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very good figure on paper, and had a plausible effect in manifestos, to the vulgar, or to those who were but little concerned. But these glosses could bear no political test of examination; as reasons of the same or a similar nature might be everlastingly found for the keeping of an army in any country, under pretence of friendship or protection, and at the same time converting it to all the purposes of a conquered province. In truth, the same reasons would have held, for sending a Russian army to Constantinople, to protect the divan, to prevent riots among the janissaries, and to restore the Christians in that empire to their ancient rights and privileges."

One of the most striking features in Catharine's reign was the subordinate dominion of the royal favourites; and this feature was rendered still more prominent by the eccentricities of the Orloffs, Potemkin, &c. men whose behaviour recalls to memory the wildest ages of despotism under the Roman Empire, when ignorance and savage brutality were invested with the purple. The anecdotes of Alexèy Orloff's transactions in Italy, chap. vi. vol. ii. will justify this remark. Let the reader attend to his feats of strength and ferocity in p. 212 and 224; and, if he be acquainted with Roman history, the character of the Emperor Maximin, as described by the Augustan historians, cannot fail to recur to his recollection. As a brief commentary on the present subject, we transcribe the following paragraph from Gibbon, vol. i. ch. vii. p. 226. "The stature of Maximin exceeded the measure of eight feet. Had he lived in a less enlightened age, tradition and poetry might well have described him as one of those monstrous giants, whose supernatural power was constantly exerted for the destruction of mankind." The Orloffs, indeed, were inferior to Maximin in stature as well as in power. Still, however, both their persons and their exploits were sufficiently gigantic; although in some instances the wildness of their caprice has perhaps been exaggerated. The following anecdote, we have reason to believe, is not entirely correct :

The empress had commissioned Alexèy Orloff to cause to be painted in Italy four pictures, representing the engagements of her squadrons and the burning of the Turkish flect. The painter,

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Hackert, having told him that he had never feen a ship blow the Russian made no hesitation of affording him an opportunity of contemplating such an object, and hazarded the firing of all the vessels in the road of Leghorn, for furnishing the painter with the means of exhibiting with greater truth the disaster of the capudan-pasha and admiral Spiridoff *.'

The French original says absurdly, "firing the road of Leghorn:" we believe that neither the vessels nor the road were

*The four pictures are at present hanging in the hall of audience at Peterhoff, one of the Russian Imperial country-seats.'

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exposed to the smallest danger: the precautions taken by the government of Florence rendered the conflagration a harmless. show, beheld without the smallest apprehension by innumerable spectators.

Alexey Orloff and Baratinsky were the principal agents in the revolution of 1762, and in the murder of Peter III. They both survived the Empress, and survived to perform a most extraordinary ceremony.

Alexius Orloff resided at Mosco at the time of the empress's death. Who would have thought that the sequel to the revolution of 1762 was to be acted in 1797? The new emperor Paul Petrovitch, on coming to the crown, caused the corpse of his father Peter III. after so many years had elapsed since its interment in the church of the monastery of St. Alexander Nefsky, to be taken up and brought to the palace, in order to pay it similar honours with those to be shewn the defunct empress his wife. In the printed ceremonial, prince Baratinsky and count Alexey Orloff were to stand one on each side the corpse of Peter as chief mourners. That unfortunate monarch having omitted the ceremony of coronation, the imperial crown was fetched from Mosco, and placed upon his coffin as it lay beside that of the empress, and over both a kind of true loveknot, with this inscription in russ: "Divided in life, united in death." The two chief mourners took their station in presence of the assembled court amid sable cloaks, black hangings, lighted tapers, and all the solemnity of imperial woe. Count Alexey, being blessed with strong nerves and much usage of the world, stood out the doleful scene; while prince Baratinsky, with a heart of finer mould, fainted under the weight of grief; and it was only by the repeated application of volatile salts and other stimulants, that he could be made to support his station during the three hours appointed by the ceremonial. Count Orloff, afterwards, received permission, without asking for it, to visit foreign parts; and prince Baratinsky was spared the trouble in future of paying his attendance at court.'.

