day on horseback, and wore no other than a man's dress, except on
Sundays. Tchoglokoff and his wife had become as gentle as lambs. In the
eyes of Madame Tchoglokoff I possessed a new merit; I fondled and
caressed a great deal one of her children, who was with her. I made
clothes for him, and gave him all sorts of playthings and dresses. Now
the mother was dotingly fond of this child, who subsequently became such
a scapegrace that, for his pranks, he was sentenced to confinement in a
fortress for fifteen years. Soltikoff had become the friend, the
confidant and the counsellor of M. and Madame Tchoglokoff. Assuredly no
person in his senses could ever have submitted to so hard a task as that
of listening to two proud, arrogant, and conceited fools, talking
nonsense all day long, without having some great object in view. Many,
therefore, were the guesses, many the suppositions, as to what this
object could be. These reached Peterhoff and the ears of the Empress.
Now at this period it often happened that when her Majesty wished to
scold any one, she did not scold for what she might well complain of,
but seized some pretext for finding fault about something which no one
would ever have thought she could object to. This is the remark of a
courtier; I have it from the lips of its author, Zachar Czernicheff. At
Oranienbaum, every one of our suite had agreed, men as well as women, to
have, for this summer, dresses of the same colour; the body gray, the
rest blue, with a collar of black velvet, and no trimmings. This
uniformity was convenient in more respects than one. It was on this
style of dress that she fixed, and more especially on the circumstance
that I always wore a riding habit, and rode like a man at Peterhoff. One
court day the Empress said to Madame Tchoglokoff that this fashion of
riding prevented my having children, and that my dress was not at all
becoming; that when she rode on horseback she changed her dress. Madame
Tchoglokoff replied, that as to having children, this had nothing to do
with the matter; that children could not come without a cause; and that,
although their Imperial Highnesses had been married ever since 1745, the
cause nevertheless did not exist. Thereupon her Imperial Majesty
scolded Madame Tchoglokoff, and told her she blamed her for this,
because she neglected to lecture, on this matter, the parties concerned;
and on the whole, she showed much ill-humour, and said that her husband
was a mere night-cap, who allowed himself to be worn by a set of
dirty-nosed brats (_des morveux_). All this, in four-and-twenty hours,
had reached their confidants. At this term of _morveux_, the _morveux_
wiped their noses; and, in a very special council held on the matter by
them, it was resolved and decreed that, in order to follow out strictly
the wishes of her Imperial Majesty, Sergius Soltikoff and Leon
Narichkine should incur a pretended disgrace at the hands of M.
Tchoglokoff, of which perhaps he himself would not be at all aware; that
under pretext of the illness of their relatives, they should retire to
their homes for three weeks or a month, in order to allow the rumours
which were current to die away. This was carried out to the letter, and
the next day they departed, to confine themselves to their own houses
for a month. As for me, I immediately changed my style of dress;
besides, the other had now become useless. The first idea of this
uniformity of attire had been suggested to us by the dress worn on
court-days at Peterhoff. The body was white, the rest green, and the
whole trimmed all over with silver lace. Soltikoff, who was of a dark
complexion, used to say that he looked like a fly in milk, in this dress
of white and silver. I continued to frequent the society of the
Tchoglokoffs as before, although it was now dreadfully wearisome. The
husband and wife were full of regrets for the absence of the chief
attractions of their society, in which most assuredly I did not
contradict them. The illness of Soltikoff prolonged his absence, and
during it the Empress sent us orders to come from Oranienbaum and join
her at Cronstadt, whither she was about to proceed, in order to admit
the waters into the canal of Peter I. That Emperor had commenced the
work, and just then it was completed. She arrived at Cronstadt before
us. The night following was very stormy, and, as immediately on her
arrival, she had sent us orders to join her, she supposed we must have
been caught in the storm, and was in great anxiety all night. She
fancied that a ship, which could be seen from her window, labouring in
the sea, might be the yacht in which we were to make the voyage. She had
recourse to the relics which she always kept by her bedside; carried
them to the window, and kept moving them in a direction opposite to the
ship which was tossing in the storm. She exclaimed repeatedly that we
should certainly be lost, and that it would be all her fault, because a
short time previously she had sent us a reprimand for not showing her
more prompt obedience, and she now supposed we must have set out
immediately on the arrival of the yacht. But, in fact, the yacht did not
reach Oranienbaum until after the storm, so that we did not go on board
until the afternoon of the next day. We remained three days at
Cronstadt, during which the blessing of the canal took place with very
great solemnity, and the waters were, for the first time, let into it.
