from many a blunder and mad excess, and on at
least one occasion rescued his army from destruction.

So strong was the hold she soon won on his affection and gratitude that
he is said to have married her secretly within three years of first
setting eyes on her. Her future and that of the children she had borne
to him became his chief concern; and as early as 1708, when he was
leaving Moscow to join his army, he left behind him a note: "If, by
God's will, anything should happen to me, let the 3000 roubles which
will be found in Menshikoff's house be given to Catherine Vassilevska
and her daughter."

But whatever the truth may be about the alleged secret marriage, we know
that early in 1712, Peter, in his Admiral's uniform, stood at the altar
with the Livonian maid-servant, in the presence of his Court officials,
and with two of her own little daughters as bridesmaids. The wedding, we
are told, was performed in a little chapel belonging to Prince
Menshikoff, and was preceded by an interview with the Dowager-Empress
and his Princess sisters, in which Peter declared his intention to make
Catherine his wife and commanded them to pay her the respect due to her
new rank. Then followed, in brilliant sequence, State dinners,
receptions, and balls, at all of which the laundress-bride sat at her
husband's right hand and received the homage of his subjects as his
Queen.

Picture now the woman who but a few years earlier had scrubbed Pastor
Glueck's floors and cleaned Menshikoff's window-panes, in all her new
splendours as Empress of Russia. The portraits of her, in her
unaccustomed glories, are far from flattering and by no means
consistent. "She showed no sign of ever having possessed beauty," says
Baron von Poellnitz; "she was tall and strong and very dark, and would
have seemed darker but for the rouge and whitening with which she
plastered her face."

The picture drawn by the Margravine of Baireuth is still less
attractive: "She was short and huddled up, much tanned, and utterly
devoid of dignity or grace. Muffled up in her clothes, she looked like a
German comedy-actress. Her old-fashioned gown, heavily embroidered with
silver, and covered with dirt, had been bought in some old-clothes shop.
The front of her skirt was adorned with jewels, and she had a dozen
orders and as many portraits of saints fastened all along the facings of
her dress, so that when she walked she jingled like a mule."

But in the eyes of one man at