I represented to him that between the Friday, the day
the despatches from the court arrived, and Saturday, on which ours
were sent off, there was not sufficient time to write so much in
cipher, and carry on the considerable correspondence with which I
was charged for the same courier. He found an admirable expedient,
which was to prepare on Thursday the answer to the despatches we
were expected to receive on the next day. This appeared to him so
happily imagined, that notwithstanding all I could say on the
impossibility of the thing, and the absurdity of attempting its
execution, I was obliged to comply during the whole time I
afterwards remained with him, after having made notes of the few loose
words he spoke to me in the course of the week, and of some trivial
circumstances which I collected by hurrying from place to place.
Provided with these materials I never once failed carrying to him on
the Thursday morning a rough draft of the despatches which were to
be sent off on Saturday, excepting the few additions and corrections I
hastily made in answer to the letters which arrived on the Friday, and
to which ours served for answer. He had another custom, diverting
enough, and which made his correspondence ridiculous beyond
imagination. He sent back all information to its respective source,
instead of making it follow its course. To M. Amelot he transmitted
the news of the court; to M. Maurepas, that of Paris; to M.
d'Havrincourt, the news from Sweden; to M.
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