BOOK III

Stanislas Leczinski chosen King of Poland—Death of the Cardinal-Primate—Great retreat of General Schullemburg—Exploits of the Czar—Foundation of Petersburg—Charles’s entry into Saxony—The peace of Altranstadt—Augustus abdicates in favour of Stanislas—General Patkul, the Czar’s plenipotentiary, is broken on the wheel, and quartered—Charles receives the ambassadors of foreign princes in Saxony—He also goes to Dresden to see Augustus before his departure.

 

YOUNG Stanislas Leczinski was therefore deputed by the Assembly at Warsaw to give the King of Sweden an account of several differences that had arisen among them since Jacques had been carried off. Stanislas’ personal appearance was pleasing, full of courage and sweetness, with that frank open air which is the greatest of outward advantages, and a better seconder of a man’s words than eloquence itself. Charles was impressed by his discreet allusions to King Augustus, the Assembly, the Cardinal and the different interests which rent Poland. King Stanislas did the writer the honour of relating his conversation with the King, which took place in Latin. “How can we hold an election if the two Princes and Constantine are absent?” he inquired. “How can you get the State out of the difficulty without an election?” answered the King.

This conversation was the only intrigue which placed Stanislas on his throne. Charles prolonged the conversation purposely, that he might the better sound the young deputy’s genius. After the conference he said aloud that he had never met a man so fit to reconcile all parties. He immediately made inquiries about the character of Leczinski, and found that he was brave and inured to fatigue, that he always slept on a kind of straw mattress, and that he required no personal service from his attendants; that he was more temperate than is usual in that climate, economical, adored by his servants, and perhaps the only popular prince in Poland, at a time when all ties were broken but those of interest and faction. This character, which corresponded in many respects with his own, made him make up his mind finally. He remarked aloud after the meeting, “There is a man who will always be my friend,” and people knew that that meant, “There is a man who shall be king.”

When the Primate of Poland heard that the King had nominated the Palatine Leczinski, he hastened to Charles to try to make him change his mind, for he wished to put the crown on the head of a certain Lubomirski. “But what objection have you to Stanislas?” asked the conqueror. “Sire,” said the Primate, “he is too young.” “He is much about my own age,” answered the King dryly, turning his back on the Prelate. Then he sent Count Horn to Warsaw at once to notify the Assembly that they must elect a king in three days, and that they must choose Stanislas Leczinski. Count Horn arrived on the 7th July, and fixed the election for the 12th, just as if he were arranging the decampment of a battalion. The Cardinal-Primate, disappointed of the fruit of so many intrigues, returned to the Assembly, where he left no stone unturned to ruin the election in which he had had no share; but the King of Sweden arrived incognito at Warsaw, so that he had to be silent. All that the Primate could do was to absent himself from the election: he took up the position of a neutral, being unable to oppose the conqueror and unwilling to assist him.

On Saturday, 12th July, the day appointed for the election, the Assembly met at Colo, at about three in the afternoon. They met there by arrangement, and the Bishop of Posnania presided instead of the Cardinal. Count Horn and two other officers were present at the ceremony, as ambassadors extraordinary from Charles to the Republic. The session lasted till nine in the evening, and the Bishop brought it to an end by declaring in the name of the Diet that Stanislas was elected King of Poland. They all threw their caps into the air, and the acclamations stifled the cries of the opposers.

It was no use for the Cardinal and his party to stay away from the elections; they were all obliged the next day to come and pay homage to the new King, who received them as if he were quite satisfied with their conduct; their greatest mortification was that they had to attend him to the King of Sweden’s quarters. His Majesty gave all honours to the King he had just made, and, to add weight to his new dignity, assigned money and troops for his use.

Charles XII left Warsaw at once to proceed to the completion of the conquest of Poland. He had ordered his army to meet before Leopold, the capital of the great Palatinate of Russia, a place important in itself, but still more so for the riches it held. It was thought that by means of the fortifications, which King Augustus had made there, it would hold out fifteen days. The conqueror invested it on the 5th, and took it the following day by assault. All who resisted were put to the sword. The victors, who were now masters of the town, did not disperse for pillage, in spite of the reports concerning treasure in Leopold: they ranged themselves in battle array in the great square. The King then proclaimed, by sounding a trumpet, that all who had anything belonging to King Augustus or his adherents should bring them themselves before sunset on pain of death. The arrangements were so well made that few dare disobey him, and they brought him 400 chests, filled with gold and silver coin, plate and other things of value.

The beginning of Stanislas’ reign was contemporaneous with a very different event. Some business for which he must be present had forced him to remain in Warsaw: he had with him his mother, his wife and two daughters; the Cardinal, the Bishop of Posnania and some prominent Poles made up his new court. His guards were 6,000 Poles of the royal army, who had lately entered his service, but whose fidelity had not yet been tried. General Horn, governor of the town, had only about 1,500 Swedes with him. They were at Warsaw in peace, and Stanislas was reckoning on starting in a few days for the conquest of Leopold, when suddenly they heard that an immense army was approaching the town. It was King Augustus, who was making a fresh effort; by one of the finest marches ever made he was coming up with 20,000 men to fall on Warsaw, after having eluded the King of Sweden; his purpose was to kidnap his rival.

Warsaw was not fortified, and the Polish troops who were defending it were not reliable. There were those in the town from whom Augustus got information, and if Stanislas delayed he would be ruined. He sent his family to Posnania, under the guard of Polish troops upon which he could absolutely rely. It was in this disorder that he feared he had lost his second daughter, aged one; she was lost by a nurse, and they discovered her in a manger, in a neighbouring village, where she had been left. That is the story that I have often heard him tell. It was this child who, after many vicissitudes, became Queen of France. Several gentlemen took different roads. The new King went to join Charles XII, learning early to suffer disgrace, and forced to leave his capital six weeks after he had been made King.

Augustus entered the capital as a victorious and enraged sovereign. The inhabitants, already fleeced by the King of Sweden, were more heavily taxed still by Augustus. The Cardinal’s palace and all the houses of the confederate lords were given over to plunder. The most extraordinary thing about this transient revolution was that the Papal Legate, who had come with King Augustus, demanded in the name of his master that the Bishop of Posnania should be handed over to him as responsible to the Court of Rome for having abetted a Prince who had been put on the throne by the arms of a Lutheran.

The Court of Rome, which had always endeavoured to increase its temporal power by means of the spiritual, had long established a kind of jurisdiction in Poland, with the Papal Legate at the head of it. These ministers never missed a chance of extending their power, which was revered by the majority, but always resisted by those of greater discernment. They had claimed the right of judging all ecclesiastical cases, and had, especially during periods of disturbance, usurped many other privileges which they maintained until about 1728, when they were deprived of them: for such abuses are seldom reformed till they have become intolerable.

