text: " The contempt here expressed for the German princes was (as we have said) very characteristic of Stein--an old free baron of the Empire; and the important matter of German _unity_ and _nationality_ here touched on is more decidedly brought forward in the following extract from a letter to the same person dated Petersburg December 1 1812:-- "I am sorry that your Excellency should see only a Prussian in me while at the same time you reveal yourself to me in the character of a Hanoverian