OFF TO ENGLAND.
Bombardier Peter Alexeyevitch entered with all his impetuosity
and marvellous energy into the preparations for the second attack
upon Azof. During the whole of the winter and spring he was busy
superintending the work of ship-building in the south of Russia. Every
little river harbour on either side of the Don had its own improvised
ship-building yards, and its hundreds of workmen from all parts of the
country, engaged in the setting up as quickly as might be of galleys
and rafts and every kind of floating vehicle. "We live, as old Adam
did, in the sweat of our brow," wrote the Tsar to one of his intimates
in Moscow, "and have hardly time to eat our bread for the pressure of
work." Dockyards burned down, and destroying in their own destruction
the work of many months; gangs of labourers deserting and disappearing
when most required to complete their work--nothing could discourage
the great Tsar, or turn him by the fraction of an inch from the path
he had laid out for himself. Galleys and boats quickly took shape,
and gradually approached completion. Peter was everywhere, swearing,
scolding, encouraging, organizing, never weary, and never losing heart
because of the misfortunes of the moment. The Don waters rose and
carried away many half-completed vessels and much valuable timber;
but the forests of Voronej were not so far away nor so poor but that
inexhaustible supplies of birch and oak and pine and beech might be had
to replace what was lost; and these same waters of the Don which had
swept the timber away should be utilized to carry down on their broad
bosom as much again and more than they had stolen and cast into the
sea. Then Peter himself fell ill; but even sickness could not quell
his ardour for the work he had set himself, and the building was not
delayed for a moment. At last, when the long nights of midsummer were
near at hand, the flotilla was ready and slipped down the broad river
straight for the doomed city. There were twenty-two galleys, and one
hundred large rafts for carrying ordnance, and some seventeen hundred
smaller vessels, boats and lighters.
By this time the regiments from Moscow and the Streltsi, who had never
left the neighbourhood, were once more assembled beneath the walls of
Azof. The Preobrajensk were there, and among them our friend Boris, who
had spent a delightful winter and spring in Moscow, and was now ready
and anxious for adventure again. All the troops which had taken part in
the former unsuccessful attack upon the fortress were now present again
to retrieve their laurels, which had faded before the breath of Turk
and Tartar.
But many new faces were to be seen among the old ones--veterans,
chiefly, of tanned and foreign appearance; experienced engineers and
gunners from France, and Hanover, and Brandenburg. Under the orders of
these men a high wall of earth was built beneath the very ramparts of
the city, so that the soil, when the wall was finished, trickled over
the ramparts of Azof, which it overtopped, and fell into the streets of
the city. At the same time the ships and rafts blockaded the town from
the water side, so that there was no escape this time by way of the
Black Sea. Then, when all was ready for the attack, preparations were
made for a combined assault both by land and sea.
But the hearts of the Tartars failed them, and the city capitulated
before the storming was commenced, greatly to the disappointment of
many young heroes who had intended to perform deeds of valour, and
especially of the valiant Boris, whose arms ached for another brush
with the Turkish swordsmen, especially with those who had been so
unfortunate as to be instructed in the art by himself, with whom he had
promised himself much entertainment.
The Tsar spared no pains to discover Boris's friend the pasha, whom,
when found, he placed at the service of Boris. The hunter, remembering
the palanquin, but recollecting also that he owed to the pasha, in a
fashion, his deliverance from death by the sword, was merciful, and did
but take his fun out of him for a day or so, after which he released
him altogether and let him go free. But for one day that poor pasha
afforded much amusement to the officers of the Preobrajensk and to
the Tsar also; for Boris harnessed the poor fat manikin to a light
hand-cart, and, himself sitting as a coachman in front, drove him up
and down the camp, whipping him up with a horse-lash when he tired,
till the wretched Turk was ready to fall between the shafts and expire
from pure exhaustion.
Jansen, who was captured also in the streets of the city, though
disguised in the garb of a common Tartar tradesman, did not escape so
easily. He was carried in chains to Moscow when the troops returned
to the capital, and there his head was struck off his shoulders and
exhibited on a pole as a warning to traitors.
The army entered Moscow in triumph, under festal arches made to
represent Hercules trampling Turkish pashas under foot, while Mars, on
the summit of a second triumphal archway, pitched Tartars over in large
numbers. The principal generals were drawn into the city upon gilded
sledges placed on wheels; while Bombardier Peter Alexeyevitch, now
raised, however, to the rank of captain, walked in the procession as
befitted his humbler grade in the service. Boris was there, too, in all
the glory of a major's epaulets; and if he had glanced up at a certain
balcony in the Troitski Street as he passed beneath, there is no doubt
that he might have seen two bright eyes for which he was the centre of
the procession, if not the only figure in it, and which did not fail
to notice with pride the new insignia of rank and promotion which he
bore on either broad shoulder. There, too, in the midst of the happy
marching host, was the wretched prisoner Yakooshka, hooted and spat
upon by the crowd as he dragged his heavily-ironed feet over the stones
of Moscow.
Thus the first triumph of Peter's new army and navy was achieved with
scarcely a single blow struck; for, with the exception of a brilliant
assault upon redoubts by the Don Cossacks and an easily-repulsed sortie
by the inhabitants, during which but few lives were lost on the Russian
side, there had been no fighting done. But the prestige of the foreign
troops was won, Peter's policy was justified, the enemies of Christ and
of the true faith had been overthrown, a seaport had been gained for
Russia, and the beginning of her expansion had become an accomplished
fact.