King Augustus, very glad to be able to punish the Bishop with decency, and at the same time to do something acceptable to the Roman Court, though he would have opposed it on any other occasion, delivered up the Polish Prelate into the hands of the Legate. The Bishop, having seen his palace plundered, was taken by the soldiers into Saxony, where he died.

Count Horn endured the continual fire of the enemy in the castle where he was enclosed for some time, but at last the place could hold out no longer, and he sounded a parley and gave himself up with his 15,000 Swedes. This was the first advantage which King Augustus gained in the torrent of his misfortune against the victorious Swedes.

Charles, accompanied by King Stanislas, went to meet his enemy at the head of the best part of his troops. The Saxon army fled before him; the towns for thirty miles round sent him their keys, and every day brought word of some advantage gained. Success became too familiar to Charles: he said it was hunting rather than fighting, and complained of never having to contest a victory.

For some time Augustus entrusted the command of his army to Count Schullemburg, a very able general: he certainly needed all his experience at the head of a discouraged army. He seemed more anxious to safeguard his master’s troops than to conquer: he made war by means of stratagem, while the two kings acted with vigour. He stole marches on them, seized advantageous posts, and sacrificed some of his cavalry to give time to his foot to withdraw in safety. He saved his troops by splendid retreats before an enemy with whom one could only gain this sort of glory.

Scarcely had he arrived in the Palatinate of Posnania than he heard that the two Kings, whom he had believed to be fifty leagues off, had covered the fifty leagues in nine days. He had not more than 8,000 foot and 1,000 horse; he had to hold his own against a superior force, the King of Sweden’s reputation and the fear which so many defeats had naturally inspired in the Saxons. He was always of opinion, in spite of the German generals, that the foot might hold their own against the horse in an open field, even without the benefit of chevaux de frise: and he ventured to try the experiment on that day against a victorious horse commanded by the two Kings and the most experienced of the Swedish generals. He took up such an advantageous position that he could not be surrounded; his first line knelt on the ground, and were armed with pikes and muskets; the soldiers were in close formation, and presented to the enemy’s horse a kind of rampart bristling with pikes and muskets; the second line bending a little over the shoulders of the first, shot over their heads, and the third, standing upright, fired simultaneously from behind the other two. The Swedes fell upon the Saxons with their usual impetuosity, but they awaited them without flinching. By this means the Swedes advanced in disorder, and the Saxons warded off the attack by keeping their ranks.

Schullemburg drew up his men in an oblong battalion, and, though wounded in five places, he retired in good order at midnight to the little town of Gurau, three leagues from the battle-field. He had scarcely time to breathe here before the two Kings appeared close behind him.

Beyond Gurau, towards the river Oder, lay a thick wood through which the Saxon general led his exhausted troops; the Swedes, without being nonplussed, pursued him through the thickets of the woods, finding their way without difficulty through places scarcely passable by foot-passengers. Yet the Saxons had not crossed the wood more than five hours before the Swedish cavalry appeared.

On the other side of the wood runs the river Parts, at the foot of a village named Rutsen. Schullemburg had sent forward in haste to get the boats ready, and had got his troops across the river: they were already lessened by half. Charles arrived just as Schullemburg had reached the other side; never had a conqueror pursued his enemy so rapidly.

The reputation of Schullemburg depended on his escaping from the King of Sweden, while the King thought his glory concerned in taking him and the rest of his army. He lost no time in making his cavalry swim the river. Thus the Saxons found themselves enclosed between the river Parts and the great river Oder, which rises in Silesia, and is very deep and rapid at this spot.

The ruin of Schullemburg seemed inevitable: but after having lost few soldiers he crossed the Oder during the night. Thus he saved his army, and Charles could not help saying, “To-day Schullemburg has conquered us.”

It was this same Schullemburg who was afterwards general of the Venetians, and he in whose honour the Republic erected a statue in Corfu, because he defended this rampart of Italy against the Turks. None but republics confer such honours; kings do not give rewards.

But what thus brought glory to Schullemburg was of little use to King Augustus. He once more abandoned Poland to his enemies, withdrew into Saxony and hastily prepared the fortifications of Dresden, for he already feared, not without reason, the loss of the capital of his hereditary dominions.

Charles XII found Poland submissive; his generals, following his example, had engaged in Courland with several small bodies of Russians, who, since the great battle of Narva, had only shown themselves in small companies, and who in this part only made war like the Tartar vagabonds, who plunder and flee and reappear only to flee again. Wherever the Swedes were they thought they were certain to win, though they numbered only twenty against a hundred.

Under these fortunate circumstances Stanislas prepared for his coronation; fortune, which had had him elected king at Warsaw and then had driven him thence, recalled him thither to the acclamation of a crowd of nobles which the fortune of war attached to him; a Diet was convoked there; all other obstacles were removed, only the Court of Rome was disposed to thwart it.

It was naturally expected that this Court would declare in favour of King Augustus, who from a Protestant had become a Catholic to gain the crown in opposition to Stanislas, who was placed upon the throne by the great enemy of the Catholic faith. The then Pope, Clement XI, sent dispatches to all the prelates of Poland, and especially to the Cardinal-Primate, threatening them with excommunication if they presumed to assist at the consecration of Stanislas or take part in any plot against King Augustus.

If these dispatches were delivered to the bishops who were at Warsaw, [Pg 105]it was to be feared that, while some would obey them through weakness, the majority would seize the opportunity to become more exacting in proportion as they were necessary. All possible precautions were therefore taken to prevent the letters of the Pope from being received at Warsaw. A Franciscan got possession of them secretly, undertaking to deliver them into the bishops’ own hands: he first gave one to the suffragan of Chelm. This prelate, who was a great partisan of King Stanislas, gave it to his Majesty unopened. The King sent for the monk, and asked how he dare take charge of such a document. The Franciscan answered that he did it by order of his general. Stanislas told him to in future take his orders from his King rather than from his Superior, and banished him immediately from the town.

The same day a placard was published by the King of Sweden, by which all ecclesiastics, secular and regular, were forbidden to take part in politics under the severest penalties.

For greater security he had guards posted at the doors of all the prelates’ houses, and forbad the entry of any stranger into the town. He exercised these small severities so that Stanislas should not fall out with the clergy on his accession; he said that he refreshed himself from the fatigue of campaigns by checking the intrigues of the Roman Curia, and that he must fight it on paper, just as he attacked other sovereigns with actual weapons.

