The History of Peter the Great, Emperor of Russia

57

See the History of Charles XII.

58

A town on the river Lycus, in the province of Assyria, now called Curdestan, where Alexander the Great fought his third and decisive battle, with Darius, king of Persia.

59

Vol. I. p. 439, of the 4to. edition, printed at the Hague.

60

The chaplain Norberg, pretends, that, immediately after the battle of Narva, the Grand Seignior wrote a letter of congratulation to the king of Sweden, in these terms. 'The sultan Basha, by the grace of God, to Charles XII. &c.' The letter was dated from the æra of the creation of the world.

61

See History of Charles XII.

62

This chapter and the following, are taken entirely from the journal of Peter the Great, sent me from Petersburg.

63

We must beg leave to remark in this place, that a king of England has the power of doing good in virtue of his own authority, and may do evil if so disposed, by having a majority in a corrupt parliament; whereas, a king of Poland can neither do good nor evil, not having it in his power to dispose even of a pair of colours.

64

This seems a mistake; our author probably meant to say Kercholme, because Wibourg is not on the lake Ladoga, but on the gulf of Finland.

65

Taken from the journal of Peter the Great.

66

Some writers call it Nyenschantz.

67

Petersburg was founded on Whitsunday, the 27th May, 1703.

68

About sixty thousand pounds sterling.

69

All the foregoing chapters, and likewise those which follow, are taken from the journals of Peter the Great, and the papers sent me from Petersburg, carefully compared with other memoirs.

70

Menzikoff's parents were vassals of the monastery of Cosmopoly: at the age of thirteen, he went to Moscow, and was taken into the service of a pastry-cook. His employment was singing ballads, and crying puffs and cakes about the streets. One day, as he was following this occupation, the czar happening to hear him, and to be diverted with one of his songs, sent for him, and asked him if he would sell his pies and his basket? The boy answered, that his business was to sell his pies, but he must ask his master's leave to sell his basket; yet as every thing belonged to his prince, his majesty had only to lay his commands upon him. The czar was so pleased with this answer, that he immediately ordered him to court, where he gave him at first a mean employment; but being every day more pleased with his wit, he thought fit to place him about his person, and to make him groom of his bed-chamber, from whence he gradually raised him to the highest preferments. He was tall and well shaped. At his first coming into the czar's service, he inlisted in Le Fort's company, and acquired, under that general's instruction, such a degree of knowledge and skill, as enabled him to command armies, and to become one of the bravest and most successful generals in Russia.

71

M. de Voltaire calls this city Wibourg, in this and some other places of his history. The French are not always very attentive to the right names of places, but here it is of some consequence. Wibourg is the capital of Jutland in Denmark. Wiburn, the city here meant, is the capital of Carelia in Russian Finland.

72

The czar's manifesto in the Ukraine, 1709.

73

The impartiality of an historian obliges us in this place to advertise our readers, that it was not the fault of Augustus, that Patkul was delivered up to the king of Sweden; Augustus having privately sent orders to the commandant of the fort of Konigstein, where Patkul was then confined, to suffer his prisoner to make his escape in time. But the avarice of this officer proved fatal to the life of the unhappy captive, and to the character of his own prince; for while he was endeavouring to make the best bargain he could for himself, the time slipped inconceivably away; and while they were yet debating upon the price of the proposed releasement, the guards sent by Charles came and demanded Patkul in the name of their sovereign. The commandant was forced to obey, and the unhappy victim was delivered up, contrary to the intentions of Augustus.

74

What would those Swedes say, were they living, to see the pitiful figure their descendants have made in this war.

75

In the Russian language, Soeza.

76

This is acknowledged by Norberg himself, vol. ii. p. 263.

77

Vol. II. page 279.

78

The Memoirs of Peter the Great, by the pretended boyard Iwan Nestesuranoy, printed at Amsterdam, in 1730, say, that the king of Sweden, before he passed the Boristhenes, sent a general officer with proposals of peace to the czar. The four volumes of these Memoirs are either a collection of untruths and absurdities, or compilations from common newspapers.

79

This fact is likewise found in a letter, printed before the Anecdotes of Russia, p. 23.

