but they appoint a new Controller-General; a M. de Silhouette, who
is thought to have an extraordinary creative genius in Finance.
Had he but a Fortunatus-Purse, how lucky were it! With Fortunatus
Silhouette as purse-holder, with a fiery young Choiseul on this
hand, and a fiery old Belleisle on that, Pompadour meditates great
things this Year,--Invasions of England; stronger German Armies;
better German Plans, and slashings home upon Hanover itself, or the
vital point;--and flatters herself, and her poor Louis, that there
is on the anvil, for 1759, such a French Campaign as will perhaps
astonish Pitt and another insolent King. Very fixed, fell and
feminine is the Pompadour's humor in this matter. Nor is the
Czarina's less so; but more, if possible; unappeasable except by
death. Imperial Maria Theresa has masculine reasons withal;
great hopes, too, of late. Of the War's ending till flat
impossibility stop it, there is no likelihood.

To Pitt this Campaign 1759, in spite of bad omens at the outset,
proved altogether splendid: but greatly the reverse on Friedrich's
side; to whom it was the most disastrous and unfortunate he had yet
made, or did ever make. Pitt at his zenith in public reputation;
Friedrich never so low before, nothing seemingly but extinction
near ahead, when this Year ended. The truth is, apart from his
specific pieces of ill-luck, there had now begun for Friedrich a
new rule of procedure, which much altered his appearance in the
world. Thrice over had he tried by the aggressive or invasive
method; thrice over made a plunge at the enemy's heart, hoping so
to disarm or lame him: but that, with resources spent to such a
degree, is what he cannot do a fourth time: he is too weak
henceforth to think of that.