Chapter XII: Part 12

Nov. 1720.] At length, the new king of Sweden demanded a cessation of arms; and as he found the menaces of the English had stood him in no stead, he had recourse to the duke of Orleans, the French regent; and this prince, at once an ally of Russia and Sweden, had the honour of effecting a reconciliation between them. (Feb. 1721.) He sent Campredon, his plenipotentiary, to the court of Petersburg, and from thence to that of Stockholm. A congress was opened at Nystadt,[113] but the czar would not agree to a cessation of arms till matters were on the point of being concluded and the plenipotentiaries ready to sign. He had an army in Finland ready to subdue the rest of that province, and his fleets were continually threatening the Swedish coasts, so that he seemed absolute master of dictating the terms of peace; accordingly they subscribed to whatever he thought fit to demand. By this treaty he was to remain in perpetual possession of all that his arms had conquered, from the borders of Courland to the extremity of the gulf of Finland, and from thence again of the whole extent of the country of Kexholm, and that narrow slip of Finland which stretches out to the northward of the neighbourhood of Kexholm; so that he remained master of all Livonia, Esthonia, Ingria, Carelia, with the country of Wybourg, and the neighbouring isles, which secured to him the sovereignty of the sea, as likewise of the isles of Oessel, Dago, Mona, and several others: the whole forming an extent of three thousand leagues of country, of unequal breadth, and which altogether made a large kingdom, that proved the reward of twenty years' immense pains and labour.

The peace was signed at Nystadt the 10th September, 1721, N. S. by the Russian minister Osterman, and general Bruce.

Peter was the more rejoiced at that event, as it freed him from the necessity of keeping such large armies on the frontiers of Sweden, as also from any apprehensions on the part of England, or of the neighbouring states, and left him at full liberty to exert his whole attention to the modelling of his empire, in which he had already made so successful a beginning, and to cherish arts and commerce, which he had introduced among his subjects, at the expense of infinite labour and industry.

In the first transports of his satisfaction, we find him writing in these terms to his plenipotentiaries; 'You have drawn up the treaty as if we ourself had dictated and sent it to you to offer the Swedes to sign. This glorious event shall be ever present to our remembrance.'

All degrees of people, throughout the Russian empire, gave proofs of their satisfaction, by the most extraordinary rejoicings of all kinds, and particularly at Petersburg. The triumphal festivals, with which the czar had entertained his people during the course of the war, were nothing to compare to these rejoicings for the peace, which every one hailed with unutterable satisfaction. The peace itself was the most glorious of all his triumphs; and what pleased more than all the pompous shows on the occasion, was a free pardon and general release granted to all prisoners, and a general remission of all sums due to the royal treasury for taxes throughout the whole empire, to the day of the publication of the peace. In consequence of which a multitude of unhappy wretches, who had been confined in prison, were set at liberty, excepting only those guilty of highway-robbery, murder, or treason.[114]

It was at this time that the senate decreed Peter the titles of _Great_, _Emperor_, and _Father of his Country_. Count Golofkin, the high chancellor, made a speech to the czar in the great cathedral, in the name of all the orders of the state, the senators crying aloud, _Long live our emperor and father!_ in which acclamations they were joined by the united voice of all the people present. The ministers of France, Germany, Poland, Denmark, and the states-general, waited on him, with their congratulations, on the titles lately bestowed on him, and formally acknowledged for emperor him who had been always publicly known in Holland by that title, ever since the battle of Pultowa. The names of _Father_, and of _Great_, were glorious epithets, which no one in Europe could dispute him; that of _Emperor_ was only a honorary title, given by custom to the sovereigns of Germany, as titular kings of the Romans; and it requires time before such appellations come to be formally adopted by those courts where forms of state and real glory are different things. But Peter was in a short time after acknowledged emperor by all the states of Europe, excepting only that of Poland, which was still divided by factions, and the pope, whose suffrage was become of very little significance, since the court of Rome had lost its credit in proportion as other nations became more enlightened.

CHAP. XXXV.

Conquests in Persia.

The situation of Russia is such, as necessarily obliges her to keep up certain connexions with all the nations that lie in the fifth degree of north latitude. When under a bad administration, she was a prey by turns to the Tartars, the Swedes, and the Poles; but when governed by a resolute and vigorous prince, she became formidable to all her neighbours. Peter began his reign by an advantageous treaty with the Chinese. He had waged war at one and the same time against the Swedes and the Turks, and now prepared to lead his victorious armies into Persia.

At this time Persia began to fall into that deplorable state, in which we now behold her. Let us figure to ourselves the thirty years' war in Germany, the times of the league, those of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, and the reigns of Charles VI. and of king John in France, the civil wars in England, the long and horrible ravages of the whole Russian empire by the Tartars, or their invasion of China; and then we shall have some slight conception of the miseries under which the Persian empire has so long groaned.

A weak and indolent prince, and a powerful and enterprising subject, are sufficient to plunge a whole nation into such an abyss of disasters. Hussein, sha, shaic, or sophi of Persia, a descendant of the great sha Abbas, who sat at this time on the throne of Persia, had given himself wholly up to luxury and effeminacy: his prime minister committed acts of the greatest violence and injustice, which this great prince winked at, and this gave rise to forty years' desolation and bloodshed.

