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CHAPTER XVII: Russians

During the reign of Alexis, Russia began to emerge from the barbarism into which it had been plunged by the Mongolian invasion and the civil wars occasioned by a long course of tyranny on the part of its rulers. His son Theodore pursued an enlightened policy, reforming the laws, encouraging the arts and introducing the manners and customs of more civilized nations. At his death he bequeathed the crown to his younger brother Peter, in preference to his imbecile brother Ivan, who was several years his senior. Through the intrigues of their ambitious sister Sophia, a rebellion broke out; and owing to the incapacity of one brother and the youth of the other, she continued to exercise the whole sovereign power. Being accused, however, of plotting the destruction of her youngest brother, she was immediately arrested and imprisoned; and Ivan having retired into private life, Peter became sole and undisputed master of the Russian empire, which was destined, through his efforts, to acquire eventually an eminent rank among the leading powers of Europe.

Endowed with an ardent thirst for knowledge, gifted with the most persevering courage, and animated by the hope of civilizing his nation, Peter I., deservedly surnamed the Great, exhibited to the world the unusual spectacle of a sovereign descending awhile from the throne, for the purpose of rendering himself more worthy of the crown. Having regulated the internal affairs of Russia, Peter quitted Moscow, and visited France, Holland, and England incognito; investigating their laws, studying their arts, sciences, and manufacturies, and everywhere engaging the most skillful artists and mechanics to follow him to Russia. But his desires did not end there: he wished also to become a conqueror. He accordingly, in 1700, entered into an alliance with Poland and Denmark, for the purpose of stripping the youthful Charles XII. of the whole, or of a part of his dominions. Nothing dismayed, the heroic Swede entered into an alliance with Holland and England, laid siege to Copenhagen, and compelled the Danish government to sue for peace. The Russians had in the meantime besieged Narva with 80,000 men. But Charles having thus crushed one of his enemies, in the short space of three weeks, immediately marched to the relief of Narva, where, with only 10,000 men, he forced the Russian intrenchments, killed 18,000 and took 30,000 prisoners, with all their artillery, baggage, and ammunition. Peter being prepared for reverses, coolly observed, "I knew that the Swedes would beat us, but they will teach us to become conquerors in our turn."

Having wintered at Narva, in the following year Charles defeated the Poles and Saxons on the Duna, and overran Livonia, Courland, and Lithuania. Elated with his successes, he formed the project of dethroning Augustus, king of Poland. Combining policy with the terror of his arms, he entered Warsaw, and through the intrigues of the primate of Poland, he obtained the deposition of Augustus, and the election of his friend, the young palatine Stanislaus Leczinski: A. D. 1704. Though Peter had been unable to afford his ally Augustus much assistance, he had not been inactive. Narva, so recently the scene of his discomfiture, he took by storm, and sent an army of 60,000 men into Poland. The Swedish king, however, drove them out of the country; and at the head of a noble and victorious army he marched onwards with the avowed intention of dethroning his most formidable enemy, the czar of Russia. Peter endeavored to avert the storm by sending proposals of peace; which being haughtily rejected, he retreated beyond the Dnieper, and sought to impede the progress of the Swedes towards Moscow, by breaking up the roads, and laying waste the surrounding country. Charles, after having endured great privations, and being urged by Mazeppa, hetman or chief of the Cossacks, who offered to join him with 30,000 men, and supply him with provisions, penetrated into the Ukraine. He reached the place of rendezvous: but the vigilance of Peter had rendered the designs of the hetman abortive, and he now appeared rather as a fugitive, attended with a few hundred followers, than as a potent ally.