The Cardinal was asked by Charles and Stanislas to perform the ceremony of coronation. But it did not seem to him seemly that he should quit Dantzig to consecrate a king who had been elected against his wish; but, as it was always his policy to act a part in all that he did, he wanted to get a legitimate excuse for his refusal: he therefore caused the Pope’s dispatch to be fixed, in the night, to the gate of his own house. The magistrate of Dantzig in great indignation had search made for the culprits, which were not found; the Primate feigned irritation and was really very pleased: he had an excuse for not consecrating the new King, and at the same time remained on good terms with Charles, Augustus, Stanislas and the Pope.

He died a few days after, leaving his country in turmoil. The only result of all his intrigues was that he had offended simultaneously three Kings, Charles, Augustus, Stanislas, the Polish State and the Pope, who had commanded him to come to Rome to account for his conduct. But, as even politicians sometimes experience remorse in their last moments, he wrote to King Augustus on his death-bed asking his pardon.

The coronation was solemnized quietly and magnificently in Warsaw in spite of the Polish custom of crowning kings in Cracow. Stanislas Leczinski and his wife Charlotte were consecrated King and Queen of Poland at the hands of the Archbishop of Leopold assisted by several other bishops. The only reward Charles reaped from his conquest was to be present at the ceremony incognito.

While he was thus providing Poland with a king, and the King of Denmark dare not harrass him, while the King of Prussia was courting his friendship and Augustus was withdrawing to his hereditary dominions, the Czar became daily more formidable. His assistance of Augustus in Poland had been feeble, but he had made powerful diversions in Ingria.

As for him, he not only began to be a great soldier himself, but also to teach his soldiers the art of war: discipline was established among his forces; he had good engineers, experienced artillery and many good officers; he had also learned the great art of supporting his armies. Some of his generals had learned both to fight well and, if necessary, to abstain from fighting; more than all, he had built up a fleet capable of making head against the Swedes in the Baltic.

Confident in all these advantages, due both to his genius and to the absence of the King of Sweden, he took Narva by assault after a regular siege and a blockade by land and sea. When the soldiers had taken the town they plundered it, and gave themselves to horrible barbarities: the Czar hastened from one place to another to stop the disorder and massacre. He rescued by force from the hands of the soldiers women whose throats they were going to cut after having outraged them; he was obliged to kill with his own hands some Russians who would not listen to his commands. In the town hall at Narva they still show the table where he laid his sword, as he said to the citizens who flocked after him, “This sword is not wet with the blood of the citizens I have slain, but with that of the Russians whom I have killed to save your lives.”

Had the Czar always shown such humanity he would have been the greatest of heroes. His ambition went beyond the destruction of towns. In the midst of his new conquests he was laying the foundations of a city not far from Narva. This was the city of Petersburg, which was henceforth his seat and the centre of his trade. It is between Finland and Ingria, in a marshy island, around which the Neva flows in several branches before it falls into the Gulf of Finland. He himself made the plan of the town, of the fortress, the port, the quays, which adorn it, and the fortifications defending its entry. This desert, uncultivated island, which is nothing but a mud heap during the short summer of that climate, and a pool of ice in winter, unapproachable by land except across wild forests and deep morasses, and till then the habitation of bears and wolves, was, in 1703, filled with more than 300,000 men whom the Czar had called together from the farthest limits of his dominions. The peasants of the kingdom of Astrakan and those who live on the frontiers of China were transported to Petersburg. Before he could lay the foundations of a town he was obliged to pierce forests, make roads, drain marshes and raise banks. Nature was subjugated in every direction. But the Czar was bent on peopling a country which did not seem meant for man’s habitation; he was not to be diverted from his resolve either by the floods, which ruined his works, or by the barrenness of the soil, or by the ignorance of the workmen, or by the mortality which swept away 200,000 men at the very beginning. The town was founded in spite of the obstacles which existed in nature herself, in the genius of the people, and an unfortunate war. Already in 1705 Petersburg was a considerable town, and its port was full of vessels. The Emperor attracted strangers in large numbers by the rewards which he gave them, giving some lands, others houses, and encouraging all the arts which might civilize life in that cruel climate. Above all, he made it inaccessible to the enemy. The Swedish generals, who frequently beat his troops in every other district, were not able to do the least harm to this increasing colony. It was at peace in the midst of the war which surrounded it.

The Czar, by thus creating new dominions for himself, still held outa helping hand to King Augustus, who was losing his. He persuaded him by the instrumentality of General Patkul, who had lately joined the Russian side, and was then the Czar’s ambassador in Saxony, to come to Grodno to confer with him once more on the unhappy state of affairs.

King Augustus came thither with some troops, attended by General Schullemburg, whose passage across the Oder had got him a reputation in the north, and in whom he placed his great hope. The Czar arrived followed by 100,000 men. The two monarchs formed new plans of war. As King Augustus was dethroned he was no longer afraid of exasperating the Poles by delivering their country to the Russian troops. It was decided that the Czar’s army should be divided into several bodies to oppose every action of the King of Sweden. During this interview King Augustus instituted the order of the White Eagle, a feeble resource to bring over to his side certain Polish lords who wanted real advantages rather than an empty honour, which becomes ridiculous when derived from a prince who is king only in name. The conference of the two Kings ended in a strange manner. The Czar departed suddenly, leaving his troops to his ally, in order to extinguish a rebellion with which he was threatened in Astrakan. He had scarcely started when King Augustus ordered the arrest of Patkul at Dresden.

All Europe was amazed that, in opposition to the law of nations, and apparently to his own interest, he should venture to imprison the ambassador of the only prince who afforded him protection. The secret history of the affair was this: Patkul, proscribed in Sweden for having maintained the privileges of his country, Livonia, had become general to Augustus: but his high spirit not according with the proud disposition of General Fleming, the King’s favourite, and more imperious than himself, he had passed into the Czar’s service, and was then his general and ambassador to Augustus. He was a man of great discernment, and had found out that the proposal of Fleming and the Chancellor of Saxony was to offer Charles peace on his own terms. He at once formed a plan to prevent this and to bring about some arrangement between the Czar and Sweden. The Chancellor got wind of his project, and obtained leave to seize him. King Augustus told the Czar that Patkul was a wretch and would betray them both. His only fault was that he served his master too well: but an ill-timed piece of service is often punished as a treason.

