sent
happy manner! The poor Czar, this day, on getting to Peterhof, and
finding Czarina vanished, understood too well; he saw "big smoke-clouds
rise suddenly over Petersburg region," withal,--"Ha, she has cannon
going for her yonder; salvoing and homaging!"--and rushed back to
Oranienbaum half mad. Old Munnich undertook to save him, by one, by two
or even three different methods, "Only order me, and stand up to it with
sword bare!"--but Peter's wits were all flying miscellaneously about,
and he could resolve on nothing.

Peter and his Czarina never met more. Saturday (to-morrow), he
abdicates; drives over to Peterhof, expecting, as per bargain, interview
with his Wife; freedom to retire to Holstein, and "every sort of
kindness compatible with his situation:" but is met there instead, on
the staircase, by brutal people, who tear the orders off his coat, at
length the very clothes off his back,--and pack him away to Ropscha, a
quiet Villa some miles off, to sit silent there till Orlof and Company
have considered. Consideration is: "To Holstein? He has an Anti-Danish
Russian Army just now in that neighborhood; he will not be safe in
Holstein;--where will he be safe?" Saturday, 17th, Peter's seventh day
in Ropscha, the Orlofs (Scarred Orlof and Four other miscreants, one of
them a Prince, one a Play-actor) came over, and murdered poor Peter, in
a treacherous, and even bungling and disgusting, and altogether hideous
manner. "A glass of burgundy [poisoned burgundy], your Highness?"
said they, at dinner with his poor Highness. On the back of which, the
burgundy having failed and been found out, came grappling and hauling,
trampling, shrieking, and at last strangulation. Surely the Devil will
reward such a Five of his Elect?--But we detain Herr Busching: it is
still only Friday morning, 9th of the month; and the Czarina's Hackney
Coach, in the manner of a comet and tail, has just gone into other
streets:--

"After this terrible uproar had left our quarter, I hastened to the
Danish Ambassador, Count Haxthausen, who lived near me, to bring him
the important news that the Czar was said to be dead. The Count was just
about to burn a mass of Papers, fearing the mob would plunder his house;
but he did not proceed with it now, and thanked Heaven for saving his
Country. His Secretary of Legation, my friend Schumacher, gave me all
the money he had in his pockets, to distribute amongst the poor; and I
returned home. Directly after, the