After dinner there was a grand ball. The Empress wished to remain at
Cronstadt to see the waters let out again, but she left on the third day
without this having been effected. The canal was never dried from that
time, until, in my reign, I caused the steam-mill to be constructed
which empties it. Otherwise, the thing would have been impossible, the
bottom of the canal being lower than the sea; but this was not perceived
at that time.
From Cronstadt every one returned to his own quarters; the Empress went
to Peterhoff, and we to Oranienbaum. M. Tchoglokoff asked and obtained
leave to go for a month to one of his estates. During his absence Madame
Tchoglokoff gave herself a great deal of trouble to execute the Empress'
orders to the letter. At first she had many conferences with Bressan,
the Grand Duke's valet de chambre. Bressan found at Oranienbaum a pretty
woman named Madame Groot, the widow of a painter. It took several days
to persuade her, to promise her I know not what, and then to instruct
her in what they wanted of her, and to what she was to lend herself. At
last Bressan was charged with the duty of making this young and pretty
widow known to the Grand Duke. I clearly saw that Madame Tchoglokoff was
deep in some intrigue, but I knew not what. At last, Serge Soltikoff
returned from his voluntary exile, and told me pretty nearly how matters
stood. Finally, after much trouble, Madame Tchoglokoff gained her end,
and when she felt sure of this she informed the Empress that everything
was going on as she wished. She expected a great reward for her trouble;
but in this she was much mistaken, for nothing was given her; however,
she maintained that the Empire was in her debt. Immediately after this
we returned to the city.
It was at this time that I persuaded the Grand Duke to break off the
negotiations with Denmark. I reminded him of the advice of the Count de
Bernis, who had already departed for Vienna. He listened to me, and
ordered the negotiations to be closed without anything being concluded:
and this was done. After a short stay at the Summer Palace, we returned
to the Winter Palace.
It seemed to me that Serge Soltikoff was beginning to be relax in his
attentions; that he became absent, sometimes absurd, arrogant, and
dissipated. I was vexed at this, and spoke to him on the subject. He
gave me but poor excuses, and pretended that I did not understand the
extreme cleverness of his conduct. He was right, for I did think it
strange enough. We were told to get ready for the journey to Moscow,
which we did. We left St. Petersburg on the 14th of December, 1752.
Soltikoff remained behind, and did not follow us for several weeks
after. I left the city with some slight indications of pregnancy. We
travelled very rapidly day and night. At the last stage before reaching
Moscow, these signs disappeared with violent spasms. On our arrival, and
seeing the turn things were taking, I felt satisfied that I had had a
miscarriage. Madame Tchoglokoff also remained behind at St. Petersburg,
as she had just been delivered of her last child, which was a girl. This
was the seventh. On her recovery she joined us at Moscow.
1753.