Panin and Gregory Orloff, the two other chiefs of the conspiracy which had placed Catharine on the throne, died before their mistress; and the death of the latter will be for ever memorable.

Panin died of grief and chagrin, a fatal malady to which discarded ministers are very liable From the moment when Potemkin resisted him in the council and deprived him of the management of affairs, he began visibly to decline, and was a stranger to all repose of mind but what he looked for in death.

* Count Panin died the 31st March 1783, and left behind him the character of an honest well-meaning man. At his death his estates were sold for 173,000 rubles, which was not sufficient to pay his debts. Many instances of his generosity are well known : of yooo boors once presented him by the empress, he gave 4000 among three of his secretaries in the department of foreign affairs.'

REV. JULY, 1798.

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• Prince Orloff closed his term of life in a still more tremendous manner. Though he remained in possession of the benefits which the empress had heaped upon him, and was the husband of a young and handsome wife, the presence of the new favourites was insupportable to him. He passed almost all the latter years of his life in travelling. In 1782 he stopped at Lausanne, where he had the misfortune to lose his wife, which threw him into a deep melancholy. He immediately returned to court, but it was only to present to his former friends the sad spectacle of his insanity. At one moment he delivered himself up to an extravagant gaiety, which made the courtiers laugh: then bursting out into reproaches against the empress, he struck terror and amazement in all that heard him, and plunged the monarch herself in the bitterness of grief. At length he was forced to retire to Mosco. There his remorse revived with tenfold fury. The bleeding shade of Peter III. pursued him into every retreat; haunted his affrighted mind by day, and scared him in the visions of the night; he beheld it incessantly aiming at him an avenging dart, and, in April 1783, he expired in despair.'

The most brilliant period in the reign of Catharine II. is that at which she performed her journey to the Crimea, conducted her subsequent war with the Turk, and effected the conclusion of the peace of Yassy. These events happened between the years 1787 and 1791, both inclusively; and they are contemporary with the principal circumstances in the life of Potemkin, the most extraordinary and most powerful of all her favourites.

With respect to the journey to the Crimea, the author speaks as follows:

The grand political object which Catharine had in view in this intended display of magnificence and power, was, after having solemnly taken the sceptre of the Krim, and awed the surrounding nations into submission, to conduct her grandson Constantine † to the gates of

* When Gregory Orloff was all powerful at court, he frequently called Catharine by the diminutive of her name, Kattinka or Ko toufelka. After his return from his first travels, he retained this habit. He had brought with him from Holland a sort of doctor, or rather a buffoon, named Janijossy, who took the same liberty. The empress was at times subject to fits of low spirits, of which this physician pretended to cure her; and when he found her in a dull hu. mour, he would say, Kattinka, we must be cheerful in order to be well, and we must walk in order to be cheerful."-Then, giving her his arm, he walked with her about the gardens of the palace.'

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At his birth he was put into the hands of greek nurses fetched on purpose from the isle of Naxos. He was always dressed in the fashion of the Greeks, and surrounded by children of that nation, that he might acquire the Greek language, and which he spoke with great facility. It was even in regard to him that the Grecian cadet-corps of zoo cadets was established.'

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that Oriental Empire to which she had destined him from his birth. All was in movement for completing the preparations, when the young prince fell sick of the measles, and he was obliged to be left at Petersburg. This circumstance, together with the news of some skirmishes, and even more serious engagements that had happened in the Krim between the Russians and the Tartars, occasioned a great alteration in the scheme of the progress to Kerson. It was now greatly narrowed in the design, was disincumbered of much of it's intended superb magnificence; the great object of the coronation, and of the assumption of new titles was entirely given up; the formidable military force that was expected did not attend; the procession did not take place at the time proposed; and the only end obtained, saving the conferences held with the king of Poland and the emperor, was nothing more than the empress's shewing herself to the new subjects, and appearing to take some sort of formal possession of Kerson and the Krimea.'