Persia, like Turkey, has several provinces, all governed in a different manner; she has subjects immediately under her dominion, vassals, tributary princes, and even nations, to whom the court was wont to pay a tribute, under the name of subsidies; for instance, the people of Daghestan, who inhabit the branches of mount Caucasus, to the westward of the Caspian Sea, which was formerly a part of the ancient Albania; for all nations have changed their appellation and their limits. These are now called Lesgians, and are mountaineers, who are rather under the protection, than the dominion, of Persia; to these the government paid subsidies for defending the frontiers.

At the other extremity of the empire, towards the Indies, was the prince of Candahar, who commanded a kind of martial militia, called Aghwans. This prince of Candahar was a vassal of the Persian, as the hospodars of Walachia and Moldavia are of the Turkish empire: this vassalage was not hereditary, but exactly the same with the ancient feudal tenures established throughout Europe, by that race of Tartars who overthrew the Roman empire. The Aghwan militia, of which the prince of Candahar was the head, was the same with the Albanians on the coasts of the Caspian Sea, in the neighbourhood of Daghestan, and a mixture of Circassians and Georgians, like the ancient Mamelucks who enslaved Egypt. The name of Aghwans is a corruption; Timur, whom we call Tamerlane, had led these people into India, and they remained settled in the province of Candahar, which sometimes belonged to the Mogul empire, and sometimes to that of Persia. It was these Aghwans and Lesgians who began the revolution.

Mir-Weis, or Meriwitz, intendant of the province, whose office was only to collect the tributes, assassinated the prince of Candahar, armed the militia, and continued master of the province till his death, which happened in 1717. His brother came quietly to the succession, by paying a slight tribute to the Persian court. But the son of Mir-Weis, who inherited the ambition of his father, assassinated his uncle, and began to erect himself into a conqueror. This young man was called Mir-Mahmoud, but he was known in Europe only by the name of his father, who had begun the rebellion. Mahmoud reinforced his Aghwans, by adding to them all the Guebres he could get together. These Guebres were an ancient race of Persians, who had been dispersed by the caliph Omar, and who still continued attached to the religion of the Magi (formerly flourished in the reign of Cyrus), and were always secret enemies to the new Persians. Having assembled his forces, Mahmoud marched into the heart of Persia, at the head of a hundred thousand men.

At the same time the Lesgians or Albanians, who, on account of the troublesome times, had not received their subsidies from the court of Persia, came down from their mountains with an armed force, so that the flames of civil war were lighted up at both ends of the empire, and extended themselves even to the capital.

These Lesgians ravaged all that country which stretches along the western borders of the Caspian Sea, as far as Derbent, or the Iron Gate. In this country is situated the city of Shamache, about fifteen leagues distant from the sea, and is said to have been the ancient residence of Cyrus, and by the Greeks called Cyropolis, for we know nothing of the situation or names of these countries, but what we have from the Greeks; but as the Persians never had a prince called Cyrus, much less had they any city called Cyropolis. It is much in the same manner that the Jews, who commenced authors when they were settled in Alexandria, framed a notion of a city called Scythopolis, which, said they, was built by the Scythians in the neighbourhood of Judea, as if either Scythians or ancient Jews could have given Greek names to their towns.

The city of Shamache was very rich. The Armenians, who inhabit in the neighbourhood of this part of the Persian empire, carried on an immense traffic there, and Peter had lately established a company of Russian merchants at his own expense, which company became very flourishing. The Lesgians made themselves masters of this city by surprise, plundered it, and put to death all the Russians who traded there under the protection of shah Hussein, after having stripped all their warehouses. The loss on this occasion was said to amount to four millions of rubles.

Peter upon this sent to demand satisfaction of the emperor Hussein, who was then disputing the throne with the rebel Mahmoud, who had usurped it, and likewise of Mahmoud himself. The former of these was willing to do the czar justice, the other refused it; Peter therefore resolved to right himself, and take advantage of the distractions in the Persian empire.

Mir-Mahmoud still pushed his conquests in Persia. The sophi hearing that the emperor of Russia was preparing to enter the Caspian Sea, in order to revenge the murder of his subjects at Shamache, made private application to him, by means of an Armenian, to take upon him at the same time the defence of Persia.

Peter had for a considerable time formed a project to make himself master of the Caspian Sea, by means of a powerful naval force, and to turn the tide of commerce from Persia and a part of India through his own dominions. He had caused several parts of this sea to be sounded, the coasts to be surveyed, and exact charts made of the whole. He then set sail for the coast of Persia the 15th day of May, 1722. Catherine accompanied him in this voyage, as she had done in the former. They sailed down the Wolga as far as the city of Astracan. From thence he hastened to forward the canals which were to join the Caspian, the Baltic, and the Euxine seas, a work which has been since executed in part under the reign of his grandson.

