e in Europe, during the last century, from the treaty of Vervins.
Three parts in four of this book are not worth your reading, as they
relate to treaties of very little importance; but if you select the most
considerable ones, read them with attention, and take some notes, it will
be of great use to you. Attend chiefly to those in which the great powers
of Europe are the parties; such as the treaty of the Pyrenees, between
France and Spain; the treaties of Nimeguen and Ryswick; but, above all,
the treaty of Munster should be most circumstantially and minutely known
to you, as almost every treaty made since has some reference to it. For
this, Pere Bougeant is the best book you can read, as it takes in the
thirty years' war, which preceded that treaty. The treaty itself, which
is made a perpetual law of the empire, comes in the course of your
lectures upon the 'Jus Publicum Imperii'.

In order to furnish you with materials for a letter, and at the same time
to inform both you and myself of what it is right that we should know,
pray answer me the following questions:

How many companies are there in the Saxon regiments of foot? How many men
in each company?

How many troops in the regiments of horse and dragoons; and how many men
in each?

What number of commissioned and non-commissioned officers in a company of
foot, or in a troop of horse or dragoons? N. B. Noncommissioned officers
are all those below ensigns and cornets.

What is the daily pay of a Saxon foot soldier, dragoon, and trooper?

What are the several ranks of the 'Etat Major-general'? N. B. The Etat
Major-general is everything above colonel. The Austrians have no
brigadiers, and the French have no major-generals in their Etat Major.
What have the Saxons? Adieu!

LETTER XXXIV

LONDON, March 27, O. S. 1748.

DEAR BOY: This little packet will be delivered to you by one Monsieur
Duval, who is going to the fair at Leipsig. He is a jeweler, originally
of Geneva, but who has been settled here these eight or ten years, and a
very sensible fellow: pray do be very civil to him.

As I advised you, some time ago, to inform yourself of the civil and
military establishments of as many of the kingdoms and states of Europe,
as you should either be in yourself, or be able to get authentic accounts
of, I send you here a little book, in which, upon the article of Hanover,
I have pointed out the short method of putting down these informations,
by way of helping