The Newport Gazette

Extract of a letter from St. Petersburgh.

"The Empress is augmenting her forces considerably, in consequence of an application from the British Court for troops.

I dislike the natives of Russia as much as I do the climate, and wish I was once more in Old England. 'Tis so cold in winter that Nature appears lifeless and totally inactive: I have had my skin taken off some of my face and hands by the intensity of the weather. On a very severe day, by way of experiment, I threw a basin of water into the air, and it all descended in congealed ice."

I would give that world to see the top of St. Paul's church once more. I have not drank a drop of good punch since I have been in Russia. Here is a nasty liquor called Crematum, and the first time I drank it I thought I had swallowed aqua fortis. The natives are much addicted to drinking: I have seen priests and monks so intoxicated as to be under the necessity of being carried along the streets in litters. However, there are some good men among the clergy; I have been in company with several of irreproachable manners: but these, the lower classes especially, are as abject slaves as the rest of their countrymen. In short, the love of freedom, and the idea of time, are not known in Russia. Slavery here damps the faculties, debases the mind, and stifles every kind of sentiment.