Part 25 (2/2)

The irregularity of the empress's life, and her intemperate use of ardent liquors, hastened her death, which took place in her thirty-ninth year.

Peter himself was a wretched example of conjugal infidelity and low debauchery. His a.s.sociates were often of the very lowest of the populace.

It is true that in his time the highest were not much removed from their inferiors in decency of manners; while the inferiors often had the advantage, if not of intellectual cultivation, at least of practical intelligence, in which Peter took delight. He spent many of his hours drinking brandy and other liquors with sailors, carpenters, and artisans, irrespective of his temporary a.s.sumption of the working man's pursuits. He consorted indiscriminately with women of all sorts and conditions.

Eventually he contracted the venereal disease. From neglect, and the general depravity of his life, the disease became so aggravated that at last it proved the indirect cause of his death. He himself used to say that he had taken it from Madame Tchnertichoff, wife of the general and diplomatist of that name. Upon the fact being mentioned to her, whether casually or with _malice prepense_ does not appear, she is reported to have replied very navely that she had not given it to him, but that he, on the contrary, had such loose habits and low a.s.sociates that he had given it to her.[272]

It was in 1722 that Peter was attacked with this malady, and while suffering from it he marched into Persia, and shared the fatigues of the meanest soldier throughout the campaign. The heat, drought, and constant dust increased the disease frightfully, and the pains became so excruciating that he could not conceal them from his immediate attendants.

Still, however, he would not consult the court physician, but directed his servant to get advice as if for some one else. He then went to the hot baths of Plonetz, and apparently recovered. But it seems the disease was not cured; it was merely palliated by this treatment, and he was obliged, on a relapse, to have recourse to the regular physicians, and for three months his life was despaired of. At last he recovered; but now, in spite of all warnings, he resumed his usual habits of life, renewed his long and severe journeys, his public works, and his general activity of mind and body, while he in nowise amended other and more injurious pursuits and practices.

On November 5, 1724, while on a journey to Finland, he stopped at the port of Lachta. There, from the sh.o.r.e, he saw a small vessel full of soldiers and sailors which had struck upon a shoal. Perceiving their imminent danger, he shouted to them, but the boisterous wind drowned his voice. He sprang into a skiff, pulled out to the shoal, and, having reached the vessel, jumped into the water, got her off, and landed the pa.s.sengers all safe. He neglected all the precautions necessary in the then state of his health, and was seized with violent fever, and at the same time his former pangs came on with all their old force. He was taken back to St.

Petersburg, where he obtained partial relief from his sufferings. He employed one of his intervals of ease in celebrating the great festival of blessing the waters of the Neva, and by his intemperance in the festivities renewed his attack, and after a period of protracted agony, died on the 28th of January, 1725.

Peter is described as having been excessively libidinous in temperament, and his coa.r.s.e promiscuous amours were made the common subject of his jocularity, even in the presence of Catharine. He was even addicted to abominable depravities, which are stated by contemporary writers to have been the common practice of the Russians at that time.[273] Peter at times gave way to fits of l.u.s.t, in which, like a furious beast, he regarded neither age nor s.e.x. Unnatural vices were punished in the Russian army at this time by an express military regulation, and the crime was a standing reproach with the people, who were said to have acquired it from the Greeks of the lower empire.[274]

Anne, the successor of Peter and Catharine, had two publicly avowed lovers--Dolgorouki and Ernest John Biren. The latter was the better known, as his influence and importance during Anne's reign were very great.

Dolgorouki had become one of the deputies to announce to Anne her succession to the throne, which office he accepted, with the hope of being able to resume his former intimate relations with his future sovereign.

When he entered the apartments, he found a man in mean apparel seated by the side of the princess. He ordered him to withdraw, and, upon his inattention to the order, took him by the arm to turn him out, when the empress stopped him. This unknown person was Biren, who became regent of the empire.[275]

Anne was not sunk in the same abyss of profligacy as her successor Elizabeth, nor in brutality as her ancestor Peter. She had been brought up in Courland, and had acquired some little refinement of ideas and manners.

Gluttony and drunkenness were somewhat less in vogue at her court, but dissipation, ruinous gambling, and boundless extravagance were in full fas.h.i.+on. The whole court became a body of buffoons and jokers, and the most absurd and preposterous fas.h.i.+ons of dress, the rudest and most boisterous romps and gambols were generally practiced. As a specimen of court manners, the practical joke played on Prince Galitzin, in which there was as much malice as fun, may be remembered.

Having given offense by changing his religion, the prince was compulsorily married to a girl of the lowest birth. A palace was built in his honor, but the material was ice, and all the furniture was composed of the same.

The wedding procession, consisting of more than three hundred persons in their national costumes, who had been collected from all the provinces of Russia, pa.s.sed along the streets. The newly-married couple were mounted in a paG.o.da on the back of an elephant. When the ball was over, the bride and bridegroom were conducted to their nuptial chamber, like the rest of the house, all of ice, and were there installed in an ice bedstead, and guards were posted at the door to prevent them escaping from the room before morning.

Anne died in 1740, and, after a short interregnum, Elizabeth, daughter of Peter I., came to the throne. She inherited all her father's vices and sensuality, but none of his great qualities. Before she became empress, Elizabeth had outraged all propriety; had openly carried on an improper intercourse with the sub-officers and soldiers of the guards who had been quartered near her dwelling. The l.u.s.t and drunkenness in which she wallowed indisposed her from all longings after greatness. But there were others who needed her name, and a conspiracy being formed, she became empress in spite of herself. Her chief paramour at the time was Grunstein, sergeant in the guards, who was elevated to the rank of major-general. The other soldiers and non-commissioned officers who had been the ministers of her lewdness were made officers. These individuals frequented the common public houses, got drunk, made their way into the houses of persons of condition, and committed all sorts of depredations with impunity. When the men who could boast of the empress's favors became intolerable, they were drafted off to the army, as officers in regiments on service.