Here we lodged in a wing built of wood, constructed only this autumn,
and in such a way that the water ran down the wainscoting, and all the
apartments were exceedingly damp. This wing consisted of two ranges of
apartments, each having five or six large rooms, of which those looking
to the street were for me, and those on the other side for the Grand
Duke. In the one intended for my toilet, my maids and ladies of the
bedchamber were lodged, together with their servants; so that there were
seventeen girls and women lodged in one room, which had, it is true,
three large windows, but no other outlet than my bed-room, through
which, for every kind of purpose, they were obliged to pass, a thing
neither pleasant for them nor for me. We were obliged to put up with
this inconvenience, of which I have never seen the like. Besides, the
room in which they took their meals was one of my ante-chambers. I was
ill when I arrived. To remedy this inconvenience, I had some very large
screens placed in my bed-room, by means of which I divided it into
three; but this was scarcely of any use, for the doors were opening and
shutting continually, as was unavoidable. At last, on the tenth day, the
Empress came to see me, and observing the continual passing to and fro,
she went into the other chamber, and said to my women, "I will have a
different outlet made for you than through the sleeping-room of the
Grand Duchess." But what did she do? She ordered a partition to be made,
which took away one of the windows of a room in which, even before this,
seventeen persons could hardly exist. Here, then, was the chamber made
smaller in order to gain a passage; the window was opened towards the
street, a flight of steps was led up to it, and thus my women were
obliged to pass and repass along the street. Under their window,
necessaries were placed for them; in going to dinner, they must again
pass along the street. In a word, this arrangement was worthless, and I
cannot tell how it was that these seventeen women, thus huddled up and
crowded together, did not catch a putrid fever; and all this, too, close
to my bed-room, which, in consequence, was so filled with vermin of
every kind that I could not sleep. At last, Madame Tchoglokoff, having
recovered after her accouchement, arrived at Moscow, as did, some days
later, Serge Soltikoff. As Moscow is very large, and people much
dispersed in it, he availed himself of this locality, so favourable to
the purpose, to conceal the decrease of his attentions, feigned or real,
at court. To tell the truth, I was grieved at this; however, he gave me
such good and specious reasons for it, that as soon as I had seen him
and spoken to him, my annoyance on the subject vanished. We agreed that,
in order to decrease the number of his enemies, I should get some remark
repeated to Count Bestoujeff which might lead him to hope that I was
less averse to him than in former days. With this message I charged a
person called Bremse, who was employed in the Holstein Chancery of M.
Pechline. This person, when not at court, frequently went to the
residence of the Chancellor Count Bestoujeff. He eagerly accepted the
commission, and brought me back word that the Chancellor was delighted,
and said that I might command him as often as I thought proper, and that
if, on his part, he could be of any use to me, he begged me to point out
to him some safe channel by which we might communicate with each other.
I perceived his drift, and I told Bremse that I would think of it. I
repeated this to Soltikoff, and it was immediately settled that he
should go to the Chancellor on the plea of a visit, as he had but just
arrived. The old man gave him a most cordial reception; took him aside,
spoke to him of the internal condition of our court, of the stupidity of
the Tchoglokoffs, saying, among other things, "I know, although you are
their intimate friends, that you understand them as well as I do, for
you are a young man of sense." Then he spoke of me, and of my situation,
just as if he had lived in my room; adding, "In gratitude for the
good-will which the Grand Duchess has so kindly evinced for me, I am
going to do her a little service, for which she will, I think, thank me.
I will make Madame Vladislava as gentle as a lamb for her, so that she
will be able to do with her whatever she pleases; she will see that I am
not such an ogre as I have been represented to her." Finally, Serge
Soltikoff returned, enchanted with his commission and his man. He gave
him some advice for himself, also, as wise as it was useful. All this
made him very intimate with us, without any one having the least
suspicion of the fact.
In the meanwhile Madame Tchoglokoff, who never lost sight of her
favourite project of watching over the succession, took me aside one day
and said, "Listen to me, I must speak to you with all sincerity." I
opened my eyes and ears, and not without cause. She began with a long
preamble, after her fashion, respecting her attachment to her husband,
her own prudent conduct, what was necessary and what was not necessary
for ensuring mutual love and facilitating conjugal ties; and then she
went on to say, that occasionally there were situations in which a
higher interest demanded an exception to the rule. I let her talk on
without interruption, not knowing what she was driving at, a good deal
astonished, and uncertain whether it was not a snare she was laying for
me, or whether she was speaking with sincerity. Just as I was making
these reflections in my own mind, she said to me, "You shall presently
see whether I love my country, and whether I am sincere; I do not doubt
but you have cast an eye of preference upon some one or other; I leave
you to choose between Sergius Soltikoff and Leon Narichkine--if I do not
mistake, it is the latter." Here I exclaimed, "No no! not at all."