While he was directing these works, the necessary provisions for his expedition were arrived in the Caspian Sea. He was to take with him twenty-two thousand foot, nine thousand dragoons, fifteen thousand Cossacks, and three thousand seamen, who were to work the ships, and occasionally assist the soldiery in making descents on the coast. The horse were to march over land through deserts where there was frequently no water to be had, and afterwards to pass over the mountains of Caucasus, where three hundred men are sufficient to stop the progress of a whole army; but the distracted condition in which Persia then was, warranted the most hazardous enterprises.

The czar sailed about a hundred leagues to the southward of Astracan, till he came to the little town of Andrewhoff. It may appear extraordinary to hear of the name of Andrew on the coasts of the Hyrcanian Sea; but some Georgians, who were formerly a sect of Christians, had built this town, which the Persians afterwards fortified; but it fell an easy prey to the czar's arms. From thence he continued advancing by land into the province of Daghestan, and caused manifestoes to be circulated in the Turkish and Persian languages.[115] It was necessary to keep fair with the Ottoman Porte, who reckoned among its subjects, not only the Circassians and Georgians, who border upon this country, but also several powerful vassals, who had of late put themselves under the protection of the grand seignior.

Among others there was one very powerful, named Mahmoud d'Utmich, who took the title of sultan, and had the courage to attack the czar's troops, by which he was totally defeated, and the story says, that his whole country was made a bonfire on the occasion.

Sept. 14, 1722.] In a short time afterwards Peter arrived at the city of Derbent, by the Persians and Turks called Demir Capi, that is, the Iron Gate, and so named from having formerly had an iron gate at the south entrance. The city is long and narrow, its upper part joins to a rocky branch of Mount Caucasus, and the walls of the lower part are washed by the sea, which in violent storms make a breach over them. These walls might pass for one of the wonders of antiquity, being forty feet in height, and six in breadth, defended with square towers at the distance of every fifty feet. The whole work seems one uniform piece, and is built of a sort of brown free-stone mixed with pounded shells, which served as mortar, so that the whole forms a mass harder than marble. The city lies open from the sea, but part of it next the land appears impregnable. There are still some ruins of an old wall like that of China, which must have been built in the earliest times of antiquity, and stretched from the borders of the Caspian Sea to the Pontus Euxinus; and this was probably a rampart raised by the ancient kings of Persia against those swarms of barbarians which dwelt between those two seas.

According to the Persian tradition, the city of Derbent was partly repaired and fortified by Alexander the Great. Arrian and Quintus Curtius tell us, that Alexander absolutely rebuilt this city. They say indeed that it was on the banks of the Tanais or Don, but then in their time the Greeks gave the name of Tanais to the river Cyrus, which runs by the city. It would be a contradiction to suppose that Alexander should build a harbour in the Caspian Sea, on a river that opens into the Black Sea.

There were formerly three or four other ports in different parts of the Caspian Sea, all which were probably built with the same view; for the several nations inhabiting to the west, east, and north of that sea, have in all times been barbarians, who had rendered themselves formidable to the rest of the world, and from hence principally issued those swarms of conquerors who subjugated Asia and Europe.

And here I must beg leave to remark, how much pleasure authors in all ages have taken to impose upon mankind, and how much they have preferred a vain show of eloquence to matter of fact. Quintus Curtius puts into the mouths of Scythians an admirable speech full of moderation and philosophy, as if the Tartars of those regions had been all so many sages, and that Alexander had not been the general nominated by the Greeks against the king of Persia, sovereign of the greatest part of southern Scythia and the Indies. Other rhetoricians, thinking to imitate Quintus Curtius, have studied to make us look upon those savages of Caucacus and its dreary deserts, who lived wholly upon rapine and bloodshed, as the people in the world most remarkable for austere virtue and justice, and have painted Alexander, the avenger of Greece, and the conqueror of those who would have enslaved him and his country, as a public robber, who had ravaged the world without justice or reason.

Such writers do not consider, that these Tartars were never other than destroyers, and that Alexander built towns in the very country which they inhabited; and in this respect I may venture to compare Peter the Great to Alexander; like him he was assiduous and indefatigable in his pursuits, a lover and friend of the useful arts; he surpassed him as a lawgiver, and like him endeavoured to change the tide of commerce in the world, and built and repaired at least as many towns as that celebrated hero of antiquity.

On the approach of the Russian army, the governor of Derbent resolved not to sustain a siege, whether he thought he was not able to defend the place, or that he preferred the czar's protection to that of the tyrant Mahmoud; brought the keys of the town and citadel (which were silver) and presented them to Peter, whose army peaceably entered the city, and then encamped on the sea-shore.

The usurper, Mahmoud, already master of great part of Persia, in vain endeavoured to prevent the czar from taking possession of Derbent: he stirred up the neighbouring Tartars, and marched into Persia to the relief of the place; but, too late, for Derbent was already in the hands of the conqueror.

Peter however was not in a condition to push his successes any further at this time. The vessels which were bringing him a fresh supply of provisions, horses, and recruits, had been cast away near Astracan, and the season was far spent. He therefore returned to Moscow, Jan. 5. which he entered in triumph; and after his arrival (according to custom) gave a strict account of his expedition to the vice-czar Romadanowski, thus keeping up this extraordinary farce, which, says his eulogium, pronounced in the academy of sciences at Paris, ought to have been performed before all the monarchs of the earth.