80

La Motraye, in the relation of his travels, quotes a letter from Charles XII. to the grand vizier; but this letter is false, as are most of the relations of that mercenary writer; and Norberg himself acknowledges that the king of Sweden never could be prevailed on to write to the grand vizier.

81

The czar, says the preface to lord Whitworth's account of Russia, who had been absolute enough to civilize savages, had no idea, could conceive none, of the privileges of a nation civilized in the only rational manner by laws and liberties. He demanded immediate and severe punishment of the offenders: he demanded it of a princess, whom he thought interested, to assert the sacredness of the persons of monarchs, even in their representatives; and he demanded it with threats of wreaking his vengeance on all English merchants and subjects established in his dominions. In this light the menaces were formidable; otherwise, happily, the rights of the whole people were more sacred here than the persons of foreign ministers. The czar's memorials urged the queen with the satisfaction which she herself had extorted, when only the boat and servants of the earl of Manchester had been insulted at Venice. That state had broken through the fundamental laws, to content the queen of Great Britain. How noble a picture of government, when a monarch, that can force another nation to infringe its constitution, dare not violate his own? One may imagine with what difficulty our secretaries of state must have laboured through all the ambages of phrase in English, French, German, and Russ, to explain to Muscovite ears and Muscovite understandings, the meaning of indictments, pleadings, precedents, juries, and verdicts; and how impatiently Peter must have listened to promises of a hearing next term? With what astonishment must he have beheld a great queen, engaging to endeavour to prevail on her parliament to pass an act to prevent any such outrage for the future? What honour does it not reflect on the memory of that princess to own to an arbitrary emperor, that even to appease him she dare not put the meanest of her subjects to death uncondemned by law! – There are, says she, in one of her dispatches to him, insuperable difficulties, with respect to the ancient and fundamental laws of the government of our people; which we fear do not permit so severe and rigorous a sentence to be given, as your imperial majesty at first seemed to expect in this case; and we persuade ourself, that your imperial majesty, who are a prince famous for clemency and exact justice, will not require us, who are the guardian and protectress of the laws, to inflict a punishment upon our subjects, which the law does not impower us to do. Words so venerable and heroic, that this broil ought to become history, and be exempted from the oblivion due to the silly squabbles of ambassadors and their privileges. If Anne deserved praise for her conduct on this occasion, it reflects still greater glory on Peter, that this ferocious man should listen to these details, and had moderation and justice enough to be persuaded by the reason of them.

82

Afterwards created lord Whitworth, by king George I.

83

The account this chaplain gives of the demands of the grand seignior is equally false and puerile. He says, that sultan Achmet, previous to his declaring war against the czar, sent to that prince a paper, containing the conditions on which he was willing to grant him peace. These conditions, Norberg tells us, were as follows: 'That Peter should renounce his alliance with Augustus, reinstate Stanislaus in the possession of the crown of Poland, restore all Livonia to Charles XII., and pay that prince the value in ready money of what he had taken from him at the battle of Pultowa; and, lastly, that the czar should demolish his newly-built city of Petersburg.' This piece was forged by one Brazey, a half-starved pamphleteer, and author of a work entitled, Memoirs, Satirical, Historical, and Entertaining. It was from this fountain Norberg drew his intelligence; and however he may have been the confessor of Charles XII. he certainly does not appear to have been his confidant.

84

The new vizier embraced every opportunity of affronting the czar, in the person of his envoy, and particularly in giving the French ambassador the preference. It was customary, on the promotion of the grand vizier, for all the foreign ministers to request an audience of congratulation. Count Tolstoy was the first who demanded that audience; but was answered – That the precedence had always been given to the ambassador of France: whereupon Tolstoy informed the vizier – That he must be deprived of the pleasure of waiting on him at all: which, being maliciously represented, as expressing the utmost contempt of his person, and the khan of Tartary being at the same time instigated to make several heavy complaints against the conduct of the Russians on the frontiers, count Tolstoy was immediately committed to the castle of the Seven Towers.

85

It is very strange that so many writers always confound Walachia and Moldavia together.

