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209.: To [PETER ANKER, Consul General of Denmark in Great Britain] - Adam Smith, Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence Vol. 6 Correspondence of Adam Smith [1740]

Edition used:

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).

Part of: The Glasgow Edition of the Works and Correspondence of Adam Smith, 7 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


209.

To [PETER ANKER, Consul General of Denmark in Great Britain]

MS., GUL Gen. 1035/133 (copy letter, unsigned); Scott 280–1.

[Edinburgh, 26 Oct. 1780]

Dear Sir,

It gave me very great pleasure to find that I had not been altogether forgotten, either by you, or by your valuable friend Mr Holt. I can plead no other excuse for having delayed so very long to answer your very obliging letter,1 except the great number of occupations in which I am necessarily involved by the duties of my Office and by my own private affairs. I did not chuse to answer your letter till I had answer’d Mr Holts.2 which required more time than I have commonly to spare. I have at last taken the liberty to inclose to you my answer to his letter which I must beg the favour of you to transmitte to him.

I have likewise taken the liberty to desire Mr Cadell to deliver to you, three copies of the second edition of my Book; I hope you will be so good as [to] accept of one of them as a memorandum of old friendship and transmitte the other two to Mr Holt, the one as a memorandum of the same kind to him, the other as a present to Mr Dreby who has done me the honour to translate my Book into your language.

It gives me great pleasure to hear from you that the arm’d Neutrality of the northern powers, does not mean to be hostile to Great Britain.3 Notwithstanding, however, the very high respect which I have for your authority, I must acknowledge that I dread a great deal from it, and hope very little. But whatever alterations may happen in the dispositions of our respective Nations towards one another, I trust no alterations will ever happen in those of our private friendship. I have the honour to be with the highest respect and esteem

Dear Sir, Your Most affectionate humble Servant

P.S. I am not sure if my address to Mr Holt at Copenhagen is sufficiently distinct. After sealing the letter you will be so good as to supply what is defective.

Copies Letters to Messrs Holt and Anker4 October 26 17804

[1 ]Not traced; possibly these letters gave news of Dræbye’s trans. of WN; see Letter 206 addressed to Cadell, dated 25 Oct. 1780.

[2 ]Letter 208, dated 26 Oct. 1780.

[3 ]On 9 July 1780, Denmark and Russia signed a treaty declaring ‘armed neutrality’ in the face of the British Navy’s enforcement of a policy of searching neutral vessels for arms and supplies for France and the former American colonies. The treaty was joined by Sweden and Prussia but proved of little value. The principles were reasserted, however, in 1797, in another treaty between Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, and this led to the battle of Copenhagen, 1801.

[4 ]Date added in a later hand.