The empire of Persia continued to be divided between Hussein and the usurper Mahmoud. The first of these thought to find a protector in the czar, and the other dreaded him as an avenger, who was come to snatch the fruits of his rebellion out of his hands. Mahmoud exerted all his endeavours to stir up the Ottoman Porte against Peter, and for this purpose sent an embassy to Constantinople, while the princes of Daghestan, who were under the protection of the grand seignior, and had been stript of their territories by the victorious army of Peter, cried aloud for vengeance. The divan was now alarmed for the safety of Georgia, which the Turks reckon in the number of their dominions.

The grand seignior was on the point of declaring war against the czar, but was prevented by the courts of Vienna and Paris. The emperor of Germany at the same time declared, that if Russia should be attacked by the Turks, he must be obliged to defend it. The marquis de Bonac, the French ambassador at Constantinople, made a dextrous use of the menaces of the imperial court, and at the same time insinuated, that it was contrary to the true interest of the Turkish empire, to suffer a rebel and an usurper to set the example of dethroning sovereigns, and that the czar had done no more than what the grand seignior himself ought to have done.

During these delicate negotiations, Mir Mahmoud was advanced to the gates of Derbent, and had laid waste all the neighbouring country in order to cut off all means of subsistence from the Russian army. That part of ancient Hyrcania, now called Ghilan, was reduced to a desert, and the inhabitants threw themselves under the protection of the Russians, whom they looked upon as their deliverers.

In this they followed the example of the sophi himself. That unfortunate prince sent a formal embassy to Peter the Great, to request his assistance; but the ambassador was hardly departed, when the rebel, Mir Mahmoud, seized on Ispahan and the person of his master.

Thamaseb, the son of the dethroned sophi, who was taken prisoner, found means to escape out of the tyrant's hands, and got together a body of troops, with which he gave the usurper battle. He seconded his father's entreaties to Peter the Great for his protection, and sent to the ambassador the same instructions which Shah Hussein had given him.

This ambassador, whose name was Ishmael Beg, found that his negotiations had proved successful, even before he arrived in person; for, on landing at Astracan, he learnt that general Matufkin was going to set out with fresh recruits to reinforce the army in Daghestan. The dey of Baku or Bachu, which with the Persians gives to the Caspian Sea the name of the Sea of Bacou, was not yet taken. The ambassador therefore gave the Russian general a letter for the inhabitants, in which he exhorted them in his master's name to submit to the emperor of Russia. The ambassador then proceeded to Petersburg, and general Matufkin departed to lay siege to the city of Bachu. (Aug. 1723.) The Persian ambassador arrived at the czar's court the very day that tidings were brought of the reduction of that city.

Baku is situate near Shamache, but is neither so well peopled, nor so rich as the latter. It is chiefly remarkable for the naptha, with which it furnishes all Persia. Never was treaty so speedily concluded as that of Ishmael Beg. (Sept. 1723.) Czar Peter promised to march with his forces into Persia, in order to revenge the death of his subjects, and to succour Thamaseb against the usurper of his crown, and the new sophi in return was to cede to him, not only the towns of Bachu and Derbent, but likewise the provinces of Ghilan, Mazanderan, and Asterabath.

Ghilan is, as we have already observed, the ancient South Hyrcania; Mazanderan, which joins to it, is the country of the Mardi, or Mardians; and Asterabath borders upon Mazanderan. These were the three principal provinces of the ancient Median kings; so that Peter beheld himself, by the means of arms and treaties, in possession of the original kingdom of Cyrus.

It may not be foreign to our subject to observe, that by the articles of this convention, the prices of necessaries to be furnished to the army were settled. A camel was to cost only sixty franks (about twelve rubles) a pound of bread no more than five farthings, the same weight of beef about six. These prices furnish a convincing proof of the plenty he found in these countries, that possessions in land are of the most intrinsic value, and that money, which is only of nominal worth, was at that time very scarce.

Such was the deplorable state to which Persia was then reduced, that the unfortunate sophi Thamaseb, a wanderer in his own kingdom, and flying before the face of the rebel, Mahmoud, who had dipt his hands in the blood of his father and his brothers, was necessitated to entreat the court of Russia and the Turkish divan to accept of one part of his dominions to preserve for him the rest.

It was agreed then, between czar Peter, sultan Achmet III. and the sophi Thamaseb, that the first of these should keep the three provinces above-named, and that the Porte should have Casbin, Tauris, and Erivan, besides what she had already taken from the usurper. Thus was this noble kingdom dismembered at once by the Russians, the Turks, and the Persians themselves.

And now the emperor Peter might be said to extend his dominions from the furthest part of the Baltic Sea, beyond the southern limits of the Caspian. Persia still continued a prey to violations and devastations, and its natives, till then opulent and polite, were now sunk in poverty and barbarism, while the Russian people had arisen from indigence and ignorance to a state of riches and learning. One single man, by a resolute and enterprising genius, had brought his country out of obscurity; and another, by his weakness and indolence, had brought destruction upon his.

