Peter the Great (117 page)

Taken as a whole, these events created an entirely new diplomatic landscape in Europe. With peace among themselves, the nations of the West could devote more attention to what, for them, had^ been a secondary threater: the War in the North. England, which had emerged from the War of the Spanish Succession virtually unchallenged in its supremacy at sea, was concerned that the growing power of Russia in the Baltic might affect British trade in that area, and powerful British naval squadrons began to appear in that northern sea. Hanover was also hostile to Peter, fearing the Tsar's new presence in northern Germany. Three times the King-Elector refused Peter's overtures for a meeting, demanding first that all Russian troops be evacuated from Germany.

Meanwhile, the foreign policy of France had done a revolutionary flip-flop. Instead of hostility to England and support for the Catholic Jacobites, France, under the regency of Philippe, sought friendship with England and guaranteed the rights of the Protestant Hanoverian dynasty. France's long support of Sweden also seemed ready for change. For years, the Sun King had subsidized the Swedes and used them as a counterpoise to keep the Austrian emperor distracted in Germany. Now, with the Swedes defeated and driven completely out of Germany, and with the power of the Hapsburg Emperor greatly enhanced, France needed a new ally in the East. Peter's Russia, which had soared to prominence within the past decade, was a natural possibility. Through diplomatic channels, various hints and overtures began to pass. And Peter was eager to listen. Although throughout his rei
gn France had opposed him in Po
land and in Constantinople, he knew that the structure of Europe was changing. An alliance or an understanding with France would be a balance to his increasingly difficult relations with Hanover and England. Even more, he saw France's help as a possible way of ending the Northern War. France was still paying monthly subsidies to Sweden; if these could be cut off and France's diplomatic support of Sweden withdrawn, Peter felt that he might at last persuade an isolated Charles XII that Sweden must make peace.

Peter's proposal to France, when it came, was a bold one: that France take Russia instead of Sweden as her ally in the East. In addition, Peter suggested that he could bring Prussia and Poland into the arrangement. Aware that France's treaties with England and Holland would be a stumbling block, Peter argued that the new alliance would not threaten the earlier one. Specifically, he proposed that, in return for Russian guarantees of the Treaty of Utrecht, France halt its subsidies to Sweden and instead pay to Russia 25,000 crowns a month for the duration of the Northern War—which, with France behind him, he hoped would be short. Finally, Peter proposed a personal link between the two nations. To seal the alliance and to mark Russia's emergence as a great power, he would marry his eight-year-old daughter Elizabeth to the seven-year-old King of France, Louis XV.

Such proposals were not unattractive to the Regent of France, but to the decisive power in French foreign policy, the Abbe Guillaume Dubois, they were unwelcome. The new alliance with England was his handiwork, and he feared that any arrangement with Russia would throw the whole thing off balance. In a letter to the Regent advising against the Russian proposal, Dubois said, "If, in establishing the Tsar, you chase the English and the Dutch from
the Baltic Sea, you will be eternally
odious to these two nations." Further, Dubois warned, the Regent might be sacrificing England and Holland in return for only a short-term relationship with Russia. "The Tsar has chronic maladies," he pointed out, and deciding that he might accomplish more by seeing the Regent in person, decided to go to Paris. Besides, he had seen Amsterdam, London, Berlin and Vienna, but never Paris. Through Kurakin, his ambassador in Holland, he informed the Regent that he would like to make a visit.

There could be no question of refusing, although the Regent and is advisors had misgivings. Following diplomatic custom, the host country paid the expenses of the guest, and for the Tsar and his suite, this expense would be enormous. Further, Peter had a reputation as an impetuous monarch, sensitive to insult and quick to anger, and the men of his suite were said to be of similar character. Nevertheless, the Regent made ready; the Tsar was to be received as a grand European monarch. A cavalcade of carriages, horses, wagons and royal servants under the command of Monsieur de Liboy, a gentleman of the King's household, was sent to Calais to escort the Russian guests to Paris. Liboy was to honor Peter, wait upon him and pay all his expenses. In Paris, meanwhile, the apartments of the Sun King's mother, Anne of Austria, in the Louvre were prepared for the guest. At the same time, Kurakin, knowing Peter's tastes, suggested that his master might be happier in a smaller, more private place. Accordingly, a handsome private mansion, the Hotel Lesdiguieres, was also prepared. On the chance that the Tsar would choose it, the hotel was handsomely furnished from the royal collection. Magnificent armchairs, polished desks and inlaid tables were carried there from the Louvre. Cooks, servants and fifty soldiers were assigned to provide the Tsar with nourishment, comfort and security.

