ome. This passion for water
remained with him to the end of his life. In a practical way it showed
itself in his wish to give his land-locked domains access to the open
sea.

While the unpopular and harsh young ruler was away from home, the
friends of the old Russian ways in Moscow set to work to undo all
his reforms. A sudden rebellion among his life-guards, the Streltsi
regiment, forced Peter to hasten home by the fast mail. He appointed
himself executioner-in-chief and the Streltsi were hanged and quartered
and killed to the last man. Sister Sophia, who had been the head of the
rebellion, was locked up in a cloister and the rule of Peter be-gan in
earnest. This scene was repeated in the year 1716 when Peter had gone
on his second western trip. That time the reactionaries followed the
leadership of Peter's half-witted son, Alexis. Again the Tsar returned
in great haste. Alexis was beaten to death in his prison cell and the
friends of the old fashioned Byzantine ways marched thousands of dreary
miles to their final destination in the Siberian lead mines. After that,
no further outbreaks of popular discontent took place. Until the time of
his death, Peter could reform in peace.

It is not easy to give you a list of his reforms in chronological order.
The Tsar worked with furious haste. He followed no system. He issued
his decrees with such rapidity that it is difficult to keep count.
Peter seemed to feel that everything that had ever happened before was
entirely wrong. The whole of Russia therefore must be changed within the
shortest possible time. When he died he left behind a well-trained army
of 200,000 men and a navy of fifty ships. The old system of government
had been abolished over night. The Duma, or convention of Nobles, had
been dismissed and in its stead, the Tsar had surrounded himself with an
advisory board of state officials, called the Senate.

Russia was divided into eight large "governments" or provinces. Roads
were constructed. Towns were built. Industries were created wherever it
pleased the Tsar, without any regard for the presence of raw material.
Canals were dug and mines were opened in the mountains of the east. In
this land of illiterates, schools were founded and establishments
of higher learning, together with Universities and hospitals and
professional schools. Dutch naval engineers and tradesmen and artisans
from all over the world were encouraged to move to Russia. Printing
shops were est