86

This duke of Holstein, at the time he married the daughter of Peter I. was a prince of very inconsiderable power, though of one of the most ancient houses in Germany. His ancestors had been stripped of great part of their dominions by the kings of Denmark; so that, at the time of this marriage, he found himself greatly circumscribed in point of possessions; but, from this epoch of his alliance with the czar of Muscovy, we may date the rise of the ducal branch of Holstein, which now fills the thrones of Russia and Sweden, and is likewise in possession of the bishopric of Lubec, which, in all probability, will fall to this house, notwithstanding the late election, which at present is the subject of litigation, the issue of which will, to all appearance, terminate in favour of the prince, son to the present bishop, through the protection of the courts of Vienna and Petersburg. The empress Catherine, who now sits on the throne of Russia is herself descended from this august house, by the side of her mother, who was sister to the king of Sweden, to the prince-bishop of Lubec, and to the famous prince George of Holstein, whose achievements made so much noise during the war. This princess, whose name was Elizabeth, married the reigning prince of Anbak Zerbst, whose house was indisputably the most ancient; and, in former times, the most powerful in all Germany, since they can trace their pedigree from the dukes of Ascania, who were formerly masters of the two electorates of Saxony and Brandenburg, as appears by their armorial bearings, which are, quarterly, the arms of Saxony and Brandenburg. Of this branch of Zerbst there is remaining only the present reigning prince, brother to the empress Catherine, who, in case he should die without issue, will succeed to the principality of Yevern, in East Friesland; from all which it appears already, that the family of Holstein is at present the most powerful in Europe, as being in possession of three crowns in the North. – [Since the above was written important changes have taken place.]

87

This same count Poniatowsky, who was at that time in the service of Charles XII., died afterwards castellan of Cracovia, and first senator of the republic of Poland, after having enjoyed all the dignities to which a nobleman of that country can attain. His connexions with Charles XII. during that prince's retirement at Bender, first made him taken notice of; and, it is to be wished, for the honour of his memory, that he had waited till the conclusion of a peace between Sweden and Poland, to be reconciled to king Augustus; but following the dictates of ambition, rather than those of strict honour, he sacrificed the interests of both Charles and Stanislaus, to the care of his own fortune; and, while he appeared the most zealous in their cause, he secretly did them all the ill services he could at the Ottoman Porte: to this double dealing he owed the immense fortune of which he was afterwards possessed. He married the princess Czartoriski, daughter of the castellan of Vilna, a lady, for her heroic spirit, worthy to have been born in the times of ancient Rome: when her eldest son, the present grand chamberlain of the crown, had that famous dispute with Count Tarlo, palatine of Lublin; a dispute which made so much noise in all the public papers in the year 1742, this lady, after having made him shoot at a mark every day, for three weeks, in order to be expert at firing, said to him, as he was mounting his horse, to go to meet his adversary – 'Go, my son; but, if you do not acquit yourself with honour in this affair, never appear before me again.' This anecdote may serve as a specimen of the character of our heroine. The family of Czartoriski is descended from the ancient Jagellins, who were, for several ages, in lineal possession of the crown of Poland; and is, at this day, extremely rich and powerful, by the alliances it has contracted, but they have never been able to acquire popularity; and so long as count Tarlo (who was killed in a duel with the young count Poniatowsky) lived, had no influence in the dictines, or lesser assembly of the states, because Tarlo, who was the idol of the nobles, and a sworn enemy to the Czartoriski family, carried every thing before him, and nothing was done but according to his pleasure.

88

About seventy pounds sterling.

89

French money, which is always counted by livres and makes about three millions sterling.

90

A town in Bohemia famous for its mineral springs.

91

About fifty thousand pounds sterling.

92

Private memoirs of Bassowitz, Jan. 21, 1712.

93

A town of Sleswic, in Denmark, situated on the river Eyder, fourteen miles from the German Ocean, having a very commodious harbour.

94

About twelve hundred pounds sterling.

95

In the preamble to this institution, the czar declared, that it was to perpetuate the memory of her love in his distressed condition on the banks of the river Pruth. He invested her with full power to bestow it on such of her own sex as she should think proper. The ensigns of this order are, a broad white riband, and wore over the right shoulder, with a medal of St. Catherine, adorned with precious stones, and the motto, 'Out of love and fidelity.'