In the meantime, the 100,000 Russians, on one side, divided into several small bodies, burnt and ravaged the estates of Stanislas’ adherents: while Schullemburg, on the other, was advancing with fresh troops. But the fortune of the Swedes dispersed these two armies in less than two months. Charles XII and Stanislas attacked the separate corps of the Russians one after another, but so swiftly that one Russian general was beaten before he had heard of the defeat of his colleague. No obstacle could check the conqueror’s advance. If he found a river in the way he and his Swedes swam across it.

One party of the Swedes took the baggage of Augustus in which were 400,000 crowns of silver coin; Stanislas seized 800,000 ducats belonging to Prince Menzikoff, the Russian general, Charles, leading his cavalry, would often march thirty leagues in twenty-four hours, every soldier leading another mount to use when his own should be spent. The Russians, panic-stricken and reduced to a small band, fled in confusion beyond the Borysthenes.

While Charles was thus driving the Russians into the heart of Lithuania, Schullemburg at last repassed the Oder and came at the head of 20,000 men to offer battle to the great Marshal Renschild, who was considered Charles’s best general, and was called the Parmenio of the North. These two famous generals, who seemed to share the fate of their respective masters, met near Punits, at a place called Frauenstadt, a territory which had already proved fatal to the troops of Augustus. Renschild had only thirteen battalions and twenty-two squadrons, which made a total of about 10,000 men, and Schullemburg had twice that number.

It must be remembered, too, that he had in his army between 6,000 and 7,000 Russians, who had been under discipline a long time, and were as reliable as veterans. This battle of Fraustadt was fought on 12th February, 1706: but the same General Schullemburg, who with 4,000 men had to a certain extent harassed the King of Sweden, was completely defeated by General Renschild. The battle did not last a quarter of an hour, in a moment the Saxons wavered, and the Russians threw down their arms on the first appearance of the Swedes. The panic was so sudden and the confusion so great that the conquerors found on the field 7,000 muskets ready loaded, which they had thrown away without firing. There never was a rout more sudden, more complete or more disgraceful: and yet all the Saxon and Swedish officers acknowledged that no general had ever arranged his men better; it was that day that they realized how little human foresight can pre-arrange events.

Among the prisoners there was a whole regiment of French. These poor wretches had been taken by the Saxon troops in 1704 at the famous battle of Hochstet, which was so fatal to the greatness of Louis XIV. They had since enlisted under King Augustus, who had formed them into a regiment of dragoons, and put them under the command of a Frenchman called Joyeuse. The colonel was killed at the first and only charge of the Swedes, and the whole regiment became prisoners of war. From that day these Frenchmen petitioned to be taken into the service of the King of Sweden; they were received into that service by a singular fate, which preserved them for a further change of their conqueror to their master.

As to the Russians they begged for their life on their knees, but they were inhumanly massacred in cold blood, six hours after the battle, to punish them for the outrages of the compatriots, and to get rid of prisoners which the conquerors did not know what to do with.

Augustus was now absolutely without resources. He had nothing left but Cracow, where he was shut up with two regiments of Russians, two of Saxons and some troops of the regal army, by whom he was afraid of being handed over to the conqueror; but his misfortune was at its height when he heard that Charles had at last entered Saxony, on the 1st September, 1706.

He had crossed Silesia without deigning to even warn the Court of Vienna. Germany was in consternation: the Diet of Ratisbon, which represents the Empire, and the resolutions of which are often as ineffectual as they are solemn, declared the King of Sweden an enemy to the Empire if he crossed the Oder with his army; this very resolution was a further inducement to him to march into Germany.

Upon his approach the villages were deserted and the inhabitants fled in all directions. Charles acted as he had at Copenhagen: he had proclamations made everywhere that he only wanted to procure peace, and that all those who returned to their houses and paid the contributions that he would demand should be treated as his own subjects, while the rest should be pursued with no quarter. This declaration from a prince who had never been known to break his word brought back in large numbers all those of the inhabitants who had been dispersed by fear. He encamped at Altranstadt, near the plains of Lutzen, the field of battle famous for the victory and death of Gustavus Adolphus. He went to see the place where this great man fell, and when he reached the spot he said, “I have endeavoured to live like him; perhaps God may one day grant me a death as glorious.”

From this camp he commanded the estates of Saxony to meet, and to send him without delay the register of Finance of the Electorate. As soon as he had them in his power, and had information of exactly what Saxony could supply, he levied a tax on it of 625,000 rixdollars a month.

Besides this contribution the Saxons were obliged to supply every Swedish soldier with two pounds of meat, two pounds of bread, two pots of beer and fourpence a day, together with forage for his horse. When the contributions had been thus fixed the King arranged a new method of protecting the Saxons from the insults of his soldiers. He ordered that in all the towns where his soldiers were quartered every housekeeper with whom the soldiers were lodged should give certificates of their behaviour each month, without which the soldier could not draw his pay; further, inspectors went round once a fortnight to inquire if the Swedes had done any damage, and housekeepers were carefully indemnified and culprits punished.

The severe discipline under which Charles’s troops lived is well known; they did not pillage towns taken by assault without permission; they pillaged in an orderly way, and desisted at the first signal. The Swedes boast to this day of the discipline they kept in Saxony: yet the Saxons complain that the most terrible outrages were committed among them. These contradictory statements would be irreconcilable if we did not remember that men look at the same thing from different points of view.

It would have been very strange had not the conquerors sometimes abused their privileges, and had not the conquered regarded the smallest damage as the most terrible injury. One day as the King was riding near Leipzig a Saxon peasant threw himself at his feet to ask justice against a grenadier, who had just gone off with what he had intended for his family dinner. The King had the soldier called. “Is it true,” he asked sternly, “that you have robbed this man?” “Sire,” answered the soldier, “I have not done him so much harm as your Majesty has done his master, for you have stolen a kingdom from him, while I have only taken a turkey from this rustic.” The King gave the peasant ten ducats, and pardoned the soldier for the boldness of the repartee, but he added, “Remember, friend, that I have taken a kingdom from King Augustus, but I have taken nothing for myself.”

The great Leipzig fair was held as usual, tradesmen attended it in perfect security; not one Swedish soldier was to be seen in the fair; it might have been said that the only object of the Swedish army in Saxony was to keep the peace: the King ruled throughout the Electorate with as absolute a power and as deep a tranquillity as in Stockholm.

King Augustus, a wanderer in Poland, and deprived both of his kingdom and his electorate, at last wrote a letter with his own hand to Charles XII to ask for a peace.