"Well, then," she said, "if it be not Narichkine, it is Soltikoff." To
that I made no reply, and she went on saying, "You shall see that it
will not be I who will throw difficulties in your way." I played the
simpleton to such a degree, that she scolded me for it several times,
both in town and in the country, whither we went after Easter.
It was at that time, or thereabout, that the Empress gave to the Grand
Duke the lands of Liberitza, and several others, at a distance of
fourteen or fifteen verstes from Moscow. But before we went to reside on
these new possessions of his Imperial Highness, the Empress celebrated
the anniversary of her coronation at Moscow. This was the 25th of April.
It was announced to us that she had ordered the ceremony to be observed
exactly as it had been on the very day of her coronation. We were
curious to know how this would be. The evening before, she went to sleep
at the Kremlin. We stayed at the Sloboda, in the wooden palace, and
received orders to go to mass at the cathedral. At nine o'clock in the
morning we started from the wooden palace in the state carriage, our
servants walking on foot. We traversed the whole of Moscow, step by
step--the distance through the city being as much as seven verstes--and
we alighted at the cathedral. A few moments after the Empress arrived
with her retinue, wearing the small crown on her head, and the imperial
mantle, borne as usual by her chamberlains. She went to her ordinary
seat in the church, and in all this there was, as yet, nothing
unusual--nothing that was not practised at all the other fêtes of her
reign. The church was damp and cold to a degree that I had never before
felt. I was quite blue, and frozen in my court-dress and with bare neck.
The Empress sent me word to put on a sable tippet, but I had not one
with me. She ordered her own to be brought, took one, and put it on her
neck. I saw another in the box, and thought she was going to send it to
me, but I was mistaken--she sent it back. This I thought a pretty
evident sign of displeasure. Madame Tchoglokoff, who saw that I was
shivering, procured me, from some one, a silk kerchief, which I put
round my neck. When mass and the sermon were over, the Empress left the
church, and we were preparing to follow her, when she sent us word that
we might return home. It was then we learned that she was going to dine
alone on the throne, and that in this respect the ceremonial would be
observed just as it was on the day of her coronation, when she had dined
alone. Excluded from this dinner, we returned, as we had come, in great
state, our people on foot, making a journey of fourteen verstes, going
and returning, through the city of Moscow, and we benumbed with cold and
dying of hunger. If the Empress seemed to us in a very bad temper during
mass, this disagreeable evidence of want of attention, to say no more,
did not leave us in the best of humours either. At the other great
festivals, when she dined on the throne, we had the honour of dining
with her; this time she repelled us publicly. Returning alone in the
carriage with the Grand Duke, I told him what I thought of this, and he
said that he would complain of it. On reaching home, half dead with cold
and fatigue, I complained to Madame Tchoglokoff of having caught cold.
The next day there was a ball at the wooden palace; I said I was ill,
and did not go. The Grand Duke really did make some complaint or other
to the Schouvaloffs on the subject, and they sent him some answer, which
appeared satisfactory to him, and nothing more was said about the
matter.
About this time we learned that Zachar Czernicheff and Colonel Nicholas
Leontieff had had a quarrel, while at play, in the house of Roman
Voronzoff; that they had fought with swords, and that Zachar Czernicheff
had received a severe wound in the head. It was so serious that he could
not be removed from Count Voronzoff's house to his own. He remained
there, was very ill, and there was some talk of trepanning him. I was
very sorry for him, for I liked him very much. Leontieff was arrested
by order of the Empress. This combat set the whole city in a ferment, on
account of the extensive connections of both the champions. Leontieff
was the son-in-law of the Countess Roumianzoff, a very near relative of
the Panines and Kourakines. The other, also, had relatives, friends, and
protectors. The occurrence had taken place at the house of Count Roman
Voronzoff; the wounded man was still there. At last, when the danger was
over, the affair was hushed up, and matters went no farther.
