Voltaire's history of Charles XII, king of Sweden · Voltaire
BOOK VII
With all his success it was not in his power to prevent the Russians, the Saxons, and the Danes from uniting. They seized his quarters, and he lost several of his men in little skirmishes; 2,000 of them were drowned in the Oder as they were going to their winter quarters in Holstein; these were losses which could not be repaired in a country where the enemy was strong in all directions. He intended to defend the country of Holstein against Denmark, but in spite of his ruses and efforts the country was lost, the whole army destroyed, and Steinbock taken prisoner. To complete the misfortunes of the Swedes, the King persisted in his resolve of staying at Demotica, and fed his mind with vain expectations of help from Turkey. The Vizir, Ibrahim Molla, who had been so bent on war with the Russians in opposition to the favourite, was pressed to death between two doors. The post of Vizir was now so dangerous that none dare take the office; but after it had been vacant for about six months, the favourite Ali-Coumourgi took it. Then the King of Sweden abandoned all hope. He really knew Coumourgi, because he had been of service to him when the favourite’s interest had corresponded with his own.
He had spent eleven months buried in idleness and oblivion at Demotica; this extreme idleness, following the most violent exercise, made the illness which he had before assumed a fact. All Europe believed he was dead, and the Regency which he had settled when he left Stockholm, getting no word from him, the Senate went to the Princess Ulrica Eleanora to ask her to take the Regency during the absence of her brother. She accepted it; but when she found that the Senate were trying to force her to peace with the King of Denmark, who was attacking Sweden from all sides, and with the Czar, she resigned the Regency in the certainty that her brother would never ratify the peace, and sent a long account of the affair to him in Turkey. The King received the dispatches at Demotica, and the despotic theories which he had inherited made him forget that Sweden had once been free, and that the Senate had formerly governed the kingdom together with the Kings. He looked on them as servants, who were usurping the government in the absence of their master; he wrote to them that if they wanted to govern he would send them one of his boots, to whom they might apply for orders. Then, to prevent any attempt to overthrow his authority in Sweden, and to defend his country, hoping for nothing further from the Ottomans, he depended on himself, and told the Grand Vizir that he would go through Germany.
Desaleurs, the French ambassador who transacted all the affairs of Sweden, made the proposal to the Vizir. “Well,” said the Vizir, “didn’t I say that the year would not pass without the King’s asking to go? Tell him that he is free to go or stay, but that he must fix his day, that we may not have a repetition of the trouble we had with him at Bender.” Count Desaleurs softened the form of this message to the King. The day was fixed, but Charles wished, in spite of his wretched position, to show the pomp of a grand king before leaving. He made Grothusen his ambassador extraordinary, and sent him to make a formal leave at Constantinople, with a suite of fourscore persons in rich attire. But the splendour of the Embassy was not so great as the mean shifts to which he descended to provide it were disgraceful. M. Desaleurs lent the King 40,000 crowns, Grothusen borrowed, through his agents at Constantinople, 1,000 from a Jew, at the rate of fifty per cent., besides 200 pistoles of an English merchant, and 1,000 of a Turk. They amassed this money solely to act before the Divan the comedy of a Swedish embassy. At the Porte, Grothusen received all the honour paid to ambassadors extraordinary on their day of audience. The object of the whole thing was to get money from the Vizir, but the scheme failed. Grothusen proposed that the Porte should lend him a million. But the Vizir answered that his master could be generous when he wished, but that lending was beneath his dignity; that the King should have all necessary for his journey, and in a degree becoming to the giver; and that possibly the Porte might send him a present of uncoined gold, but that he was not to count on that.