He commissioned Baron Imhof, accompanied by M. Finsten of the Privy Council, secretly to deliver this letter; he gave them full powers and carte blanche, directing them to try to obtain for him reasonable and Christian conditions. He was obliged to conceal his overtures for peace and to refrain from having recourse to the mediation of any prince, for being then in Poland, at the mercy of the Russians, he had reason to fear that the dangerous ally whom he had abandoned would take vengeance on him for his submission to the conqueror. His two plenipotentiaries came by night to Charles’s camp and had a private audience. The King read the letter, and said, “Gentlemen, you shall have your answer in a moment.” Then he went into his office and wrote as follows—

“I consent to grant peace on the following conditions, in which it must not be expected that I will make the least alteration:—

“1. That King Augustus renounce for ever the crown of Poland, that he acknowledge Stanislas as lawful king; and that he promise never to recover the throne, even after the death of Stanislas.

“2. That he renounce all other treaties, and especially those he has made with Russia.

“3. That he send back with honour into my camp the Princess Sobieski, and any other prisoners he may have taken.

“4. That he deliver into my hands all the deserters who have taken service with him, particularly Jean Patkul; and that proceedings be stopped against all such as have passed from his service to mine.”

He gave this paper to Count Piper, bidding him negotiate the rest with King Augustus’s plenipotentiaries. They were overwhelmed by the severity of the terms, and tried with the small skill which is possible to the powerless, to lessen the rigour of the King of Sweden. They had several conferences with Count Piper, the only answer he would give to all their suggestions was, “Such is the will of the King my master, and he never changes his mind.”

While this peace was being negotiated secretly in Saxony, chance seemed to give King Augustus the opportunity of gaining more honourable terms, and of treating with his conqueror on a more equal footing.

Prince Menzikoff, commander-in-chief of the Russian army, went to join him in Poland with 30.000 men, at a time when he not only did not expect their assistance but even feared it. He was accompanied by Polish and Saxon troops, 6,000 in all. Surrounded by Prince Menzikoffs army, and with only this small body-guard, he was in terror lest they should discover his negotiation; he pictured himself simultaneously dethroned by his enemy, and in danger of being taken prisoner by his ally. In this critical state of affairs the army found itself in the near neighbourhood of one of the Swedish generals, called Meyerfield, who was at the head of 6,000 troops at Calish, near the Palatinate of Posnania. Prince Menzikoff pressed the King to give battle. The King, in this most difficult position, delayed under various pretexts, for though the enemy had only one third of his numbers, there were 4,000 Swedes in the army of Meyerfield, and that was enough to make the result doubtful. On the other hand, to fall upon the Swedes during the negotiations and to lose the day, would mean irretrievable ruin. He therefore resolved to send a reliable messenger to the enemy’s general to let him know the secret of the peace and to warn him to retreat. But this advice had a very different effect from what had been expected. General Meyerfield believed that it was a snare to intimidate him, and on that supposition alone he dared to risk a battle.

That day the Russians for the first time conquered the Swedes in a pitched battle. This victory, which King Augustus had gained in spite of himself, was complete; in the midst of his ill-fortune he entered in triumph into Warsaw, formerly his capital, but now a dismantled and ruined town, ready to receive any conqueror whatever, and to acknowledge the strongest as king. He was tempted to seize this moment of prosperity, and to attack the King of Sweden in Saxony with the Russian army. But when he remembered that Charles was at the head of a Swedish army, which had till then been invincible; that the Russians would forsake him directly they had information that the treaty had been begun; that Saxony, his hereditary dominions, already drained of men and money, would be ravaged by the Russians as well as by the Swedes; that the Empire, occupied with the French war, could not help him; and that he would be left without dominions, friends, or money, he considered it better to accept the King of Sweden’s terms.

These terms were made even more severe when Charles heard that King Augustus had attacked his troops during the negotiations. His rage and the pleasure of still further humbling an enemy who had just conquered his troops, made him more inflexible about all the articles of the treaty. Thus the victory of King Augustus was wholly to his own disadvantage, a circumstance in which his experience was unique.

He had just had the Te Deum sung in Warsaw, when Finsten, one of his plenipotentiaries, arrived from Saxony, with the treaty of peace which deprived him of his crown. Augustus signed it after some hesitation, and then started for Saxony, in the vain hope that his presence might soften the King of Sweden, and that his enemy might recall the former bonds between their houses, and their common blood.

The two Princes first met at Gutersdorf, in Count Piper’s quarters. The meeting was unceremonious; Charles was in jack-boots, with a piece of black taffeta tied carelessly round his neck instead of a cravat; his coat was as usual made of coarse blue cloth with brass buttons. He was wearing the long sword which he had used in the battle of Narva, and often leaned upon it.

The conversation turned entirely upon those great boots. Charles told Augustus that he had not had them off for six years, except at bed-time. These details were the only subject discussed by two kings, whereof one had taken the crown from the other.

Augustus adopted during the whole interview that air of delight and satisfaction which princes and great men accustomed to business know how to assume in the midst of the cruelest mortifications. The two kings dined together several times afterwards. Charles always pretended to give the place of honour to Augustus, but far from relaxing his terms, he made them even more severe. It was bad enough for a sovereign to be forced to hand over a general and a public minister, it was a great humiliation to be forced to send to his successor, Stanislas, the crown jewels and archives, but it was the finishing touch to this humiliation to be forced to congratulate on his accession him who had taken his place on the throne. Charles insisted on a letter from Augustus to Stanislas: the King showed no haste to comply with this demand; but Charles had made up his mind, and it had to be written.

Here is a faithful copy of the original, which King Stanislas still keeps, and which I have lately seen.

“SIR AND BROTHER,

“We do not consider it was necessary to enter upon a detailed correspondence with your Majesty; but to please the King of Sweden, and that it may not be said that we have been unwilling to satisfy him, we hereby congratulate you on your accession, and hope that your subjects will prove more faithful to you than ours have been to us. Every one will do us the justice to believe that we have only been paid with ingratitude for all our benefits, and that the majority of our subjects have only aimed at our ruin. We hope that you will not be exposed to like misfortunes, and commit you to God’s keeping.

“Your brother and neighbour,

“Augustus, King.

“Dresden: April 8, 1707.”