Hitherto we know very little of the private calamities which for so long a time spread desolation over the face of the Persian empire. It is said, that shah Hussein was so pusillanimous as to place with his own hands the tiara or crown of Persia on the head of the usurper Mahmoud, and also that this Mahmoud afterwards went mad. Thus the lives of so many thousands of men depend on the caprice of a madman or a fool. They add furthermore, that Mahmoud, in one of his fits of frenzy, put to death with his own hand all the sons and nephews of the shah Hussein to the number of a hundred; and that he caused the gospel of St. John to be read upon his head, in order to purify himself, and to receive a cure for his disorder. These and such like Persian fables have been circulated by our monks, and afterwards printed in Paris.

The tyrant, after having murdered his uncle, was in his turn put to death by his nephew Eshreff, who was as cruel and bloody a tyrant as Mahmoud himself.

Shah Thamaseb still continued imploring the assistance of Russia. This Thamaseb or shah Thomas, was assisted and afterwards replaced on the throne by the famous Kouli Khan, and was again dethroned by the same Kouli Khan.

The revolutions and wars which Russia had afterwards to encounter against the Turks, and in which she proved victorious, the evacuating the three provinces in Persia, which cost Russia more to keep than they were worth, are events which do not concern Peter the Great, as they did not happen till several years after his death; it may suffice to observe, that he finished his military career by adding three provinces to his empire on the part next to Persia, after having just before added the same number on that side next to Sweden.

CHAP. XXXVI.

Of the Coronation of the Empress Catherine I. and the Death of Peter
the Great.

Peter, at his return from his Persian expedition, found himself in a better condition than ever to be the arbiter of the North. He now openly declared himself the protector of Charles XII. whose professed enemy he had been for eighteen years. He sent for the duke of Holstein, nephew to that monarch, to his court, promised him his eldest daughter in marriage, and began to make preparations for supporting him in his claims on the duchy of Holstein Sleswick, and even engaged himself so to do by a treaty of alliance, (Feb. 1724.) which he concluded with the crown of Sweden.

He continued the works he had begun all over his empire, to the further extremity of Kamtshatka, and for the better direction of them, established an academy of sciences at Petersburg. The arts began now to flourish on every side: manufactures were encouraged, the navy was augmented, the army well provided, and the laws properly enforced. He now enjoyed his glory in full repose; but was desirous of sharing it in a new manner with her who, according to his own declaration, by remedying the disaster of the campaign of Pruth, had been in some measure the instrument of his acquiring that glory.

Accordingly, the coronation of his consort Catherine was performed at Moscow, in presence of the duchess of Courland, his eldest brother's daughter, and the duke of Holstein, his intended son-in-law. (May 28, 1724.) The declaration which he published on this occasion merits attention: he therein cites the examples of several Christian princes who had placed the crown on the heads of their consorts, as likewise those of the heathen emperors, Basilides, Justinian, Heraclius, and Leo, the philosopher. He enumerates the services Catherine had done to the state, and in particular in the war against the Turks,--'Where my army,' says he, 'which had been reduced to 22,000 men, had to encounter an army above 200,000 strong.' He does not say, in this declaration, that the empress was to succeed to the crown after his death; but this ceremony, which was altogether new and unusual in the Russian empire, was one of those means by which he prepared the minds of his subjects for such an event. Another circumstance that might perhaps furnish a stronger reason to believe that he destined Catherine to succeed him on the throne, was, that he himself marched on foot before her the day of her coronation, as captain of a new company, which he had created under the name of the _knights of the empress_.

When they arrived at the cathedral, Peter himself placed the crown on her head; and when she would have fallen down and embraced his knees, he prevented her; and, at their return from the church, caused the sceptre and globe to be carried before her. The ceremony was altogether worthy an emperor; for on every public occasion Peter shewed as much pomp and magnificence as he did plainness and simplicity in his private manner of living.

Having thus crowned his spouse, he at length determined to give his eldest daughter, Anna Petrowna, in marriage to the duke of Holstein. This princess greatly resembled her father in the face, was very majestic, and of a singular beauty. She was betrothed to the duke of Holstein on the 24th of November, 1724, but with very little ceremony. Peter having for some time past found his health greatly impaired, and this, together with some family uneasiness, that perhaps rather increased his disorder, which in a short time proved fatal, permitted him to have but very little relish for feasts or public diversions in this latter part of his life. [116] The empress Catherine had at that time a young man for the chamberlain of her household, whose name was Moens de la Croix, a native of Russia, but of Flemish parents, remarkably handsome and genteel. His sister, madame de Balc, was bed-chamber-woman to the empress, and these two had entirely the management of her household. Being both accused of having taken presents, they were sent to prison, and afterwards brought to their trial by express order of the czar; who, by an edict in the year 1714, had forbidden any one holding a place about court to receive any present or other gratuity, on pain of being declared infamous, and suffering death; and this prohibition had been several times renewed.

