a respecter of persons. His feuds with Betzki,
the Empress's faithful factotum, were as acrid as the feuds between
Voltaire and Maupertuis. Betzki had his own ideas about the statue that
was to do honour to the founder of the Empire, and he insisted that the
famous equestrian figure of Marcus Aurelius should be the model.
Falconet was a man of genius, and he retorted that what might be good
for Marcus Aurelius would not be good for Peter the Great. The courtly
battle does not concern us, though some of its episodes offer tempting
illustrations of biting French malice. Falconet had his own way, and
after the labour of many years, a colossus of bronze bestrode a charger
rearing on a monstrous mass of unhewn granite. Catherine took the
liveliest interest in her artist's work, frequently visiting his studio,
and keeping up a busy correspondence. With him, as with the others, she
insisted that he should stand on no ceremony, and should not spin out
his lines with epithets on which she set not the smallest value. She may
be said to have encouraged him to pester her with a host of his obscure
countrymen in search of a living, and a little colony of Frenchmen whose
names tell us nothing, hung about the Russian capital. Diderot's
account of this group of his countrymen at St. Petersburg recalls the
picture of a corresponding group at Berlin. "Most of the French who are
here rend and hate one another, and bring contempt both on themselves
and their nation: 'tis the most unworthy set of rascals that you can
imagine."[84]

[84] _Oeuv._, xx. 58.

Diderot reached St. Petersburg towards the end of 1773, and he remained
some five months, until the beginning of March, 1774. His impulsive
nature was shocked by a chilly welcome from Falconet, but at the palace
his reception was most cordial, as his arrival had been eagerly
anticipated. The Empress always professed to detest ceremony and state.
In a letter to Madame Geoffrin she insists, as we have already seen her
doing with Falconet, on being treated to no oriental prostrations, as if
she were at the court of Persia. "There is nothing in the world so ugly
and detestable as greatness. When I go into a room, you would say that I
am the head of Medusa: everybody turns to stone. I constantly scream
like an eagle against such ways; yet the more I scream, the less are
they at their ease.... If you came into my room, I should say to
you,--Madame, be seated; let us chatter at our ease. You