Augustus was further obliged to command all the magistrates to no longer style him King of Poland, and to efface the title he renounced from the liturgy. He was less concerned about liberating the Sobieskis; on coming out of prison these princes refused to see him. But the sacrifice of Patkul was a great hardship to him; on the one hand, the Czar was clamouring for him to be sent back as his ambassador; on the other, the King of Sweden threatened terrible penalties if he were not handed over. Patkul was then imprisoned in the castle of Konigstein in Saxony. Augustus thought he could satisfy Charles and his own honour at the same time. He sent his guards to deliver up the wretched prisoner to the Swedish troops; but sent, in advance, a secret message to the Governor of Konigstein to let him escape. Patkul’s bad luck frustrated the care they took to save him. The governor, knowing him to be very rich, wished him to buy his liberty. The prisoner, still relying on the law of nations, and informed of the intentions of King Augustus, refused to pay for what he thought he could obtain for nothing. During the interval, the guards appointed to deliver him to the Swedes arrived, and handed him over at once to the four Swedish officers, who took him straight to head-quarters at Altranstadt, where he stayed three months, tied to a stake by a heavy iron chain. Then he was taken to Casimir.

Charles XII, forgetting that he was the Czar’s ambassador, and only remembering that he had been his own subject, commanded the court-martial to pass sentence upon him with the greatest rigour. He was condemned to be broken on the wheel and quartered. A chaplain came to tell him he must die, without informing him of the form of his execution. Then the man who had braved death in so many battles, finding himself alone with a priest, and his courage no longer supported by the incitements of glory or passion, wept bitterly.

He was engaged to a Saxon lady, named Madame D’Einstedel, who had birth, merit, and beauty, and whom he had hoped to marry at the time that he was given up to execution. He asked the chaplain to visit her and comfort her, and assure her that he died full of the tenderest affection for her. When he was led to the place of execution, and saw the wheels and stakes in readiness for his death, he fell into convulsions of fear, and threw himself into the arms of the minister, who embraced him, and covering him with his cloak wept over him. A Swedish officer then read aloud a paper as follows—

“This is to declare that the express order of his Majesty, our merciful lord, is, that this man, who is a traitor to his country, be broken and quartered for the reparation of his crimes, and as an example to others. Let every man beware of treason, and faithfully serve his King.”

At the words “most merciful lord,” Patkul cried out, “What mercy!” and at “traitor to his country,” “Alas, I have served it too well.” He received sixteen blows, and endured the longest and most dreadful tortures imaginable. So perished the unfortunate Jean Patkul, ambassador and general to the King of Russia.

Those who regarded him only as a revolted subject who had rebelled against his King, thought that he deserved his death, but those who regarded him as a Livonian, born in a province with privileges to defend, and who remembered that he was driven from Livonia just for supporting these rights, called him the martyr to the liberties of his country. All agreed that the title of ambassador to the Czar should have rendered his person sacred. The King of Sweden alone, trained in despotic principles, believed that he had only done an act of justice, while all Europe condemned his cruelty.

His quartered members were exposed on gibbets till 1713, when Augustus, having regained his throne, ordered these testimonials of the straits he was reduced to at Altranstadt to be collected. They were brought to him in a box at Warsaw, in the presence of the French ambassador. The King of Poland showed the box to him, simply remarking, “These are the members of Patkul,” without one word of blame or regret for his memory, so that none present dare refer to so sad and terrible a subject.

About this time Paikel, a Livonian officer of Saxon troops, taken prisoner in the field, was condemned at Stockholm by a decree of the Senate; but his sentence was only to lose his head. This difference of punishment in the same cases made it only too plain that Charles, in putting Patkul to so cruel a death, had thought rather of vengeance than of punishment.

However that may be, Paikel, after his condemnation, proposed to the Senate to disclose to the King in exchange for a pardon the secret of the manufacture of gold; he made the experiment in prison, in the presence of Colonel Hamilton and the magistrates of the town; and whether he had really discovered some useful art, or whether he had learned the art of cunning deception, as seems most probable, certain it is that they carried the gold which was found at the bottom of the crucible to the mint at Stockholm, and made such a circumstantial report to the Senate that the Queen, Charles’s grandmother, ordered that the execution should be suspended till the King had been informed of this curious fact, and should send his orders from Stockholm. The King answered that he had refused to pardon a criminal for the entreaties of his friends, and that he would never do for the sake of profit what he could not do for friendship. There was something heroic in this inflexibility on the part of a prince who, it must be remembered, thought the secret possible. When King Augustus heard of the incident he remarked that he was not surprised that the King of Sweden was so indifferent about the philosopher’s stone, as he had found it in Saxony.

When the Czar heard of the strange peace that Augustus, in spite of their treaties, had concluded at Altranstadt, and that Patkul, his ambassador and plenipotentiary, had been handed over to the King of Sweden, in defiance of international law, he advertised his complaints in all the Courts of Europe. He wrote to the Emperor of Germany, to the Queen of England, and to the States-General of the United Provinces. He said that the unfortunate necessity to which Augustus had yielded were merely cowardice and treachery. He called upon all these Powers to mediate that his ambassador might be sent back, and to resist the affront which, through him, was offered to all crowned heads; he appealed to their honour not to stoop so low as to guarantee the Peace of Altranstadt, which Charles was urging upon them by threats. The only effect of these letters was to make the power of the King of Sweden more obvious. The Emperor, England and Holland, were then carrying on a destructive war against France; they thought it inexpedient to exasperate Charles by refusing him the vain form of guaranteeing a treaty. As for the wretched Patkul, not one Power mediated for him, which proves both the danger of a subject’s reliance on a prince, and also the great prestige of Charles.

A proposal was made in the Czar’s Council to retaliate on the Swedish officers who were prisoners at Moscow. The Czar would not consent to a barbarity which would have had such fatal results; there were more Russians prisoners in Sweden than Swedes in Russia.

He sought for a more useful vengeance. The great army of his enemy lay idle in Saxony. Levenhaupt, general to the King of Sweden, who was left in Poland at the head of about 20,000 men, could not guard the passes in a country which was both unfortified and full of factions. Stanislas was at the camp of Charles. The Russian Emperor seized the chance, and entered Poland with more than 60,000 men; he split them into several corps, and marched with a flying camp as far as Leopold, which was not garrisoned by the Swedes. All Polish towns are at the mercy of whoever may present himself at their gates at the head of an army. He had an assembly called together at Leopold, like the one which had dethroned Augustus at Warsaw.

Poland then had two primates, as well as two kings, the one nominated by Augustus, the other by Stanislas. The primate nominated by Augustus summoned the assembly at Leopold, and got together there all those men whom the Prince had abandoned by the Peace of Altranstadt, and also those who had been bribed to the Czar’s side. It was proposed to elect a new king. So that Poland was very near having three kings at one time, and no one could say which was the right one.

