Ann in 1735. The British diplomatist at St. Petersburg is
reporting about his endeavours to induce Russia to conclude peace with
the Turks. The passages omitted are irrelevant.

[2] England was at that time negotiating a commercial treaty with
Russia.

[3] To this time it has remained among historians a point of
controversy, whether or not Panin was in the pay of Frederick II. of
Prussia, and whether he was so behind the back of Catherine, or at her
bidding. There can exist no doubt that Catherine II., in order to
identify foreign Courts with Russian Ministers, allowed Russian
Ministers ostensibly to identify themselves with foreign Courts. As to
Panin in particular, the question is, however, decided by an authentic
document which we believe has never been published. It proves that,
having once become the man of Frederick II., he was forced to remain so
at the risk of his honour, fortune and life.

[4] The Russian Minister at London.

[5] The oligarchic Constitution set up by the Senate after the death of
Charles XII.

[6] Thus we learn from Sir George Macartney that what is commonly known
as Lord Chatham's "grand conception of the Northern Alliance," was, in
fact, Panin's "grand scheme of uniting the Powers of the North." Chatham
was duped into fathering the Muscovite plan.

[7] The compact between the Bourbons of France and Spain concluded at
Paris on August, 1761.

[8] This was a subterfuge on the part of Frederick II. The manner in
which Frederick was forced into the arms of the Russian Alliance is
plainly told by M. Koch, the French professor of diplomacy and teacher
of Talleyrand. "Frederick II.," he says, "having been abandoned by the
Cabinet of London, could not but attach himself to Russia." (See his
_History of the Revolutions in Europe_.)

[9] Horace Walpole characterises his epoch by the words--"_It was the
mode of the times to be paid by one favour for receiving another._" At
all events, it will be seen from the text that such was the mode of
Russia in transacting business with England. The Earl of Sandwich, to
whom Sir George Macartney could dare to address the above despatch,
distinguished himself, ten years later, in 1775, as First Lord of the
Admiralty, in the North Administration, by the vehement opposition he
made to Lord Chatham's motion for an equitable _adjustment of the
American difficulties_. "He could not believe it (Chatham's motion) _the
production of a British peer_; it appeared to