MY dear I was equally surprised and de lighted that while you are tasked with the work of renovating Europe, you yet found time to send me lately a friendly congratulation on my being spared so long. It is indeed a great happiness to survive till these times, when three or four men,-who loved noth ing so much as peace, and after long and hard service were only seeking to close their career in tranquillity, win during a war of defense more military glory than the wildest imagination conceived of, and in three months bid fair to bring the German hope of a thousand years to its fulfillment.