During the conferences of Leopold, the Czar, whose interests were closely connected with those of the Emperor of Germany, through their mutual fear of the King of Sweden, secretly obtained from him a number of German officers. These gradually considerably strengthened his force, by the discipline and experience they brought with them.

He attached them to his service by great rewards; and for the greater encouragement of his own troops he gave his portrait set in diamonds to all the generals who had fought in the battle of Calish; the subaltern officers had gold medals, and every private soldier had a silver medal.

These monuments of the victory at Calish were all struck in the new town of Petersburg, where arts and sciences flourished in proportion as he taught his troops of emulation and glory. The confusion, multiplicity of factions, and frequent ravages in Poland hindered the Diet of Leopold from coming to any conclusion. The Czar transferred it to Lubin. But the change of place made no alteration in the disorder and uncertainty which every one felt. The assembly contented themselves with owning neither Augustus, who had abdicated, nor Stanislas, who had been elected contrary to their wishes.

But they lacked both the unanimity and the resolution to name another king. During these futile deliberations the party of the Princess Sapieha, Oginski’s party, those who secretly supported King Augustus, and the new subjects of Stanislas, were all at war with one another, ravaging each other’s estates, and completing the ruin of their country.

The Swedish troops, commanded by Levenhaupt, of which one part was in Livonia, another in Lithuania, and a third in Poland, were seeking the Russian troops, and burning the property of Stanislas’ enemies. The Russians ruined friends as well as enemies, and nothing was to be seen but towns in ashes, and vagrant troops of Poles, deprived of all their possessions, who hated their two kings Charles and the Czar, equally.

King Stanislas set out from Altranstadt on the 15th of July, 1707, with General Renschild, sixteen Swedish regiments and much money. His object was to appease the troubles in Poland, and to make his authority owned by peaceable means. He was acknowledged wherever he went; the discipline of his troops, which threw into stronger contrast the cruelty of the Russians, gained all hearts; his extreme affability brought round to him, in proportion as it was realized, almost all factions, and his money gained him the majority of the royal forces. The Czar, fearing that he would lack supplies in a country ravaged by his own troops, withdrew into Lithuania, where he had told the various parts of the army to meet, and established magazines. This retreat left King Stanislas in peaceable possession of all Poland.

The only one who then troubled him in his dominions was Count Siniawski, Grand General by nomination of Augustus. He was extremely able and very ambitious, and, heading a third party, he recognized neither Augustus nor Stanislas. He had used all his influence to get [Pg 132]himself elected, but was now content to lead a party, as he could not be king.

The crown troops, who continued under his command, had hardly any other pay but licence to ravage their own country with impunity. All who suffered from their ravages or were afraid of them, immediately submitted to Stanislas, whose power was daily increased.

The King of Sweden was then receiving in his camp at Altranstadt ambassadors from almost all the princes of Christendom. Some begged him to retire from the Imperial dominions, others to turn his arms against the Emperor. It was reported on all sides that he meant to join France in crushing the House of Austria.

Amongst these ambassadors was the famous John, Duke of Marlborough, who was sent by Anne, Queen of Great Britain. This man, who took every town that he besieged, and gained every battle that he fought, was a prominent courtier at St. James, the leader of a Parliamentary party, and the most able foreign minister of his time. He did France as much damage by his diplomatic talent as by his arms; and M. Fagel, Secretary of the States-General, has been heard to say that, on more than one occasion, the States having resolved to oppose what the Duke intended to lay before them, the Duke, when he appeared, though he spoke very poor French, brought them all round to his way of thinking.

Together with Prince Eugene, his fellow-victor, and the Grand Pensioner of Holland, Heinsius, he bore the whole weight of the enterprises of the allies against France. He knew that Charles was angry with the Emperor and the Empire, that he was being secretly approached by the French, and that if the conqueror joined Louis XIV the allies would be overwhelmed.

It is true that Charles had given his word to take no part whatever in the war between Louis XIV and the allies; but the Duke did not believe that any prince would be so great a slave to his word as not to sacrifice it to his greatness and interest. He therefore started for the Hague in order to sound the King of Sweden.

As soon as he arrived at Leipzig, he went secretly, not to Count Piper, first minister, but to Baron Gortz, who was beginning to share the King’s confidence with Piper. When he was presented to the King with the English minister Robinson, he spoke French, saying that he would be happy to have the opportunity of acquiring under his direction what he had yet to learn of the art of war. The King made no polite remark in answer to this compliment, and seemed to forget that he was being addressed by Marlborough. The conversation was tedious and trivial, Charles using Swedish, and Robinson acting as interpreter. Marlborough, who was never in a hurry to propose things, and who had learned by long experience the art of reading men, and discovering the connection between their inmost thoughts and their actions, gestures and speech, studied the King carefully. When he spoke on war in general he thought he remarked in his Majesty a natural dislike of France, and he saw, too, that he was talking with pleasure of the conquests of the allies. He noticed that his eyes kindled when he mentioned the Czar, in spite of the restraint shown in the conversation; and he noticed a map of Russia before him on the table. This quite convinced him that the real intention of the King of Sweden, and his only ambition, was to dethrone the Czar, just as he had dethroned the King of Poland. He understood that his object in remaining in Saxony was to impose on the Emperor of Germany certain severe conditions. But he knew that the Emperor would accept them, and that thus matters would be satisfactorily settled. He left Charles to follow his own bent, and, satisfied with having fathomed his intentions, he did not make any proposal to him.

As few negotiations are concluded without money, and as ministers have been known to sell the hatred or friendship of their masters, all Europe believed that the Duke of Marlborough had succeeded with the King of Sweden by means of the gift of a large sum of money to Count Piper, and the Count’s reputation has suffered for it to this very day. For my part I have traced this report to its source, and I have it on authority that Piper received a small present from the Emperor, with the consent of the King his master, and nothing from the Duke of Marlborough. It is certain that Charles was bent on dethroning the Czar of Russia, that he took counsel of no one, and that he had no need of advice from Count Piper to wreak his long-meditated vengeance on Peter Alexiowitz. Lastly, the minister’s reputation is absolutely vindicated by the fact that Charles paid honour to his memory long after, when, hearing of his death in Russia, he had his body taken to Stockholm, and buried with great pomp and magnificence at his own expense.

The King, who had as yet experienced no ill-fortune, nor even any hindrance to success, thought that one year would dethrone the Czar, and that then he could retrace his steps as the arbiter of Europe; but his aim was first to humiliate the Emperor of Germany.

Baron Stralheim, Swedish ambassador at Vienna, had quarrelled at table with Count Zobor, the Emperor’s chamberlain; the latter, having refused to drink to the health of Charles, and having accused him of treating his master too badly, Stralheim had given him the lie with a box on the ears, and had dared, after this insult, to demand reparation at the Imperial Court.

