Вольтер
The History of Peter the Great, Emperor of Russia
CHAP. XIX
Consequences of the battle of Pultowa. – Charles XII. takes refuge among the Turks. – Augustus, whom he had dethroned, recovers his dominions. – Conquests of Peter the Great.
1709.
The chief prisoners of rank were now presented to the conqueror, who ordered their swords to be returned, and invited them to dinner. It is a well known fact, that, on drinking to the officers, he said, 'To the health of my masters in the art of war.' However, most of his masters, particularly the subaltern officers, and all the private men, were soon afterwards sent into Siberia. There was no cartel established here for exchange of prisoners between the Russians and Swedes; the czar, indeed, had proposed one before the siege of Pultowa, but Charles rejected the offer, and his troops were in every thing the victims of his inflexible pride.
It was this unseasonable obstinacy that occasioned all the misfortunes of this prince in Turkey, and a series of adventures, more becoming a hero of romance than a wise or prudent king; for, as soon as he arrived at Bender, he was advised to write to the grand-vizier, as is the custom among the Turks; but this he thought would be demeaning himself too far. The like obstinacy embroiled him with all the ministers of the Porte, one after another, in short, he knew not how to accommodate himself either to times or circumstances.80
The first news of the battle of Pultowa produced a general revolution in minds and affairs in Poland, Saxony, Sweden, and Silesia. Charles, while all powerful in those parts, had obliged the emperor Joseph to take a hundred and five churches from the catholics in favour of the Silesians of the confession of Augsburg. The catholics then no sooner received news of the defeat of Charles, than they repossessed themselves of all the Lutheran temples. The Saxons now thought of nothing but being revenged for the extortions of a conqueror, who had robbed them, according to their own account, of twenty-three millions of crowns.
The king of Poland, their elector, immediately protested against the abdication that had been extorted from him, and being now reconciled to the czar (Aug. 3.), he left no stone unturned to reascend the Polish throne. Sweden, overwhelmed with consternation, thought her king for a long time dead, and in this uncertainty the senate knew not what to resolve.
Peter in the mean time determined to make the best use of his victory, and therefore dispatched marshal Sheremeto with an army into Livonia, on the frontiers of which province that general had so often distinguished himself. Prince Menzikoff was sent in haste with a numerous body of cavalry to second the few troops left in Poland, to encourage the nobles who were in the interest of Augustus to drive out his competitor, who was now considered in no better light than a rebel, and to disperse a body of Swedes and troops that were still left in that kingdom under the command of general Crassau.
The czar soon after sets out in person, marches through the province of Kiow, and the palatinates of Chelm and Upper Volhinia, and at length arrives at Lublin, where he concerts measures with the general of Lithuania. He then reviews the crown troops, who all take the oath of allegiance to king Augustus, from thence he proceeds to Warsaw, and at Thera enjoyed the most glorious of all triumphs (Sept. 18.), that of receiving the thanks of a king, whom he had reinstated in his dominions. There it was that he concluded a treaty against Sweden, with the kings of Denmark, Poland, and Prussia (Oct. 7.): in which he was resolved to recover from Charles all the conquests of Gustavus Adolphus. Peter revived the ancient pretensions of the czars to Livonia, Ingria, Carelia, and part of Finland; Denmark laid claim to Scania, and the king of Prussia to Pomerania.
Thus had Charles XII. by his unsuccessful valour, shook the noble edifice that had been erected by the prosperous bravery of his ancestor Gustavus Adolphus. The Polish nobility came in on all sides to renew their oaths to their king, or to ask pardon for having deserted him; and almost the whole kingdom acknowledged Peter for its protector.
To the victorious arms of the czar, to these new treaties, and to this sudden revolution, Stanislaus had nothing to oppose but a voluntary resignation: he published a writing called Universale, in which he declares himself ready to resign the crown, if the republic required it.