In the course of the month of May, I again had indications of pregnancy.
We went to Liberitza, an estate of the Grand Duke, twelve or fourteen
verstes from Moscow. The stone house which was on it, had been built a
long time ago by Prince Menchikoff, and was now falling to decay, so
that we could not live in it. As a substitute, tents were set up in the
court, and every morning, at two or three o'clock, my sleep was broken
by the sound of the axe, and the noises made in building a wooden wing,
which was being hurriedly erected, within two paces, so to speak, of our
tents, in order that we might have a place to live in during the
remainder of the summer. The rest of our time we spent in hunting,
walking, or riding. I no longer went on horseback, but in a cabriolet.
About the Feast of St. Peter we returned to Moscow. I was seized with
such drowsiness that I slept every day till noon, and then it was only
with difficulty that I was awakened in time for dinner. The Feast of St.
Peter was kept in the usual way: I was present at Mass, at the dinner,
the ball, and the supper. Next morning I felt great pains in my loins.
Madame Tchoglokoff summoned a midwife, who predicted the miscarriage,
which actually occurred the following night. I might have been with
child two or three months. For thirteen days I was in great danger, as
it was suspected that a portion of the after-birth had remained behind.
This circumstance was kept a secret from me. At last, on the thirteenth
day, it came away of itself--without pain, or even a struggle. In
consequence of this accident I had to keep my room for six weeks, during
which the heat was insupportable. The Empress came to see me the day I
fell ill, and appeared to be affected by my state. During the six weeks
that I kept my room I was nearly tired to death. The only society I had
was Madame Tchoglokoff, who came but rarely, and a little Kalmuck girl,
whom I liked for her pretty, agreeable ways. I frequently cried from
ennui. As for the Grand Duke, he was mostly in his own room, where one
of his valets, a Ukrainian, named Karnovitch, a fool as well as a
drunkard, did his best to amuse him; furnishing him with toys, with
wine, and such other strong liquors as he could procure, without the
knowledge of M. Tchoglokoff, who, in fact, was deceived and made a fool
of by every one. But in these nocturnal and secret orgies with the
servants of the chamber, among whom were several young Kalmucks, the
Grand Duke often found himself ill-obeyed and ill-served; for, being
drunk, they knew not what they did, and forgot that they were with their
master, and that that master was the Grand Duke. Then his Imperial
Highness would have recourse to blows with his stick, or the blade of
his sword; but in spite of all this, he was ill-obeyed; and more than
once he had recourse to me, complaining of his people, and begging me to
make them listen to reason. On these occasions I used to go to his
rooms, give them a good scolding, and remind them of their duties, when
they would instantly resume their proper places. This made the Grand
Duke often say to me, and also to Bressan, that he could not conceive
how I managed those people; for, as for himself, though he belaboured
them soundly, yet he could not make them obedient, while I, with a
single word, could get them to do whatever I wished. One day when I went
for this purpose into the apartments of his Imperial Highness, I beheld
a great rat, which he had had hung--with all the paraphernalia of an
execution--in the middle of a cabinet, formed by means of a partition. I
asked him what all this meant. He told me that this rat had committed a
crime; one which, according to the laws of war, was deserving of capital
punishment; it had climbed over the ramparts of a fortress of cardboard
which he had on the table in his cabinet, and had eaten two sentinels,
made of pith, who were on duty at the bastions. He had had the criminal
tried by martial law, his setter having caught him, and he was
immediately hung, as I saw, and was to remain there exposed to the
public gaze for three days, as an example. I could not help bursting
into a loud laugh at the extreme folly of the thing; but this greatly
displeased him. Seeing the importance he attached to the matter, I
retired, excusing myself on account of my ignorance, as a woman, of
military law; but this did not prevent his being very much out of humour
with me on account of my laughter. In justification of the rat, however,
it may at least be said, that he was hung without having been questioned
or heard in his own defence.