Meanwhile, Peter and his party of sixty-one persons, including Golovkin, Shafirov, Peter Tolstoy, Vasily Dolgoruky, Buturlin, Osterman and Yaguzhinsky, traveled slowly through the Low Countries. As was his custom, the Tsar stopped often to visit towns, examine curiosities and study the people and their way of life. Although he had again adopted the partial facade of traveling incognito to minimize the time wasted in official ceremonies, he was pleased to hear church bells rung and cannon fired in his honor as he passed by. Catherine accompanied him as far as Rotterdam; to simplify the journey, she would wait at The Hague while he visited France. He felt that her presence would demand additional time-consuming ceremonies which by himself he could avoid.

From Rotterdam, Peter traveled by boat to Breda and up the

Shceldt to Antwerp, where he climbed the cathedral tower to gaze out over the city. In Brussels, he wrote to Catherine: "I wish to send you lace for
fontange
and
engagements
[that is, lace ribbons to be clustered in the hair and across the bodice—the latest style in Paris], for the best lace in all Europe is made here, but they make it to order only. Therefore, send the pattern and what name or arms you wish worked on it." From Brussels, Peter moved on to Ghent, Bruges, Ostend and Dunquerque, finally reaching the French frontier at Calais, where he rested for nine days to observe the last week of Lent and to celebrate Russian Easter.

At Calais, the Russian travelers met Liboy and the French welcoming escort. For Liboy, this first exposure to the Russian character was traumatic. The guests complained about the carriages to which they were assigned
, and they spent freely, every e
cue of which had to be paid by Liboy. In desperation, he urged Paris that the Tsar and his suite be put on a fixed daily allowance, not to be exceeded, allowing them to argue among themselves how the sum would be spent.

Liboy had been ordered to report to Paris on the habits of the visitors and to ascertain the purpose of their visit. He found it impossible to understand Peter, who, instead of doing anything serious, seemed only to be idly amusing himself, ambling along, examining things which, in Liboy's eyes, were irrelevant. "This littl court," he wrote of the Russian party of twenty-two persons of rank and thirty-nine orderlies, "is very changeable and irresolute and from the throne to the stable, very subject to anger." The Tsar, he reported, "is of very great stature, a little stooped, with the habit of holding his head down. He is dark and there is a fierceness in his expression. He appears to have a lively mind and a ready understanding, with a certain grandeur, in his movements, but with little restraint." Elaborating in a subsequent report, Liboy continued:

In the Tsar, one does indeed find seeds of virtue, but they are wild and very mixed with failings. I believe that he lacks most of all uniformity and constancy of purpose and that he has not arrived at that point where one can rely on what would be concluded with him. I admit that Prince Kurakin is polite; he appears to be intelligent and to desire to arrange everything to our mutual satisfaction. I do not know if it is by temperament or through fear of the Tsar, who appears, as I have said, very hard to please and quick-tempered. Prince Dolgoruky appears a gentleman and to be much esteemed by the Tsar; the only inconvenience is that he understands absolutely no language but Russian. In this respect allow me to remark that the term "Muscovite" or even "Muscovy" is deeply offensive to all this court.

The Tsar rises very early, dines about ten o'clock, sups about seven and retires before nine. He drinks liquors before meals, beer and wine in the afternoon, sups very little and sometimes not at all. I have not been able to perceive any sort of council or conference for
serious business, unless they discuss affairs while tippling, the Tsar deciding alone and promptly whatever is presented. This prince varies on all occasions his amusements and walks and is extraordinarily quick, impatient and very hard to please.
...
He likes especially to see the water. He lives in the great apartments and sleeps in some out-of-the-way room if there by any.

