ander's mysticism was for ornament, not for
use, and, before very long, Egeria and her Muscovite Numa parted
company.]
[321] The dexterity of Catherine extricated Peter (called the Great by
courtesy), when surrounded by the Mussulmans on the banks of the river
Pruth. [Catherine, who had long been Peter's mistress, had at length
been acknowledged as his wife. Her "dexterity" took the form of a bribe
of money and jewels, conveyed to the Turkish grand-vizier
Baltazhi-Mahomet, who was induced to accede to the Treaty of Pruth, July
20, 1711.]
[322] {565}
["Eight thousand men had to Asturias march'd
Beneath Count Julian's banner.... To revenge
His quarrel, twice that number left their bones,
Slain in unnatural battle, on the field
Of Xeres, where the sceptre from the Goths
By righteous Heaven was reft."
Southey's _Roderick_, Canto XXV. lines 1, 2, 7-11.]
[323] [The Bashkirs are a Turco-Mongolian tribe inhabiting the slopes of
the Ural Mountains. They supply a body of irregular cavalry to the
Russian army.]
[324] [The Austrian and Russian armies stood between the Greeks and
other peoples, and their independence, as Alexander the Great stood
between Diogenes and the sunshine.]
[en]
_Still will I roll my tub at Sinope_
_Be slaves who may_----.--[MS.]
[325] [Lines 482, 483, are not in the MS.]
[326] {566} [Constant (Henri Benjamin de Rebecque, 1767-1830) was the
"stormy petrel" of debate in the French Chamber. For instance, in a
discussion on secret service money for the police (July 27, 1822), he
exclaimed, "Vous les representez-vous payant d'une main le salaire du
vol, et tenant peut-etre un crucifix de l'autre?" No wonder that there
were "violens murmures, cris d'indignation a droite." The duel, however,
did not arise out of a speech in the Chamber, but from a letter of June
5, 1822, in _La Quotidienne_, in which the Marquis de Forbin des Issarts
replied to some letters of Constant, which had appeared in the
_Courrier_ and _Constitutionnel_. Constant was lame, and accordingly
both combatants "out ete places a dix petits pas sur des chaises." Both
fired twice, but neither "was a penny the worse." (See _La Grande
Encyclopedie_, art. "Constant;" and, for details, _La Quotidienne_, June
8, 1822. See, too, for "session de 1822," _Opinions el Discours_ de M.
Casimir Perrier, 1838, ii. 5-47.)]
[327] [Louis XVIII. (Louis Stanislas Xavier, 1755-1824) pas
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