The brother and sister were found guilty, and received sentence, and all those who had either purchased their services or given them any gratuity in return for the same, were included therein, except the duke of Holstein and his minister count Bassewitz: as it is probable that the presents made by that prince, to those who had a share in bringing about his marriage with the czar's daughter, were not looked upon in a criminal light.

Moens was condemned to be beheaded, and his sister (who was the empress's favourite) to receive eleven strokes of the knout. The two sons of this lady, one of whom was an officer in the household, and the other a page, were degraded, and sent to serve as private soldiers in the army in Persia.

These severities, though they shock our manners, were perhaps necessary in a country where the observance of the laws is to be enforced only by the most terrifying rigour. The empress solicited her favourite's pardon; but the czar, offended at her application, peremptorily refused her, and, in the heat of his passion, seeing a fine looking-glass in the apartment, he, with one blow of his fist, broke it into a thousand pieces; and, turning to the empress, 'Thus,' said he, 'thou seest I can, with one stroke of my hand, reduce this glass to its original dust.' Catherine, in a melting accent, replied, 'It is true, you have destroyed one of the greatest ornaments of your palace, but do you think that palace is the more charming for its loss?' This answer appeased the emperor's wrath; but all the favour that Catherine could obtain for her bed-chamber-woman was, that she should receive only five strokes of the knout instead of eleven.

I should not have related this anecdote, had it not been attested by a public minister, who was eye-witness of the whole transaction, and who, by having made presents to the unfortunate brother and sister, was perhaps himself one of the principal causes of their disgrace and sufferings. It was this affair that emboldened those who judge of every thing in the worst light, to spread the report that Catherine hastened the death of her husband, whose choleric disposition filled her with apprehensions that overweighed the gratitude she owed him for the many favours he had heaped upon her.

These cruel suspicions were confirmed by Catherine's recalling to court her woman of the bed-chamber immediately upon the death of the czar, and reinstating her in her former influence. It is the duty of an historian to relate the public reports which have been circulated in all times in states, on the decease of princes who have been snatched away by a premature death, as if nature was not alone sufficient to put a period to the existence of a crowned head as well as that of a beggar; but it is likewise the duty of an historian to shew how far such reports were rashly or unjustly formed.

There is an immense distance between the momentary discontent which may arise from the morose or harsh behaviour of a husband, and the desperate resolution of poisoning that husband, who is at the same time our sovereign and benefactor in the highest degree. The danger attending such a design would have been as great as it was criminal. Catherine had at that time a powerful party against her, who epoused the cause of the son of the deceased czarowitz. Nevertheless, neither that faction, nor any one person about the court, once suspected the czarina; and the vague rumours which were spread on this head were founded only on the mistaken notions of foreigners, who were very imperfectly acquainted with the affair, and who chose to indulge the wretched pleasure of accusing of heinous crimes those whom they thought interested to commit them. But it was even very doubtful whether this was at all the case with Catherine. It was far from being certain that she was to succeed her husband. She had been crowned indeed, but only in the character of wife to the reigning sovereign, and not as one who was to enjoy the sovereign authority after his death.

Peter, in his declaration, had only ordered this coronation as a matter of ceremony, and not as conferring a right of governing. He therein only cited the examples of emperors, who had caused their consorts to be crowned, but not of those who had conferred on them the royal authority. In fine, at the very time of Peter's illness, several persons believed that the princess Anna Petrowna would succeed him jointly with her husband the duke of Holstein, or that the czar would nominate his grandson for his successor; therefore, so far from Catherine's being interested in the death of the emperor, she rather seemed concerned in the preservation of his life.

It is undeniable, that Peter had, for a considerable time, been troubled with an abscess in the bladder, and a stoppage of urine. The mineral waters of Olnitz, and some others, which he had been advised to use, had proved of very little service to him, and he had found himself growing sensibly weaker, ever since the beginning of the year 1724. His labours, from which he would not allow himself any respite, increased his disorder, and hastened his end: (Jan. 1723.) his malady became now more and more desperate, he felt burning pains, which threw him into an almost constant delirium,[117] whenever he had a moment's interval, he endeavoured to write, but he could only scrawl a few lines that were wholly unintelligible; and it was with the greatest difficulty that the following words, in the Russian language, could be distinguished:--'_Let every thing be given to ----_'

He then called for the princess Anna Petrowna, in order to dictate to her, but by that time she could come to his bed-side, he had lost his speech, and fell into a fit, which lasted sixteen hours. The empress Catherine did not quit his bed-side for three nights together. At length, he breathed his last in her arms, on the 28th of Jan. 1725. about four o'clock in the morning.

His body was conveyed into the great hall of the palace, accompanied by all the imperial family, the senate, all the principal personages of state, and an innumerable concourse of people. It was there exposed on a bed of state, and every one was permitted to approach and kiss his hand, till the day of his interment, which was on the 10-21st of March, 1725.[118]

It has been thought, and it has been asserted in print, that he had appointed his wife Catherine to succeed him in the empire, by his last will, but the truth is, that he never made any will, or at least none that ever appeared; a most astonishing negligence in so great a legislator, and a proof that he did not think his disorder mortal.

