Mr. Pitt was triumphant at home as abroad. In spite of the king's small predilection for his minister, the latter had obtained the garter for his brother-in-law, Lord Temple. Enormous subsidies were voted by the House without demur. "It is the wisest economy to spare nothing in the expenses of war," he had said, without circumlocution, when he was presenting the budget to Parliament. His animosity against France was on the increase. "Formerly I would have been content to see her on her knees," he said, in privacy; "to-day I wish to see her overturned in the dust." Notwithstanding the persistent bravery of the French nobles, who are always ready to die on the battle-field, the disorder of the troops and the inferiority of the generals who commanded in opposition to Frederick II. and Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick, sadly subserved the hatred of the great English minister.
The victories of England in both worlds and the triumphant supremacy of Pitt in the Houses were not sufficient to assure the success of their allies on the continent. At one time the great Frederick thought he saw all Germany rallied round him. Now, defeated and fortified in Saxony during the winter of 1760, he sought alliances everywhere, and everywhere saw himself repelled. "There remain to me but two allies," said he; "valor and perseverance." Repeated victories, earned at the sword's point by dint of boldness and at extreme danger, could not even protect Berlin. The capital of Prussia saw itself compelled to open its gates to the foe, on the sole condition that the Cossacks should not go beyond its precincts. { 253} When the regular troops withdrew, the generals had not been able to prevent the pillage of the town. The heroic efforts of the King of Prussia only ended in his keeping one foot still in Saxony. On the 10th of March he wrote to Count Algarotti, "It is certain that we have only experienced disasters during the last campaign, and that we have found ourselves nearly in the same situation as the Romans after Cannes. Unfortunately, toward the end I had an attack of gout. My left hand and my feet were disabled, and I could only let myself be carried from place to place, a witness to my own reverses. Happily, the speech of Barca to Hannibal can be applied to our enemies, 'You know how to conquer, but you do not know how to profit by victory.'" The cruel bombardment of Dresden in the month of August, 1760, was like an overflowing of the long pent-up rage of Frederick II. He had lately said, "Miserable fools that we are, we have only an instant to live, and we make that instant as sorrowful as we can. We take pleasure in destroying the masterpieces of art that time has spared us; we seemed resolved to leave behind us the odious memories of our ravages and of the calamities we have caused." The monuments and the palaces of Dresden fell beneath the fire of the Prussian cannon in the face of the flames which devoured the suburbs.