96

Inhabitants of a small town of Hungarian Dalmatia, with a harbour, from whence the neighbouring sea takes the name of Golfo di Bickariga.

97

The conspiracy carried on in France by cardinal Alberoni, was discovered in a very singular manner. The Spanish ambassador's secretary, who used frequently to go to the house of one La Follon, a famous procuress of Paris, to amuse himself for an hour or two after the fatigues of business, had appointed a young nymph, whom he was fond of, to meet him there at nine o'clock in the evening, but did not come to her till near two o'clock in the morning. The lady, as may be supposed, reproached him with the little regard he paid to her charms, or his own promise; but he excused himself, by saying, that he had been obliged to stay to finish a long dispatch in ciphers, which was to be sent away that very night by a courier to Spain: so saying, he undressed and threw himself into bed, where he quietly fell asleep. In pulling off his clothes, he had, by accident, dropped a paper out of his pocket, which, by its bulk, raised in the nymph that curiosity so natural to her sex. She picked it up, and read it partly over, when the nature of its contents made her resolve to communicate them to La Follon: accordingly, she framed some excuse for leaving the room, and immediately went to the apartment of the old lady, and opened her budget. La Follon, who was a woman of superior understanding to most in her sphere, immediately saw the whole consequence of the affair; and, after having recommended to the girl, to amuse her gallant as long as possible, she immediately went to waken the regent, to whom she had access at all hours, for matters of a very different nature to the present. This prince, whose presence of mind was equal to every exigency, immediately dispatched different couriers to the frontiers; in consequence of which, the Spanish ambassador's messenger was stopped at Bayonne, and his dispatches taken from him; upon deciphering of which, they were found exactly to agree with the original delivered to the regent by La Follon: upon this the prince of Cellamar, the Spanish ambassador was put under an arrest, and all his papers seized; after which he was sent under a strong guard to the frontiers, where they left him to make the best of his way to his own country. Thus an event, which would have brought the kingdom of France to the verge of destruction, was frustrated by a votary of Venus, and a priestess of the temple of pleasure.

98

As these letters and answers afford the most striking evidence of the czar's prudence, and the prince's insincerity, and will convey to the reader a clear idea of the grounds and motives of this extraordinary transaction, we have inserted the following translation of them. The first letter from the czar to his son, is dated the 27th of October, 1715, and displays a noble spirit of religion, with the most ardent desire of leaving a successor who should perpetuate his name and glory to future ages.

'Son,' says the czar to him, 'you cannot be ignorant of what is known to all the world, that our people groaned under the oppression of the Swedes, before the beginning of this present war. By the usurped possession of many of our maritime ports, so necessary to our state, they cut us off from all commerce with the rest of mankind; and we saw, with deep regret, that they had even cast a mist over the eyes of persons of the greatest discernment, who tamely brooked their slavery, and made no complaints to us. You know how much it cost us at the beginning of this war, to make ourselves thoroughly experienced, and to stand our ground in spite of all the advantages which our irreconcileable enemies gained over us. The Almighty alone has conducted us by his hand, and conducts us still. We submitted to that probationary state with resignation to the will of God, not doubting but it was he who made us pass through it: he has accepted our submission; and the same enemy, before whom we were wont to tremble, now trembles before us. These are effects, which, under God's assistance, we owe to our labour, and those of our faithful and affectionate sons, and Russian subjects. But while I survey the successes with which God has blessed our arms, if I turn my eyes on the posterity that is to succeed me, my soul is pierced with anguish; and I have no enjoyment of my present happiness, when I carry my views into futurity. All my felicity vanishes away like a dream, since you, my son, reject all means of rendering yourself capable of governing well after me. Your incapacity is voluntary; for you cannot excuse yourself from want of genius: it is inclination alone you want. Far less can you plead the want of bodily strength, as if God had not furnished you sufficiently in that respect: for though your constitution be none the strongest, it cannot be reckoned weak. Yet you will not so much as hear of warlike exercises; though it is by those means we are risen from that obscurity in which we were buried, and have made ourselves known to the nations about us, whose esteem we now enjoy. I am far from desiring you to cherish in yourself a disposition to make war for its own sake, and without just reasons: all I demand of you is, that you would apply yourself to learn the military art; because, without understanding the rules of war, it is impossible to be qualified for government. I might set before your eyes many examples of what I propose to you; but shall only mention the Greeks, with whom we are united by the same profession of faith. Whence came the declension of their empire, but from the neglect of arms? Sloth and inaction have subjected them to tyrants, and that slavery under which they have groaned. You are much mistaken if you imagine it is enough for a prince that he have good generals to act under his orders: no, my son, it is upon the chief himself that the eyes of the world are fixed; they study his inclinations, and easily slide into the imitation of his manners. My brother, during his reign, loved magnificence in dress, and splendid equipages, and horses richly caparisoned; the taste of this country was not much formed that way; but the pleasures of the prince soon became those of the subjects, who are readily led to imitate him both in the objects of his love and disgust. If people are so easily disengaged from things that are only for pleasure, will they not be still more prone to forget, and in process of time wholly to lay aside the use of arms, the exercise of which grows the more irksome the less they are habituated to them? You have no inclination to learn the profession of war; you do not apply yourself to it; and consequently will never know it. How then will you be able to command others, and to judge of the rewards which those subjects deserve who do their duty, or of the punishment due to such as fall short of obedience? You must judge only by other people's eyes; and will be considered as a young bird, which reaching out its beak, is as ready to receive poison as proper nourishment. You say, the infirm state of your health makes you unfit to bear the fatigues of war; but that is a frivolous excuse. I desire you not to undergo the fatigues of that profession, though it is there that all great captains are begun; but I wish you had an inclination to the military art; and reason may give it you, if you have it not from nature. Had you once this inclination, it would occupy your thoughts at all times, even in your hours of sickness. Ask those who remember my brother's reign: his state of health was much more infirm than your's; he could not manage a horse of never so little mettle, nor hardly mount him: yet he loved horses, and perhaps there never will be in the country finer stables than his. Hence you see, that success does not always depend upon personal labour, but upon the inclination. If you think that there are princes, whose affairs fail not to succeed, though they go not to war in person, you are in the right; but if they go not to the field of battle, they have, however, an inclination to go, and are acquainted with the military art. For instance, the late king of France did not always take the field himself; but we know to what a degree he was a lover of war, and how many glorious exploits he performed therein; which made his campaigns be called the theatre and school of the world. The bent of that prince's mind was not turned to military affairs only, he had also a taste for the polite arts, for manufactures, and other institutions, which have made his kingdom more flourishing than any other. After all these remonstrances which I have laid before you, I return to my first subject, which immediately concerns yourself. I am a man, and consequently must die: to whom shall I leave the care of finishing what, by God's grace, I have begun, and of preserving what I have in part recovered? To a son who, like that slothful servant in the gospel, buries his talent in the earth, and neglects to improve what God has committed to his trust? How often have I reproached you for your sullenness and indocility? I have been obliged to chastise you on that account. For these several years past I have hardly spoke to you, because I almost despair of bringing you back to the right way; discouraged and disheartened by the fruitlessness of all my endeavours. You loiter on in supine indolence; abandoning yourself to shameful pleasures, without extending your foresight to the dangerous consequences which such a conduct must produce both to yourself and the whole state: you confine yourself to the government of your own house, and in that station you acquit yourself very ill; St. Paul has told us, 'he that knows not how to govern his own house, how shall he be able to rule the church of God?' In like manner I say to you, since you know not how to manage your domestic affairs, how can you be able to govern a kingdom? I am determined, at last, to signify to you my final purpose; being willing, however, to defer the execution of it for a short time, to see if you will reform: if not, know that I am resolved to deprive you of the succession, as I would lop off a useless branch. Do not imagine, that because I have no other child but you,120 I mean by this only to intimidate you: I will most certainly execute my resolution; and God requires it of me: for, since I spare not my own life for the sake of my country, and the welfare of my people, why should I allow an effeminate prince to ascend the throne after me, who would sacrifice the interest of the subject to his pleasures? and should he be obliged to expose his life in their behalf, would leave them to perish, rather than redress their grievances. I will call in a mere stranger to the crown, if he be but worthy of that honour, sooner than my own son, if he is unworthy.