Peter, having concerted all the necessary measures with the king of Poland, and ratified the treaty with Denmark, set out directly to finish his negotiation with the king of Prussia. It was not then usual for sovereign princes to perform the function of their own ambassadors. Peter was the first who introduced this custom, which has been followed by very few. The elector of Brandenburg, the first king of Prussia, had a conference with the czar at Marienverder, a small town situated in the western part of Pomerania, and built by the old Teutonic knights, and included in the limits of Prussia, lately erected into a kingdom. This country indeed was poor, and of a small extent; but its new king, whenever he travelled, displayed the utmost magnificence; with great splendour he had received czar Peter at his first passing through his dominions, when that prince quitted his empire to go in search of instruction among strangers. But he received the conqueror of Charles XII. in a still more pompous manner. (Oct. 20.) Peter for this time concluded only a defensive treaty with him, which afterwards, however, completed the ruin of Sweden.
Not an instant of time was lost. Peter, having proceeded with the greatest dispatch in his negotiations, which elsewhere are wont to take up so much time, goes and joins his army, then before Riga, the capital of Livonia; he began by bombarding the place (Nov. 21.), and fired off the three first bombs himself; then changed the siege into a blockade; and, when well assured that Riga could not escape him, he repaired to his city of Petersburg, to inspect and forward the works carrying on there, the new buildings, and finishing of his fleet; and having laid the keel of a ship of fifty-four guns, (Dec. 3.) with his own hands, he returned to Moscow. Here he amused himself with assisting in the preparations for the triumphal entry, which he exhibited in the capital. He directed every thing relating to that festival, and was himself the principal contriver and architect.
He opened the year 1710 with this solemnity, so necessary to his subjects, whom it inspired with notions of grandeur, and was highly pleasing to every one who had been fearful of seeing those enter their walls as conquerors, over whom they now triumphed. Seven magnificent arches were erected, under which passed in triumph, the artillery, standards, and colours, taken from the enemy, with their officers, generals, and ministers, who had been taken prisoners, all on foot, amidst the ringing of bells, the sound of trumpets, the discharge of a hundred pieces of cannon, and the acclamations of an innumerable concourse of people, whose voices rent the air as soon as the cannon ceased firing. The procession was closed by the victorious army, with the generals at its head; and Peter, who marched in his rank of major-general. At each triumphal arch stood the deputies of the several orders of the state; and at the last was a chosen band of young gentlemen, the sons of boyards, clad in Roman habits, who presented a crown of laurels to their victorious monarch.
This public festival was followed by another ceremony, which proved no less satisfactory than the former. In the year 1708 happened an accident the more disagreeable to Peter, as his arms were at that time unsuccessful. Mattheof, his ambassador to the court of London, having had his audience of leave of queen Anne, was arrested for debt, at the suit of some English merchants, and carried before a justice of peace to give security for the monies he owed there. The merchants insisted that the laws of commerce ought to prevail before the privileges of foreign ministers; the czar's ambassador, and with him all the public ministers, protested against this proceeding, alleging, that their persons ought to be always inviolable. The czar wrote to queen Anne, demanding satisfaction for the insult offered him in the person of his ambassador.
But the queen had it not in her power to gratify him; because, by the laws of England, tradesmen were allowed to prosecute their debtors, and there was no law that excepted public ministers from such prosecution.81 The murder of Patkul, the czar's ambassador, who had been executed the year before by the order of Charles XII. had encouraged the English to shew so little regard to a character which had been so cruelly profaned. The other public ministers who were then at the court of London, were obliged to be bound for the czar's ambassador; and at length all the queen could do in his favour, was to prevail on her parliament to pass an act, by which no one for the future could arrest an ambassador for debt; but after the battle of Pultowa, the English court thought proper to give satisfaction to the czar.
The queen made by a formal embassy an excuse for what had passed. Mr. Whitworth,82 the person charged with this commission, began his harangue with the following words. – (Feb. 16.) 'Most high and mighty emperor.' He told the czar that the person who had presumed to arrest his ambassador, had been imprisoned and rendered infamous. There was no truth in all this, but it was sufficient that he said so, and the title of emperor, which the queen had not given Peter before the battle of Pultowa, shewed the consideration he had now acquired in Europe.
This title had been already granted him in Holland, not only by those who had been his fellow-workmen in the dock-yards at Saardam, and seemed to interest themselves most in his glory, but likewise by the principal persons in the state, who unanimously styled him emperor, and made public rejoicings for his victory, even in the presence of the Swedish minister.