No one knew, at the time of his death, who was to succeed him: he left behind him his grandson Peter, son of the unfortunate Alexis, and his eldest daughter Anna, married to the duke of Holstein. There was a considerable faction in favour of young Peter; but prince Menzikoff, who had never had any other interests than those of the empress Catherine, took care to be beforehand with all parties, and their designs; and accordingly, when the czar was upon the point of giving up the ghost, he caused the empress to remove into another apartment of the palace, where all their friends were assembled ready: he had the royal treasures conveyed into the citadel, and secured the guards in his interest, as likewise the archbishop of Novogorod; and then they held a private council, in presence of the empress Catherine, and one Macarof, a secretary, in whom they could confide, at which the duke of Holstein's minister assisted.

At the breaking up of this council, the empress returned to the czar's bed-side, who soon after yielded up the ghost in her arms. As soon as his death was made known, the principal senators and general officers repaired to the palace, where the empress made a speech to them, which prince Menzikoff answered in the name of all present. The empress being withdrawn, they proceeded to consider the proper forms to be observed on the occasion, when Theophanes, archbishop of Pleskow, told the assembly, that, on the eve of the coronation of the empress Catherine, the deceased czar had declared to him, that his sole reason for placing the crown on her head, was, that she might wear it after his death; upon which the assembly unanimously signed the proclamation, and Catherine succeeded her husband on the throne the very day of his death.

Peter the Great was regretted by all those whom he had formed, and the descendants of those who had been sticklers for the ancient customs soon began to look on him as their father: foreign nations, who have beheld the duration of his establishments, have always expressed the highest admiration for his memory, acknowledging that he was actuated by a more than common prudence and wisdom, and not by a vain desire of doing extraordinary things. All Europe knows that though he was fond of fame, he coveted it only for noble principles; that though he had faults, they never obscured his noble qualities, and that, though, as a man, he was liable to errors, as a monarch he was always great: he every way forced nature, in his subjects, in himself, by sea and land: but he forced her only to render her more pleasing and noble. The arts, which he transplanted with his own hands, into countries, till then in a manner savage, have flourished, and produced fruits which are lasting testimonies of his genius, and will render his memory immortal, since they now appear as natives of those places to which he introduced them. The civil, political, and military government, trade, manufactures, the arts and the sciences, have all been carried on, according to his plan, and by an event not to be paralleled in history: we have seen four women successively ascend the throne after him, who have maintained, in full vigour, all the great designs he accomplished, and have completed those which he had begun.

The court has undergone some revolutions since his death, but the empire has not suffered one. Its splendour was increased by Catherine I. It triumphed over the Turks and the Swedes under Anna Petrowna; and under Elizabeth it conquered Prussia, and a part of Pomerania; and lastly, it has tasted the sweets of peace, and has seen the arts flourish in fulness and security in the reign of Catherine the Second.[119]

Let the historians of that nation enter into the minutest circumstances of the new creation, the wars and undertakings of Peter the Great: let them rouse the emulation of their countrymen, by celebrating those heroes who assisted this monarch in his labours, in the field, and in the cabinet. It is sufficient for a stranger, a disinterested admirer of merit, to have endeavoured to set to view that great man, who learned of Charles XII. to conquer him, who twice quitted his dominions, in order to govern them the better, who worked with his own hands, in almost all the useful and necessary arts, to set an example of instruction to his people, and who was the founder and the father of his empire.[120]

Princes, who reign over states long since civilized, may say to themselves, 'If a man, assisted only by his own genius, has been capable of doing such great things in the frozen climes of ancient Scythia, what may not be expected from us, in kingdoms where the accumulated labours of many ages have rendered the way so easy?'

ORIGINAL PIECES RELATIVE TO THIS HISTORY, AGREEABLE TO THE TRANSLATIONS MADE AT THEIR FIRST PUBLICATION, BY ORDER OF CZAR PETER I.

SENTENCE _Pronounced against the CZAROWITZ ALEXIS, June 24th, 1718._

By virtue of an express ordinance issued by his czarish majesty, and signed by his own hand, on the 13th of June, for the judgment of the czarowitz Alexis Petrowitz, in relation to his crimes and transgressions against his father and sovereign; the undernamed ministers and senators, estates military and civil, after having assembled several times in the regency chamber of the senate of Petersburg, and having heard read the original writings and testimonies given against the czarowitz, as also his majesty's admonitory letters to that prince, and his answers to them in his own writing, and other acts relating to the process, and likewise the criminal informations, declarations and confessions of the czarowitz, partly written with his own hand, and partly delivered by word of mouth to his father and sovereign, before the several persons undernamed, constituted by his czarish majesty's authority to the effect of the present judgment, do acknowledge and declare, that though according to the laws of the Russian empire, it belongs not to them, the natural subjects of his czarish majesty's sovereign dominions, to take cognizance of an affair of this nature, which for its importance depends solely on the absolute will of the sovereign, whose power, unlimited by any law, is derived from God alone; yet, in submission to his ordinance who hath given them this liberty, and after mature reflection, observing the dictates of their consciences without fear, flattery, or respect of persons, having nothing before their eyes but the divine laws applicable to the present case, the canons and rules of councils, the authority of the holy fathers and doctors of the church, and taking also for their rule the instruction of the archbishops and clergy assembled at Petersburg on this occasion, and conforming themselves to the laws and constitutions of this empire, which are agreeable to those of other nations, especially the Greeks and the Romans, and other Christian princes; they unanimously agreed and pronounced the czarowitz Alexis Petrowitz _to be worthy of death_, for the aforesaid crimes and capital transgressions against his sovereign and father, he being his czarish majesty's son and subject; and that, notwithstanding the promise given by his czarish majesty to the czarowitz, in a letter sent by M. Tolstoy and captain Romanzoff, dated from Spaw, the 10th of July, 1717, to pardon his elopement if he voluntarily returned, as the czarowitz himself acknowledges with gratitude, in his answer to that letter, dated from Naples, the 4th of October, 1717, wherein he returns thanks to his majesty for the pardon he had promised him solely on condition of his speedy and voluntary return; yet he hath forfeited and rendered himself unworthy of that pardon, by renewing and continuing his former transgressions, as is fully set forth in his majesty's manifesto of the 3d of February, in this present year, and for not returning voluntarily and of his own accord.

