Why, he has wasted fifteen months over it already, and it has cost him Ingria.

He could have made any terms with Poland he liked, after his victory on the Dwina, and would then have been free to use all his forces against us.

As it is, he has wasted two summers, and is likely to waste another, and that not for any material advantage, but simply to gratify his hatred against Augustus; and he has left us to take Ingria almost without a blow, and to gain what Russia has wanted for the last hundred years, a foothold on the Baltic.

He may be a great general, but he is no politician.

No real statesman would throw away solid advantages in order to gratify personal pique." "He considers Augustus the author of this league against him," Charlie said.