The King began his journey on the 1st of October, 1714. A capigi-pasha, with six chiaoux, went to accompany him from Demirtash, whither he had removed a few days before. The presents they brought him from the Sultan were a large scarlet tent embroidered with gold, a sabre set with jewels, eight beautiful Arab horses, with fine saddles and stirrups set with massive silver. It is not beneath the dignity of history to tell that the Arabian groom, who had charge of the horses, gave the King an account of their genealogy; it is the custom there to think more of the family of a horse than of a man; which is not unreasonable, for if we are careful of the breed these animals never degenerate. The convoy consisted of sixty chariots, laden with all sorts of provisions, and three hundred horses. The Pasha, knowing that many Turks had advanced money to the King’s suite at high rate of interest, told him that, as usury was forbidden by the law of Mahomet, he desired his Majesty to settle the debts, so that his resident at Constantinople should only pay the principal. “No,” said the King, “if my servants have given bills for a hundred crowns it shall be paid, even if they have only received ten for it.” He proposed to the creditors to go with him, and promised payment of all their debts; and many did go to Sweden, and Grothusen was responsible for seeing that they were paid.
The Turks, to show more respect for their guest, made very short stages in the journey; this respectful delay bored the King; he got up as usual about three in the morning; as soon as he was dressed he himself called the capigi and the chiaoux, and ordered them to march in the midst of pitch darkness. The Turkish solemnity was not pleased by this novel way of travelling, and the King was glad to find it was so, and said that he would avenge Bender a little. When he arrived at the Turkish frontier, Stanislas was leaving it by another road, intending to withdraw into Germany to the Duchy of Deux Ponts, a country bordering on the Rhine Palatinate and Alsace, which had belonged to the King of Sweden ever since it had been united to the crown by Christina, successor to Charles XI. Charles assigned the revenue of this Duchy to Stanislas; it was then reckoned at about 70,000 crowns. And this was the end of so many wars and so many hopes. Stanislas both would and could have made an advantageous treaty with Augustus, if Charles had not been so obstinate as to make him lose his actual estates in Poland only that he might keep the title King. The Prince stayed at Deux Ponts, till Charles’s death, then this Duchy falling to the Palatine family, he retired to Weissemburg in French Alsace. When M. Sum, King Augustus’ ambassador, complained to the Duke of Orleans, Regent of France, he received this strange answer: “Sir, tell the King, your master, that France has ever been a refuge for kings in misfortune.”
The King of Sweden, having arrived on the German frontier, found that the Emperor had given orders for his reception with proper state throughout his dominions. The towns and villages where harbingers had fixed his route were making great preparations to entertain him; and every one was looking forward to see the passing of this extraordinary man, whose conquests and misfortunes, whose least actions and whose very times of rest had made so much talk in Europe. But Charles disliked so much pomp, nor did he, as the prisoner of Bender, care to go on show; he had even resolved to never re-enter Stockholm till he had repaired his misfortunes. So dismissing his Turkish attendants at Tergowitz, on the border of Transylvania, he called his people together in a yard, and bade them not to be anxious about him, but make the best of their way to Stralsund, in Pomerania, about 300 leagues from that spot, on the Baltic. He took no one with him, but a certain During, and parted cheerfully with all his officers, leaving them in astonishment, fear and grief. As a disguise he wore a black wig, a gold-laced hat, and a blue cloak, passing for a German officer. Then he rode post-haste with his travelling companion.
On the road he kept clear of places belonging to his real or secret enemies, and so, through Hungary, Moravia, Austria, Bavaria, Wirtemburg, the Palatinate, Westphalia and Mecklenburg, he made the tour of Germany, and doubled his route. At the end of the first day, During, who was not used to such fatigues, fainted when he alighted. The King would not wait a moment, but asked him how much money he had. He said about a thousand crowns. “Give me half,” said the King; “I see you can go no further; I will go without you.” During begged him to rest for at least three hours, assuring him that then he would be able to go on, and desired him to consider the risk of travelling alone. The King would not be persuaded, but made him hand over the five hundred crowns, and called for horses. During, fearing the consequences, bethought himself of a plan.
He drew the post-master to one side, and, pointing to the King, “Friend,” he said, “this is my cousin; we are travelling on the same business, and you see he won’t wait three hours for me; pray give him the worst horse you have, and procure me a chaise or coach.” He put a couple of ducats in the man’s hand, and was obeyed punctually; so that the King had a horse which was both lame and restive. He started at about ten at night, through wind, snow, and rain. His fellow-traveller, after a few hours’ rest, set out again in a chaise with very good horses. At about daybreak he overtook the King, with his horse in a state of exhaustion, and walking to the next stage. Then he was obliged to get in with During, and slept on the straw; then they continued their journey, on horseback during the day and sleeping in the coach at night. They did not make any halts, and so, after sixteen days’ riding, and often at the risk of being taken, they arrived at last at the gates of the town of Stralsund, at one o’clock in the morning.