And although his majesty did, upon the arrival of the czarowitz at Moscow, and his humbly confessing in writing his crimes, and asking pardon for them, take pity on him, as is natural for every father to act towards a son, and at the audience, held in the great hall of the castle, dated the said 3d day of February, did promise him full pardon for all his crimes and transgressions, it was only on condition that he would declare, without reserve or restriction, all his designs, and who were his counsellors and abettors therein, but that if he concealed any one person or thing, that in such case the promised pardon should be null and void, which conditions the czarowitz did at that time accept and receive, with all outward tokens of gratitude and obedience, solemnly swearing on the holy cross and the blessed evangelists, and in the presence of all those assembled at that time and for that purpose in the cathedral church, that he would faithfully, and without reserve, declare the whole truth.

His majesty did also the next day confirm to the czarowitz in writing the said promise, in the interrogatories which hereafter follow, and which his majesty caused to be delivered to him, having first written at the begining what follows:

'As you did yesterday receive your pardon, on condition that you would confess all the circumstances of your flight, and whatever relates thereto; but if you concealed any part thereof, you should answer for it with your life; and, as you have already made some confessions, it is expected of you, for our more full satisfaction, and your own safety, to commit the same to writing, in such order as shall in the course of your examination be pointed out to you.'

And at the end, under the seventh question, there was again written, with his czarish majesty's own hand:

'Declare to us, and discover whatever hath any relation to this affair, though it be not here expressed, and clear yourself as if it were at confession; for if you conceal any thing that shall by any other means be afterwards discovered, do not impute the consequence to us, since you have been already told, that in such case the pardon granted you should be null and void.'

Notwithstanding all which, the answers and confessions of the czarowitz were delivered without any sincerity; he not only concealing many of his accomplices, but also the capital circumstances relating to his own transgressions, particularly his rebellious design in usurping the throne even in the life-time of his father, flattering himself that the populace would declare in his favour; all which hath since been fully discovered in the criminal process, after he had refused to make a discovery himself, as hath appeared by the above presents.

Thus it hath appeared by the whole conduct of the czarowitz, as well as by the confessions which he both delivered in writing, and by word of mouth, particularly, that he was not disposed to wait for the succession in the manner in which his father had left it to him after his death, according to equity, and the order of nature which God has established; but intended to take the crown off the head of his father, while living, and set it upon his own, not only by a civil insurrection, but by the assistance of a foreign force, which he had actually requested.

The czarowitz has hereby rendered himself unworthy of the clemency and pardon, promised him by the emperor his father; and since the laws divine and ecclesiastical, civil and military, condemn to death, without mercy, not only those whose attempts against their father and sovereign have been proved by testimonies and writings; but even such as have been convicted of an intention to rebel, and of having formed a base design to kill their sovereign, and usurp the throne; what shall we think of a rebellious design, almost unparalleled in history, joined to that of a horrid parricide, against him who was his father in a double capacity; a father of great lenity and indulgence, who brought up the czarowitz from the cradle with more than paternal care and tenderness; who earnestly endeavoured to form him for government, and with incredible pains, and indefatigable application, to instruct him in the military art, and qualify him to succeed to so great an empire? with how much stronger reason does such a design deserve to be punished with death?

It is therefore with hearts full of affliction, and eyes streaming with tears, that we, as subjects and servants, pronounce this sentence; considering that it belongs not to us to give judgment in a case of so great importance, and especially to pronounce against the son of our most precious sovereign lord the czar. Nevertheless, it being his pleasure that we should act in this capacity, we, by these presents, declare our real opinion, and pronounce this sentence of condemnation with a pure and Christian conscience, as we hope to be able to answer for it at the just, awful, and impartial tribunal of Almighty God.

We submit, however, this sentence, which we now pass, to the sovereign power, the will, and merciful revisal of his czarish majesty, our most gracious sovereign.

THE PEACE OF NYSTADT.

In the name of the Most Holy and undivided Trinity.