Peter was thoroughly and entirely happy, for he had made the first move
in the great game he had come into this world to play, and it was a
good move. The Mussulmans had been hustled out of Azof, and a garrison
of Streltsi left in the city to take care that they did not return; and
now three thousand Russian families were sent to the town, there to
abide for ever, they and their descendants. Ship-building was commenced
wherever docks could be conveniently erected, and all classes were
heavily taxed in order to pay for the ships to be built in them.
Meanwhile, young Russians of talent were despatched to Venice, to the
Netherlands, to London, and to Paris, in order to learn the newest
things, whether in ship-building, or in gunnery, or in drill and
uniform. Their orders were to keep their eyes open and to see and learn
everything worth learning.
And now Peter felt that he might conscientiously undertake that trip
to foreign lands which he had long promised himself, and to which he
had so ardently looked forward. He was to travel incognito, in order to
avoid the worry of publicity and the tedious attentions of courts. The
journey was to be undertaken under the ægis of a great embassy, Peter
following in the train of his ambassadors in the character of a humble
_attaché_ or secretary. Boris was to go, as the Tsar had long since
promised him; for he would be extremely useful, in England at least,
if they ever got so far, by reason of his knowledge of the language.
Besides, Peter liked to have his faithful bear-eater, as he still loved
to call him, constantly at his side, and would not have thought of
leaving him behind under any circumstances.
There was one little heart that was sore indeed when Boris came to
take his leave before the departure of the embassy. It was always
good-bye, Nancy said wistfully, as the hunter tore himself regretfully
from her side: would there never come a time when she would not
continually be looking forward with dread to his departure somewhere?
Boris gazed long and earnestly into the sorrowful blue eyes raised to
his own. "Perhaps there will, my Nancy, perhaps there will," he said at
last, "when you are a little older--God knows; but I must always be a
soldier and serve the Tsar wherever he will have me go."
"And I shall always love you and be miserable when you go away," said
Nancy, in perfect sincerity.
Nancy had intrusted to Boris many letters and presents to her friends
and relations in England, letters in which she had not failed to
enlarge upon the greatness and heroism of the bearer; for she had
extracted a promise that Boris would deliver with his own hands certain
of the packages. There would be frequent couriers backwards and
forwards, so that she could write to her friend, and he would write
too; so after all Nancy felt there would still be some comfort in life
in spite of the envious fate which so constantly took her idol away
from her.
Then began that historical journey of Peter and his suite through the
Baltic provinces, and Königsberg, and Hanover, and the Netherlands,
where Peter left his embassy to follow him at leisure while he hastened
on and lived for some weeks at Zaandam as a common Dutch labourer, in
order to learn thoroughly the rudiments of ship-building, and to set a
good example of industry and self-denial to a lazy and self-indulgent
people at home. The details of Peter's life at Zaandam are known to the
"youngest schoolboy." I need not therefore dwell upon this hackneyed
subject.
Boris had passed with wonder and admiration through the various foreign
lands and courts visited by the great Muscovite embassy; but there
was far too much eating and drinking and wearing of fine clothes to
please him, and he soon began to weary of it and think of home and the
simplicity of his life in Moscow, and of hunting expeditions, with
Nancy for companion. Especially after the Tsar left the suite and went
his own way, Boris found life desperately dull and monotonous. Right
glad was he when the embassy reached Amsterdam and the spell of the
Tsar's presence was once more upon him. Peter had just been informed
that, good as the Dutch ship-builders were, they were very inferior to
those of England. This had been quite sufficient for the energetic
Tsar, and Boris found that arrangements had already been made for a
visit to the latter country.
"So get ready, my bold Bear-eater, for to-morrow we cross the water.
You will be sea-sick, of course; but then you will see Nancy's native
land--ha, think of that!"
Boris did think of that, and it rejoiced his heart to reflect that his
eyes should look upon the country which could produce so wonderful a
thing as Nancy Drury.
So, on the following morning, Peter, with Boris and fifteen other
Russians, took ship in the private yacht of his Majesty William III.,
which that monarch had sent for his accommodation, together with three
ships of war, the whole under the orders of Admiral Mitchell of the
British navy, and crossed the seas for this hospitable land of Britain.
The weather being rough, Boris was sea-sick, as foretold by the Tsar;
but Peter himself was as happy as a schoolboy out for a holiday, for
that sail in his Majesty's beautiful yacht, escorted by such ships of
war as he had never yet beheld, was the most delightful thing he had
ever experienced. Such being the case, Peter arrived in this country
in the highest good-humour, having familiarized himself on the way with
the name and use of every single object on board the yacht, as well as
with the names, ages, duties, and salaries of every man and boy that
went to make up her crew.
Once on shore, the Tsar would hear no talk of palaces and luxury and
the idle life of courts, but went with two or three chosen followers
and pitched his tent in a country house close to the shipping at
Deptford, where he was soon busy among the skippers and sailors,
inquiring into and laying to heart everything that he saw which was
likely to prove of service to him in his own country. And ever at his
right hand, ready for work or for play, though preferring the latter,
was Boris the Bear-Hunter, whose prowess in all athletic matters Peter
was never weary of showing off to his English friends.