaving behind them their whole Artillery, Stores, and every thing, even their very Dinners upon their Tables. The General had sent Parties in Pursuit of them; but I have heard no farther Particulars. This important News came by a Capt Hamilton, and I had this Account of [it] from Sir Hugh Palliser and Mr Stephens’s own mouths at the Admiralty this Morning. It will doubtless be in tomorrow’s Gazette; but I write tonight to give you a Chance of having [it] a Day sooner than your Neighbour will probably have. As General Burgoyne is doubtless got there, our Force in that Province is now very respectable. Indeed the Preservation of it was of the utmost Consequence, as had it been lost, our affairs in America would have been nearly desperate. Two hundred men were on their way to reinforce the Provincials before Quebec; so that it is matter of great Surprise what could induce them to act so cowardly a Part. You would see by the last Gazette, at the same time, what Havock our Navy was making among their Shipping, no less than 70 and upwards of their Ships having already fallen into our Hands. If we proceed at this Rate we shall soon make them weary of opposing themselves to the Strength of Old England, which I hope will still prove triumphant over all her Enemies, Domestic as well as Foreign. This is no awkward beginning of the Campaign; nor is little to be expected from the Operations of our Fleet during the Summer, as they are but just now got into their Gears, as Sir H. Palliser expressed it a few Days ago.
Whenever I can convey to you any Intelligence which you are not likely to receive from any other Quarter, or can give it you sooner than you can have it by the usual Channels of Conveyance, I shall be sure to write you, that I may contri[bute] my Mite towards making your Retirement as agreeable to you as possible.
I am Dear Sir Your most affectionate and faithful humble Servt
Will: Strahan
General Carlton has great Merit as a Soldier, and will, I hope, prove an Exception to the general Maxim with regard to the Characters of the Age.
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