Fear of the displeasure of the King of Sweden had forced the Emperor to banish the subject whom it was his duty to avenge. Charles was not satisfied, but insisted that the Count of Zobor should be handed over to him. The Court of Vienna had to swallow its pride and hand over the Count to the King, who sent him back, after having kept him prisoner some time at Stettin. Contrary to international law he further demanded that 1,500 wretched Russians, who had escaped his arms and fled to the Empire, should be given up to him. The Court of Vienna would have had to consent to this strange demand, and they would have been handed over to the enemy, had not the Russian ambassador at Vienna arranged for their escape by different routes.

The third and last of his demands was the most exorbitant. He declared himself protector of the Emperor’s Protestant subjects in Silesia, a province of the House of Austria, and not of the Empire; he wanted the Emperor to grant them the liberties and privileges which had been gained by the Treaty of Westphalia, but nullified, or at least eluded, by the Treaty of Ryswick. The Emperor, whose great aim was to get rid of so dangerous a neighbour, still assented, and granted him all that he wanted. The Lutherans obtained more than 100 churches, which the Catholics were obliged to cede by this treaty, but many of these concessions, secured for them by the King of Sweden’s fortune, were taken from them as soon as he could no longer impose laws.

The Emperor, who was forced to make these concessions, and who submitted to Charles’s wishes in everything, was Joseph, the eldest son of Leopold, and brother of Charles VI, who succeeded him. The Pope’s nuncio, who then resided in the court of Joseph, reproached him severely for ceding, as a Catholic, the interests of his own religion to the heretics. “It is very lucky for you,” answered the Emperor, smiling, “that the King of Sweden did not propose that I should turn Protestant, for had he done so I do not know what I might have done.”

Count Wratislau, his ambassador to Charles XII, brought the treaty in favour of the Silesians, and signed by his master, to Leipzig. Charles then said he was satisfied, and the firm friend of the Emperor. But he was disgusted that Rome had opposed him to the utmost of her ability. He felt the greatest contempt for the weakness of the Court, which being at present the irreconcilable enemy of half Europe, always distrusts the other half, and only maintains its credit by its skilful diplomacy. He seemed determined on vengeance. He told Count Wratislau that the Swedes had once subjugated Rome, and that they had not degenerated as she had done.

He let the Pope know that he would one day demand the effects which Queen Christina had left at Rome. It is impossible to say how far this young conqueror would have carried his resentment and his arms, had fortune seconded his designs. Nothing then seemed an impossibility to him; he even sent several officers secretly to Asia, and as far as Egypt, to take plans of the towns and inform him of the strength of those countries. Certainly, if any one were capable of overturning the empire of the Persians and Turks, and then going on into Italy, it was Charles XII. He was as young as Alexander, as great a soldier, and as daring; but he was more indefatigable, stronger, and more temperate; then the Swedes, too, were perhaps better men than the Macedonians. But such plans, which are called divine when they succeed, are regarded as chimeras when they fail.

At last, all difficulties having been overcome, and all his plans carried out, after having humiliated the Emperor, dictated to the Empire, protected the Lutherans in the midst of Roman Catholics, dethroned one king and crowned another, and made himself the terror of all princes, he prepared to start. The luxuries of Saxony, where he remained idle a whole year, had made no alteration in his mode of life. He rode out thrice a day, got up at four o’clock in the morning, dressed unaided, never drank wine, only spent a quarter of an hour at table, exercised his men every day, and indulged in no other pleasure than that of making Europe tremble.

The Swedes did not yet know what was to be their destination, but it was rumoured in the army that Charles might go to Moscow. Some days before he started he commanded the Grand Marshal of the Household to write out for him the route from Leipzig, then he paused, and, that the Grand Marshal should have no idea of his project, he added, with a smile, “and to all the capitals of Europe.” The marshal brought him a list of them all, at the head of which he had purposely placed “Route from Leipzig to Stockholm.” The majority of the Swedes longed to return thither, but it was far from the King’s intention to take them back home. “Monsieur le Maréchal,” he said, “I see whither you would lead me; but we shall not return to Stockholm so soon.”

The army was already on the march, and passed near Dresden. Charles was at their head, riding, as was his habit, two or three hundred paces in advance of his guards. Suddenly they lost sight of him; some officers advanced at full gallop to see what had become of him, but they could not find him. In a minute the whole army took the alarm. They halted; the generals assembled; they were in a state of great consternation when they learned from a Saxon peasant what had become of him.

As he was passing so near Dresden, he had taken it into his head to pay a visit to King Augustus; he rode into the town, followed by three or four generals. Count Fleming, seeing them pass, had only time to run and let his master know. He suggested to Augustus a suitable reception on this occasion, but Charles came into the room in his boots, before Augustus had time to recover from his surprise. He was then ill, and in a nightshirt, but he hastily dressed. Charles breakfasted with him as a traveller taking leave of a friend, then he expressed a wish to see the fortifications. During the short time that they were going round them, a Livonian, exiled from Sweden, who was serving in the Saxon army, thought that he could not have a better chance of pardon. He felt sure that his Majesty would not refuse so small a favour to a prince from whom he had taken a crown, and in whose power he had placed himself. Augustus readily undertook the office—he was a short distance from Charles, talking to General Hord. “I believe,” he said, smiling, “that your master would not refuse me.” “You don’t know him,” answered the General; “he would rather refuse you here than anywhere else.” This did not prevent Augustus from asking a pardon for the Livonian in the most pressing way. Charles refused, in such a way that it was impossible to ask again. After having spent some hours on this strange visit, he embraced Augustus and departed.

On rejoining his army, he found all his generals panic-stricken. He inquired the reason; they told him that they had determined to besiege Dresden, in case he had been detained prisoner there. “Pshaw!” said the King; “they dare not.” The next day they got news that Augustus was holding a Council extraordinary at Dresden. “You see,” remarked Renschild, “they are deliberating as to what they ought to have done yesterday.” Some days later, Renschild, in an interview with the King, spoke with astonishment of the journey to Dresden. “I had confidence in my good fortune,” said Charles; “but at one moment it looked critical. Fleming was not at all anxious that I should leave Dresden so soon.”

 

 

BOOK IV

Charles leaves Saxony—Pursues the Czar—Advances into Ukrania—His losses and wounds, and the battle of Pultowa—The consequences of the battle—Charles forced to escape into Turkey—His reception in Bessarabia.