Page:The Wentworth Papers 1715-1739.djvu/33

 here as his staff is at Vienna ; and Lord Sunderland pro- tested to me that the present he had from the Emperor was not worth seeing."

Interesting evidence of the state in which our embassy at Berlin at this time was kept up is given us by a list, which has been preserved, of Lord Raby's so-called "family" in the month of December, 1705. From this we learn that the household consisted in all of sixty-four persons, whose names and positions are for the most part denoted. First on the list are Mr. Tilson, secretary to the Embassy, and Mr. Mogg and Mr. Powell, gentlemen. The chaplain ranks apparently between the maitre d'hotel and the English valet. Then come a French valet, housekeepers, a confectioner, " soumillier," butler, " gargon de cave," a master cook, second cook, and three others ; six pages, three running footmen, one of them "Black a moor"; twenty footmen, "including Dutch John, French John, and Simon the Dane"; two grooms with five English saddle-horses, three coachmen, viz. — " Peter with the eight brown horses, Efrem with the eight bay horses, and another with the six light-brown horses," and a postilion with each coachman.

Early in 1706 Lord Raby was advanced from the humbler post of envoy to the more dignified position of ambassador extraordinary at Berlin, and made a grand entry into the city in that capacity in April, 1706; and in the same year an opportunity was given Lord Raby of renewing for a few months his experiences of military life, for the King of Prussia was absent from Berlin for some time on a visit to Holland. On June 8, 1706, he writes to Stepney: — "I shall follow the King to Cleves . . . The marriage of the Princess of Hanover with our Prince I now think sure, and you see our march like the proverb, — " better be at the end of a feast than the beginning of a fray"; and from Wesel, on June 25, we learn, that having received letters from the Duke of Marl- borough and from England, which encourage him to take a step to the army, he was resolved to go thither for some days. From the camp at Helchin, July 22, he writes : —

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