The empress set out *, accompanied by her ladies of honour, by the favourite Momonoff, the grand-ecuyer Narishkin, count Ivan Chernicheff, the two counts Shuvaloff, and several more of the courtiers, with the ambassadors of Austria and France, and the English envoy. The sledges travelled night and day. A great number of horses had been previously collected at every station; great fires were lighted at the distance of every 30 fathom, and an immense crowd of persons attracted by curiosity skirted the road.

On the sixth day the empress arrived at Smolensk. Fifteen days after, she made her entry into Kieff, where the princes Sapieha and Lubomirsky, the Potockis, the Branitskies, and most of the other nobles of Poland who were devoted to Russia, had repaired to meet the sovereign.

Prince Potemkin had gone on before. He joined her at Kieff, as well as prince Nassau-Siegen; who, for some time past, had been engaged in the Russian service. Marshal Romantzoff was there also. Already hurt at the arrogance of Potemkin †, he had, during his stay at Kieff, additional causes of complaint, and his discontent became visible. But, whatever value the empress set upon the brilliant services of the vanquisher of the Ottomans, the favour of Potemkin was undiminished.

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Fifty magnificent gallies had been disposed on the Dniepr for the reception of the empress. Her majesty, at the beginning of the spring, went to Krementchuk, and embarked ‡ there attended by a numerous suite.

The next day the fleet cast anchor over against Kanieff. The king of Poland, who had come thither under his old name of count Poniatoffsky, repaired immediately on board the empress's galley. The two sovereigns had not seen each other for the spage of three

*The 18th of January 1787.'

Marshal Romantzoff was general-in-chief of the cavalry, and during the space of 14 years there was no promotion in that corps; because prince Potemkin had a dislike to the marshal.'

The 6th of May 1787.'

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and twentry years. On their first meeting, Catharine seemed rather affected but Stanislaus Augustus preserved his entire presence of mind, and discoursed with great composure. Soon after this they remained alone in the apartment belonging to the empress, and had a private conference which lasted somewhat more than half an hour. After which, they went over to another galley, where they dined together. Catharine decorated her former lover with the ribbon of the order of St. Andrew.

Prince Potemkin, who had never seen the Polish monarch, seemed quite enchanted at now meeting him. It was perhaps to the impression which it made on him, that Stanislaus Augustus has to ascribe the preservation of his crown for some years longer than he otherwise would. However this be, he retired that evening highly satisfied to all appearance at the reception he had met with, and the fleet continued its course.

At Krementshuk the empress was lodged in a house superbly ornamented. There she found an army of 12,000 men in new uniforms, who presented before her a sham-fight by manœuvring in four columns, with a square battalion of Kosaks †.

The passage by water was still more agreeable. The shores of the Dniepr were covered with villages constructed for the occasion, with peasants elegantly dressed tending numerous flocks, who came by cross-roads to different places on the coast, which the fleet was to pass, and were thus incessantly re-produced before the eyes of the voyagers. The beauty of the season even added to the magical effects of the spectacle presented to the empress, and all together converted this almost desart region into a delightful country.

6 Joseph II. had arrived at Kerson some time before the empress. He set out to meet her, and joined her majesty at Kaïdak; where she immediately landed, and proceeded by land to Kerson, to which place the emperor returned with her.

Kerson was already an opulent city; having a harbour full of vessels, and dock-yards well supplied. A 66-gun man of war was launched in presence of the empress, and a frigate of 40 guns. As her majesty was going through the several parts of the town, she read upon a gate, on the side to the east, a Greek inscription of this import :-" BY THIS THE WAY LEADS TO BYZANTIUM."

The origin of the war with the Turks, the diversion made by Sweden in their favour, the taking of Otchakoff, and other railitary events, are fully detailed in the work before us, as in other histories of the times. The following particulars are

It was said that a private interview between them took place at Riga in 1764.'

It was on that occasion that the empress, who was granting favours to every body, and of whom every body was pressing to ask them, said to Suvarof: And you, General, do you want nothing?""Only that you would order my lodgings to be paid, madam," answered Suvaro. His lodgings cost two rubles a month." * Under the title of count Falkenstein."

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