The universal reputation which he had acquired by his victory of Pultowa, was still further increased by his not suffering a moment to pass without making some advantages of it. In the first place, he laid siege to Elbing, a Hans town of Regal Prussia in Poland, where the Swedes had still a garrison. The Russians scaled the walls, entered the town, and the garrison surrendered prisoners of war. (Mar. 11.) This was one of the largest magazines belonging to Charles XII. The conquerors found therein one hundred and eighty-three brass cannon, and one hundred and fifty-seven mortars. Immediately after the reduction of Elbing, Peter re-marched from Moscow to Petersburg (April 2.); as soon as he arrived at this latter place, he took shipping under his new fortress of Cronslot, coasted along the shore of Carelia, and notwithstanding a violent storm, brought his fleet safely before Wiburg, the capital of Carelia in Finland; while his land-forces advanced over the frozen morasses, and in a short time the capital of Livonia beheld itself closely blockaded (June 23.): and after a breach was made in the walls, Wiburg surrendered, and the garrison, consisting of four thousand men, capitulated, but did not receive the honours of war, being made prisoners notwithstanding the capitulation. Peter charged the enemy with several infractions of this kind, and promised to set these troops at liberty, as soon as he should receive satisfaction from the Swedes, for his complaints. On this occasion the king of Sweden was to be consulted, who continued as inflexible as ever; and those soldiers, whom, by a little concession, he might have delivered from their confinement, remained in captivity. Thus did king William III. in 1695, arrest marshal Boufflers, notwithstanding the capitulation of Namur. There have been several instances of such violations of treaties, but it is to be wished there never had been any.
After the taking of this capital, the blockade of Riga was soon changed into a regular siege, and pushed with vigour. They were obliged to break the ice on the river Dwina, which waters the walls of the city. An epidemical disorder, which had raged some time in those parts, now got amongst the besiegers, and carried off nine thousand; nevertheless, the siege was not in the least slackened; it lasted a considerable time, but at length the garrison capitulated (July 15.): and were allowed the honours of war; but it was stipulated by the capitulation, that all the Livonian officers and soldiers should enter into the Russian service, as natives of a country that had been dismembered from that empire, and usurped by the ancestors of Charles XII. But the Livonians were restored to the privileges of which his father had stripped them, and all the officers entered into the czar's service: this was the most noble satisfaction that Peter could take for the murder of his ambassador, Patkul, a Livonian, who had been put to death, for defending those privileges. The garrison consisted of near five thousand men. A short time afterwards the citadel of Pennamund was taken, and the besiegers found in the town and fort above eight hundred pieces of artillery of different kinds.
Nothing was now wanting, to make Peter entirely master of the province of Carelia, but the possession of the strong town of Kexholm, built on an island in the lake of Ladoga, and deemed impregnable; it was bombarded soon after, and surrendered in a short time. (Sep. 19.) The island of Oesel in the sea, bordering upon the north of Livonia, was subdued with the same rapidity. (Sep. 23.)
On the side of Esthonia, a province of Livonia, towards the north, and on the gulf of Finland, are the towns of Pernau and Revel: by the reduction of these Peter completed the conquest of all Livonia. Pernau surrendered after a siege of a few days (Aug. 25.), and Revel capitulated (Sep. 10.) without waiting to have a single cannon fired against it; but the besieged found means to escape out of the hands of the conquerors, at the very time that they were surrendering themselves prisoners of war: for some Swedish ships, having anchored in the road, under favour of the night, the garrison and most of the citizens embarked on board, and when the besiegers entered the town, they were surprised to find it deserted. When Charles XII. gained the victory of Narva little did he expect that his troops would one day be driven to use such artifices.
In Poland, Stanislaus finding his party entirely ruined, had taken refuge in Pomerania, which still belonged to Charles XII. Augustus resumed the government, and it was difficult to decide who had acquired most glory, Charles in dethroning him, or Peter in restoring him to his crown.
The subjects of the king of Sweden were still more unfortunate than that monarch himself. The contagious distemper, which had made such havock over Livonia, passed from thence into Sweden, where, in the city of Stockholm, it carried off thirty thousand persons: it likewise desolated the provinces, already thinned of their inhabitants; for during the space of ten years successively, most of the able-bodied men had quitted their country to follow their master, and perished in foreign climes.
