ir knees and begged for pardon.

"Chain them!" said the czar, in a terrible voice.

Turning then to the commander of the guards, he struck him and accused
him of having disobeyed orders. But the officer proving to him that the
hour fixed had just arrived, the czar, in sudden remorse at his haste,
clasped him in his arms, kissed him on the forehead, proclaimed his
fidelity, and gave the traitors into his charge.

And now Peter showed the savage which lay within him under the thin
veneer of civilization. The conspirators were put to death with the
cruellest of tortures, and, to complete the act of barbarity, their
heads were exposed on the summit of a column with their limbs arranged
around them as ornaments.

Satisfied that this fearful example would keep Russia tranquil during
his absence, Peter set out on his journey, visiting most of the
countries of Western Europe. He had reached Vienna, and was on the point
of setting out for Venice, when word was brought him from Russia that
the Strelitz had broken out in open insurrection and were marching from
their posts on the frontier upon Moscow.

The czar at once left Vienna and journeyed with all possible speed to
Russia, reaching Moscow in September, 1698. His appearance took all by
surprise, for none knew that he had yet left Austria.

He came too late to suppress the insurrection. That had been already
done by General Gordon, who, marching in all haste, had met the rebels
about thirty miles from Moscow and called on them to surrender. As they
refused and attacked the troops, he opened on them with cannon, put them
to flight, and of the survivors took captive about two thousand. These
were decimated on the spot, and the remainder imprisoned.

This was punishment enough for a soldier, but not enough for an
autocrat, whose mind was haunted by dark suspicions, and who looked upon
the outbreak as a plot to dethrone him and to call his sister Sophia to
the throne. In his treatment of the prisoners the spirit of the monster
Ivan IV. seems to have entered into his soul, and the cruelty shown,
while common enough in old-time Russia, is revolting to the modern mind.

The trial was dragged out through six weeks, with daily torture of some
of the accused, under the eyes of the czar himself, who sought to force
from them a confession that Sophia had been concerned in the outbreak.
The wives of the prisoners, all the women servants of the princesses,
even poor beggars who live