Elizabeth is said to have been privately married to Razamoffsky, as also to the well-known Chevalier d'Eon, who visited the court of Russia in the disguise of a woman, and undoubtedly enjoyed Elizabeth's favors, whatever may be the truth about her marriage to him. Elizabeth withdrew herself for whole months from business, and was drunk for days or even weeks consecutively. She had a reputation for humanity; but, although she sentenced no one to death, not less than eighty thousand of her subjects were tortured or sent to Siberia during her reign. Her extravagance was such that when she died there were in her wardrobe some fifteen thousand dresses, thousands of pairs of sleeves, and several hundred pieces of French and other silks.

Catharine II. of Russia was, like Peter, a compound of the n.o.blest intellectual endowments, with a moral organization of unsurpa.s.sed depravity. She has usually been considered a monster of l.u.s.t; but she was no less infamous for her cruelty, and for the total absence of all those qualities and feelings which form the chief grace and beauty of woman's inner life. Her favorite dining-room in the Tauric palace was adorned with pictures representing the sacking of Ohkzakoff and Ismail, in which the painter had surpa.s.sed the gloomy vision of a Carravaggio, and had depicted the a.s.sault, the carnage, the mutilation, and all the hideous details of such scenes. In these Catharine is said to have taken great delight. She hated music, and never could permit other sounds than those of drums, trumpets, and similar barbaric instruments within her hearing; and yet it is said that, in her outset in life as Princess of Anhalt Zerbst, she had a womanly heart, delicacy of taste, and refinement of intellect;[276] that it was not till long after her husband, Peter III., had insulted her by open neglect of her very winning person and youthful graces, and had abandoned her for the vulgar and ugly Princess Woronzoff, that she committed herself to the terrible career which she afterward pursued so steadily.

The d.u.c.h.esse d'Abrantes, in her memoir of Catharine, tells us that her first lover, Soltikoff, was forced upon her as a matter of public policy by the crafty and unscrupulous Bestujeff, the able minister of Elizabeth, for the sake of procuring an heir to the Grand Duke Peter. Catharine remonstrated, and threatened to complain. ”To whom will you complain?”

asked the minister, coldly. Catharine submitted, and accepted the lover thus imposed upon her. At the time of this adultery for expediency sake, Catharine was deeply intent upon study, with a view to qualify herself worthily for her future destiny, disgusted as she was with the indecencies of the Russian court!

Subsequently, it was considered expedient to remove Soltikoff. Catharine had given birth to a child, and was not pleased with this dismissal; but the impa.s.sible Bestujeff only sneered at her remonstrances and professions of affection for the dismissed lover, and recommended her to choose another. This was a lesson she was not slow to carry out. The list of her paramours was little less numerous than that of Elizabeth.

After Catharine had caused Peter III. to be murdered, and had ascended the throne as empress in her own right, she abandoned herself to the fullest gratification of her pa.s.sions, both royal and personal. Besides the vulgar crowd whom she selected as the recipients of her filthy favors, the world knew, as the public and recognized paramours, the names of Orloff, by whom she had a son called Count Bobruski, Wa.s.silitchikoff, Potemkin, Louskoi, Mornonoff, and Zuboff.

These were appointed in a manner that was reduced to a system, and an etiquette was established as precise as that of naming a state minister.

When Catharine was tired of her present favorite, one of her intimate friends was commissioned to look out for another. At other times, her notice having fallen on some young man who pleased her fancy, she signified her wishes to some female friend, and thereupon an entertainment was arranged at the lady's house, which the empress honored with her presence, and thereby gained an opportunity of closer acquaintances.h.i.+p with the chosen individual. He then received orders to attend at the palace, where he was introduced to the court physician, and examined as to his general health and physical condition. After this he was placed under the charge of a certain Mademoiselle Protasoff.[277] The various examinations having been successfully pa.s.sed, the favorite was installed into the regular apartments of office, which were immediately contiguous to those of the empress. On the first day of his installation he received one hundred thousand rubles (about twenty-five thousand dollars) for linen, and an allowance of twelve thousand rubles per month; besides which, all his household expenses were defrayed. He was required to attend the empress wherever she went, and was not permitted to leave the palace without her permission. He might not converse familiarly with other women, and if he dined with his friends, it was imperative that the mistress of the house should be absent.

When a favorite had completed his term of service he received orders to travel, and from that moment all access to her majesty was denied. The favorites rarely rebelled against their destiny in this particular; but Potemkin and Orloff, who had far other views than those of dalliance, had the temerity to disobey the order, and succeeded in retaining power and the friends.h.i.+p of the empress long after their personal claims on her tenderness were at an end. On terminating the intimacy, the favorite usually received magnificent gifts. Potemkin, after he had ceased his functions as favorite, became pander to his royal mistress, thereby securing the double advantage of the favor of the empress and the patronage of the favorite, from whom he levied a handsome fee for the introduction. Potemkin and Orloff were at one period rivals, in which contest Orloff was at last defeated; but when Potemkin reached his pride of place, he became so necessary to Catharine in his higher capacity that he set up and pulled down the favorite of the hour as he pleased, and even ventured upon the most extravagant flights of insolence and personal disrespect to the empress. Orloff had been also the rival of Poniatowski, but his superior capacity and brutal energy of will made him respected and feared by Catharine long after she had ceased to like him.

The pecuniary results to the state, enormous as was the plunder, was perhaps the least of the evils sustained through this system of iniquity.

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