Charles's ill fortune pursued him also in Pomerania: his army had retired thither from Poland, to the number of eleven thousand; the czar, the kings of Denmark and Prussia, the elector of Hanover, and the duke of Holstein, joined together to render this army useless, and to compel general Crassau, who commanded it, to submit to neutrality. The regency of Stockholm, hearing no news of their king, and distracted by the mortality that raged in that city, were glad to sign this neutrality, which seemed to deliver one of its provinces at least from the horrors of war. The emperor of Germany favoured this extraordinary convention, by which it was stipulated, that the Swedish army then in Pomerania should not march from thence to assist their monarch in any other part of the world; nay, it was furthermore resolved in the German empire, to raise an army to enforce the execution of this unparalleled convention. The reason of this was, that the emperor of Germany, who was then at war with France, was in hopes to engage the Swedish army to enter into his service. This whole negotiation was carried on while Peter was subduing Livonia, Esthonia, and Carelia.
Charles XII. who was all this time at Bender, putting every spring in motion to engage the divan to declare war against the czar, received this news as one of the severest blows his untoward fortune had dealt him: he could not brook, that his senate at Stockholm should pretend to tie up the hands of his army, and it was on this occasion that he wrote them word, he would send one of his boots to govern them.
The Danes, in the mean time, were making preparations to invade Sweden; so that every nation in Europe was now engaged in war, Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, Germany, Holland, and England, were contending for the dominions left by Charles II. of Spain; and the whole North was up in arms against Charles XII. There wanted only a quarrel with the Ottoman empire, for every village in Europe to be exposed to the ravages of war. This quarrel happened soon afterwards, when Peter had attained to the summit of his glory, and precisely for that reason.
CHAP. XX
Campaign of Pruth.
Sultan Achmet III. declared war against Peter I. not from any regard to the king of Sweden, but, as may readily be supposed, merely from a view to his own interest. The Khan of the Crim Tartars could not without dread, behold a neighbour so powerful as Peter I. The Porte had, for some time, taken umbrage at the number of ships which this prince had on the Palus Mæotis, and in the Black Sea, at his fortifying the city of Azoph, and at the flourishing state of the harbour of Taganroc, already become famous; and, lastly, at his great series of successes, and at the ambition which success never fails to augment.
It is neither true, nor even probable, that the Porte should have begun the war against the czar, on the Palus Mæotis, for no other reason than because a Swedish ship had taken a bark on the Baltic, on board of which was found a letter from a minister, whose name has never been mentioned. Norberg tells us, that this letter contained a plan for the conquest of the Turkish empire; that it was carried to Charles XII. who was then in Turkey, and was by him sent to the divan; and that immediately after the receipt of this letter, war was declared. But this story carries the mark of fiction with it. It was the remonstrances of the khan of Tartary, who was more uneasy about the neighbourhood of Azoph, than the Turkish divan, that induced this latter to give orders for taking the field.83
It was in the month of August, and before the czar had completed the reduction of Livonia, when Achmet III. resolved to declare war against him. The Turks, at that time, could hardly have had the news of the taking of Riga; and, therefore, the proposal of restoring to the king of Sweden the value in money, of the effects he had lost at the battle of Pultowa, would have been the most absurd thing imaginable, if not exceeded by that of demolishing Petersburg. The behaviour of Charles XII. at Bender, was sufficiently romantic; but the conduct of the Turkish divan would have been much more so, if we suppose it to have made any demands of this kind.
Nov. 1710.] The khan of Tartary, who was the principal instigator of this war, paid Charles a visit in his retreat at Bender. They were connected by the same interests, inasmuch as Europe makes part of the frontiers of Little Tartary. Charles and the khan were the two greatest sufferers by the successes of the czar; but the khan did not command the forces of the grand seignior. He was like one of the feudatory princes of Germany, who served in the armies of the empire with their own troops, and were subject to the authority of the emperor's generals for the time being.
Nov. 29, 1710.] The first step taken by the divan, was to arrest Tolstoy, the czar's ambassador at the Porte, in the streets of Constantinople, together with thirty of his domestics, who, with their master, were all confined in the prison of the Seven Towers. This barbarous custom, at which even savages would blush, is owing to the Turks having always a number of foreign ministers residing amongst them from other courts, whereas they never send any in return. They look upon the ambassadors of Christian princes in no other light than as merchants or consuls; and, having naturally as great a contempt for Christians as they have for Jews, they seldom condescend to observe the laws of nations, in respect to them, unless forced to it; at least, they have hitherto persisted in this barbarous pride.