To counsel the French mais d'hotel and chefs who would be preparing food for the Russian visitor, Liboy forwarded specific recommendations:

The Tsar has a head cook who prepares two or three dishes for him every day and who uses for this purpose enough wine and meat to serve a table of eight.

He is served both a meat and a Lenten dinner on Fridays and Saturdays.

He likes sharp sauces, brown and hard bread, and green peas. He eats many sweet oranges and apples and pears. He generally drinks light beer and dark vin de nuits without liquor.

In the morning he drinks aniseed water [kummel], liquors before meals, beer and wine in the afternoon. All of them fairly cold.

He eats no sweetmeats and does not drink sweetened liquors at his meals.

On May
4,
Peter left Calais on the road to Paris, characteristically refusing to follow and expected route. A formal reception had been prepared for him at Amiens; he skirted the city. At Beauvais, where he saw the nave of the largest cathedral in France, still unfinished since the thirteenth century, he spumed a banquet which was offered. "I am a soldier," he told the Bishop of Beauvais, "and when I
find bread and water I am conten
t." Peter was exaggerating; he still liked wine, although he preferred his favorite Hungarian Tokay to the French varieties. "Thanks to the Hungarian wine, which here is a great rarity," he wrote to Catherine from Calais. "But there is only one bottle of vodka left. I don't know what to do."

At noon on May
7,
at Beaumont-sur-Oise, twenty-five miles northeast of Paris, Peter found the marshal de Tesse waiting for him with a procession of royal carriages and an escort of red-coated cavalry, of the Maison de Roi. Tesse, standing beside the Tsar's carriage, made a deep, low bow, flourishing his hat, as Peter stepped out. Peter greatly admired the Marshal's carriage and chose to ride in it as he entered the capital through the Porte St.

Denis. But he did not want Tesse in the carriage with him, preferring instead
three of his own Russians. Tesse
, whose duty was to please, followed in another carriage.

The procession arrived at the Louvre at nine p.m. Peter entered the palace and walked through the late Queen Mother's apartments which had been prepared for him. As Kurakin had predicted, the Tsar found them too magnificent and too brilliantly lighted. While there, Peter looked at a dinner table which had been superbly set for him and sixty people, but he only nibbled some bread and radishes, tasted six kinds of wine and drank two glasses of beer. Then he returned to his carriage and, with his suite following, drove to the Hotel Lesdiguieres. Peter liked this better, although here, too, he found the rooms assigned to him to be too large and luxuriously furnished and ordered his own camp bed to be placed in a small dressing room.

The next morning, the Regent of France, Philippe d'Orleans, came to pay his official welcoming call. As the Regent's carriage entered the
couryard of the Hotel Lesdiguidi
cres, it was met by four noblemen of the Tsar's suite, who conducted the Regent into the reception hall. Peter emerged from his private chamber, embraced the Regent and then turned and walked into the private chamber ahead of Philippe, leaving him and Kurakin, who was to serve as interpreter, to follow. The French, noting every nuance of protocol, were affronted by Peter's embrace and his walking ahead of the Regent; these acts, they said, displayed "a haughty air of superiority" and were "without the slighest civility."

In Peter's room, two armchairs had been placed facing each other, and the two men sat down with Kurakin nearby. For nearly an hour they talked, devoting themselves entirely to pleasantries. Then the Tsar walked out of the room, "the Regent once again behind him. In the reception hall, Peter made a deep bow (rendered in mediocre fashion, says Saint-Simon), and left his guest at the same spot where he had met him on entering. This precise formality was unnatural for Peter, but he had come to Paris on a mission and he thought it important to comply with the demands of his etiquette-conscious hosts.

The remainder of that day and the day following (a Sunday), -Peter remained cloistered in the Hotel Lesdiguieres. Anxious as he was to get out and see Paris, he forced himself to observe protocol and remain secluded until he had received the formal visit of the King. As he wrote to Catherine during this weekend: