"The ill-temper of France and England at the dismemberment of Poland calls for serious reflections," wrote the King of Prussia on the 5th of August, 1772: "these two courts are already moving heaven and earth to detach the court of Vienna from our system; but as the three chief points whence their support should come are altogether to seek in France, and there is neither system, nor stability, nor money there, her projects will be given up with the same facility with which they were conceived and broached.

They appear to me, moreover, like the projects of the Duke of Aiguillon, ebullitions of French vivacity." France did not do anything, and could not do anything; the king's secret negotiators, as well as the minister of foreign affairs, had been tricked by the allied powers.

"Ah! if Choiseul had been here!" exclaimed King Louis XV., it is said, when he heard of the partition of Poland.

The Duke of Choiseul would no doubt have been more clear-sighted and better informed than the Duke of Aiguillon, but his policy could have done no good.

Frederick II.