The famous vizier, Achmet Couprougli, the same who took the island of Candia, under Mahomet IV., insulted the son of the French ambassador, and even carried his brutality so far as to strike him, and afterwards to confine him in prison, without Lewis XIV., proud and lofty as he was, daring to resent it, otherwise than by sending another minister to the Porte. The Christian princes, who are so remarkably delicate on the point of honour amongst themselves, and have even made it a part of the law of nations, seem to be utterly insensible on this head in regard to the Turks.
Never did a crowned head suffer greater affronts in the persons of his ministers, than czar Peter. In the space of a few years, his ambassador at the court of London was thrown into jail for debt, his plenipotentiary at the courts of Poland and Saxony was broke upon the wheel, by order of the king of Sweden; and now his minister at the Ottoman Porte was seized and thrown into a dungeon at Constantinople, like a common felon.84
We have already observed, in the first part of this history, that he received satisfaction from queen Anne, of England, for the insult offered to his ambassador at London. The horrible affront he suffered, in the person of Patkul, was washed away in the blood of the Swedes slain at the battle of Pultowa; but fortune permitted the violation of the law of nations by the Turks to pass unpunished.
Jan. 1711.] The czar now found himself obliged to quit the theatre of war in the west, and march towards the frontiers of Turkey. He began by causing ten regiments, which he had in Poland, to advance towards Moldavia.85 He then ordered marshal Sheremeto to set out from Livonia, with his body of forces; and, leaving prince Menzikoff at the head of affairs at Petersburg, he returned to Moscow, to give orders for opening the ensuing campaign.
Jan. 18.] He now establishes a senate of regency: the regiment of guards begin their march, he issues orders for all the young nobility to follow him to the field, to learn the art of war, and places some of them in the station of cadets, and others in that of subaltern officers. Admiral Apraxin goes to Azoph to take the command by sea and land. These several measures being taken, the czar publishes an ordonnance in Moscow for acknowledging a new empress. This was the person who had been taken prisoner in Marienburg, in the year 1702. Peter had, in 1696, repudiated his wife Eudoxia Lopoukin (or Lapouchin) by whom he had two children. The laws of his church allow of no divorces; but, had they not, Peter would have enacted a new law to permit them.
The fair captive of Marienburg, who had taken the name of Catherine, had a soul superior to her sex and her misfortunes. She rendered herself so agreeable to the czar, that this prince would have her always near his person. She accompanied him in all his excursions, and most fatiguing campaigns: sharing in his toils, and softening his uneasiness by her natural gaiety, and the great attention she shewed to oblige him on all occasions, and the indifference she expressed for the luxury, dress, and other indulgences, of which the generality of her sex are, in other countries, wont to make real necessities. She frequently softened the passionate temper of the czar, and, by making him more clement and merciful, rendered him more truly great. In a word, she became so necessary to him, that he married her privately, in 1707. He had already two daughters by her, and the following year she bore him a third, who was afterwards married to the duke of Holstein.86
March 17, 1711.] The czar made this private marriage known the very day he set out with her to try the fortune of his arms against the Turks. The several dispositions he had made seemed to promise a successful issue. The hetman of the Cossacks was to keep the Tartars in awe, who had already began to commit ravages in the Ukraine. The main body of the Russian army was advancing towards Niester, and another body of troops, under prince Galitzin, were in full march through Poland. Every thing went on favourably at the beginning: for Galitzin having met with a numerous body of Tartars near Kiow, who had been joined by some Cossacks and some Poles of king Stanislaus' party, as also a few Swedes, he defeated them entirely, and killed near five thousand men. These Tartars had, in their march through the open country, made about ten thousand prisoners. It has been the custom of the Tartars, time immemorial, to carry with them a much greater number of cords than scimitars, in order to bind the unhappy wretches they surprise. The captives were all set free, and those who had made them prisoners were put to the sword. The whole Russian army, if it had been assembled together, would have amounted to sixty thousand men. It was to have been farther augmented by the troops belonging to the king of Poland. This prince, who owed every thing to the czar, came to pay him a visit at Jaroslaw, on the river Sana, the 3d of June, 1714, and promised him powerful succours. War was now declared against the Turks, in the name of these two monarchs: but the Polish diet, not willing to break with the Ottoman Porte, refused to ratify the engagement their king had entered into. It was the fate of the czar to have, in the king of Poland, an ally who could never be of any service to him. He entertained the same hopes of assistance from the princes of Moldavia and Walachia, and was, in the like manner, disappointed.
These two provinces ought to have taken this opportunity to shake off the Turkish yoke. These countries were those of the ancient Daci, who, together with the Gepidi, with whom they were intermixed, did, for a long time, disturb the Roman empire. They were at length subdued by the emperor Trajan, and Constantine the First made them embrace the Christian religion. Dacia was one of the provinces of the eastern empire; but shortly after these very people contributed to the ruin of that of the west, by serving under the Odoacers and Theodorics.
They afterwards continued to be subject to the Greek empire; and when the Turks made themselves masters of Constantinople, were governed and oppressed by particular princes; at length they were totally subjected by the Padisha, or Turkish emperor, who now granted them an investiture. The Hospodar, or Waiwod, chosen by the Ottoman Porte to govern these provinces, is always a Christian of the Greek church. The Turks, by this choice, give a proof of their toleration, while our ignorant declaimers are accusing them of persecution. The prince, nominated by the Porte, is tributary to, or rather farms these countries of the grand seignior; this dignity being always conferred on the best bidder, or him who makes the greatest presents to the vizier, in like manner as the Greek patriarch, at Constantinople. Sometimes this government is bestowed on a dragoman, that is to say, the interpreter to the divan. These provinces are seldom under the government of the same Waiwod, the Porte choosing to divide them, in order to be more sure of retaining them in subjection. Demetrius Cantemir was at this time Waiwod of Moldavia. This prince was said to be descended from Tamerlane, because Tamerlane's true name was Timur, and Timur was a Tartarian khan; and so, from the name Tamurkan, say they, came the family of Cantemir.
Bassaraba Brancovan had been invested with the principality of Walachia, but had not found any genealogist to deduce his pedigree from the Tartarian conqueror. Cantemir thought the time now come to shake off the Turkish yoke, and render himself independent by means of the czar's protection. In this view he acted in the very same manner with Peter as Mazeppa had done with Charles XII. He even engaged Bassaraba for the present to join him in the conspiracy, of which he hoped to reap all the benefit himself: his plan being to make himself master of both provinces. The bishop of Jerusalem, who was at that time at Walachia, was the soul of this conspiracy. Cantemir promised the czar to furnish him with men and provisions, as Mazeppa did the king of Sweden, and kept his word no better than he had done.
General Sheremeto advanced towards Jassi, the capital of Moldavia, to inspect and occasionally assist the execution of these great projects. Cantemir came thither to meet him, and was received with all the honours due to a prince: but he acted as a prince in no one circumstance, but that of publishing a manifesto against the Turkish empire. The hospodar of Walachia, who soon discovered the ambitious views of his colleague, quitted his party, and returned to his duty. The bishop of Jerusalem dreading, with reason, the punishment due to his perfidy, fled and concealed himself: the people of Walachia and Moldavia continued faithful to the Ottoman Porte, and those, who were to have furnished provisions for the Russian army, carried them to the Turks.
The vizier, Baltagi Mahomet had already crossed the Danube, at the head of one hundred thousand men, and was advancing towards Jassi, along the banks of the river Pruth (formerly the Hierasus), which falls into the Danube, and which is nearly the boundary of Moldavia and Bessarabia. He then dispatched count Poniatowsky,87 a Polish gentleman, attached to the fortunes of the king of Sweden, to desire that prince to make him a visit, and see his army. Charles, whose pride always got the better of his interest, would not consent to this proposal: he insisted that the grand vizier should make him the first visit, in his asylum near Bender. When Poniatowsky returned to the Ottoman camp, and endeavoured to excuse this refusal of his master, the vizier, turning to the khan of the Tartars, said, 'This is the very behaviour I expected from this proud pagan.' This mutual pride, which never fails of alienating the minds of those in power from each other, did no service to the king of Sweden's affairs; and indeed that prince might have easily perceived, from the beginning, that the Turks were not acting for his interest, but for their own.
