an guarantee the duration of feelings and opinions
in the habitual quiet of life, and the Russians, like all people
subject to despotism, are more capable of dissimulation than
reflection.

On my arrival at Petersburg my first sentiment was to return thanks
to heaven for being on the borders of the sea. I saw waving on the
Neva the English flag, the symbol of liberty, and I felt that on
committing myself to the ocean, I might return under the immediate
power of the Deity; it is an illusion which one cannot help
entertaining, to believe one's self more under the hand of
Providence, when delivered to the elements than when depending on
men, and especially on that man who appears to be a revelation of
the evil principle on this earth.

Just facing the house which I inhabited at Petersburg was the statue
of Peter I.; he is represented on horseback climbing a steep
mountain, in the midst of serpents who try to stop the progress of
his horse. These serpents, it is true, are put there to support the
immense weight of the horse and his rider; but the idea is not a
happy one: for in fact it is not envy which a sovereign can have to
dread: neither are his adulators his enemies: and Peter I.
especially had nothing to fear during his life, but from Russians
who regretted the ancient customs of their country. The admiration
of him, however, which is still preserved is the best proof of the
good he did to Russia: for despots have no flatterers a hundred
years after their death. On the pedestal of the statue is written:
To Peter the First, Catherine the Second. This simple, yet proud,
inscription has the merit of truth. These two great monarchs have
elevated the Russian pride to the highest pitch; and to teach a
nation to regard itself as invincible, is to make it such, at least
within its own territory: for conquest is a chance which probably
depends more upon the faults of the vanquished than upon the genius
of the victor,

It is said, and properly, that you cannot, at Petersburg, say of a
woman, that she is as old as the streets, the streets themselves are
so modern. The buildings still possess a dazzling whiteness, and at
night when they are lighted by the moon, they look like large white
phantoms regarding, immoveable, the course of the Neva. I know not
what there is particularly beautiful in this river, but the waves of
no other I had yet seen ever appeared to me so limpid. A succession
of granite quays, thirty versts in le