The King shouted to the sentinel that he was a messenger from the King of Sweden in Turkey, that he must speak that very moment to General Ducker, the governor of the place; the sentinel answered that it was late, that the governor was in bed, and that they must wait till daybreak. The King answered that he was on important business, and declared that if they did not wake the governor without delay he would have them all hanged. The next morning a sergeant went and called the governor; Ducker imagined that he was perhaps one of the King of Sweden’s generals; the gates were opened, and the courier was brought into the room. Ducker, half asleep, asked the news. The King seized him by the arm. “What,” he said, “my most faithful subjects have forgotten me!” The General recognized the King; he could hardly believe his eyes. He threw himself from his bed, and embraced his master’s feet, shedding tears of joy. The news was all over the town in a minute; every one got up, the soldiers collected round the governor’s house; the streets were full of people asking if the news were true; the windows were illuminated, the conduits ran with wine, and the artillery fired a volley. In the meantime they put the King to bed, as he had not rested for sixteen days. They had to cut his boots from his legs, so much were they swollen from excessive fatigue. He had neither linen nor clothes. They hastily manufactured a wardrobe from whatever would fit him best that was in the town. When he had had some hours’ sleep, he got up to go and review his troops, and visit the fortifications. That very day he sent his orders to all parts for renewing the war against his enemies with more vigour than ever.
Europe was now in a very different condition from that she had been in when Charles went away in 1709. The war in the South, between England, Holland, France, Spain, Portugal and Italy, was over; this general peace was due to some private quarrels in the English Court. The Earl of Oxford, a clever minister, and Lord Bolingbroke, one of the greatest geniuses and most eloquent men of his century, were in the ascendant against the famous Duke of Marlborough, and persuaded Queen Anne to make peace with Louis XIV. France having made peace with England, soon forced the other Powers to terms. Philip IV, grandson of Louis XIV, was beginning a peaceful rule over the ruins of the Spanish monarchy. The Emperor, master of Naples and Flanders, was firmly settled in his vast dominions. The only thing that Louis asked was to finish his long career in peace. Queen Anne of England died in August 1714, hated by half the nation for having given peace to so many States. Her brother James Stewart, an unfortunate prince excluded from the throne almost from his birth, failing to appear in England to try to recover a succession which new laws would have settled on him, had his party prevailed, George I, Elector of Hanover, was unanimously chosen King of Great Britain. The throne came to him not by right of descent, but by Act of Parliament.
Called at an advanced age to rule a people whose language he did not understand, and where everything was strange, George considered himself rather Elector of Hanover than King of England; his whole ambition was for the improvement of his German States; nearly every year he crossed the seas to visit the subjects who adored him. In other ways he preferred a private to public life; the pomp of majesty was burdensome to him, and what he liked was a familiar talk with a few old courtiers. He was not the most dazzling king of Europe, but he was one of the wisest of the kings, and perhaps the only one who could, as king, taste the pleasures of friendship and a private life. These were the chief princes, and this was the position of affairs in South Europe. The changes that had occurred in the North were of another kind: the kings there were at war, but all united against the King of Sweden. Augustus had been long restored to the crown of Poland, by the help of the Czar, and with the consent of the Emperor, Queen Anne, and the States-General, who, though guarantors of the Peace of Altranstadt, in Charles’s better days, forgot their obligations when they found there was no longer anything to fear from him. But Augustus was not at peace in his kingdom. His people’s fears of arbitrary power returned with the return of their King; they had taken up arms to make him submit to the Pacta Conventa, a solemn compact they had with their King.
They seemed to have summoned him home only to make war on him. At the beginning of these troubles not a word was said of Stanislas, his party seemed to have disappeared, and the King of Sweden was no more remembered than as a kind of torrent, which had for a time borne down all before it. Pultawa and Charles’s absence, which caused the fall of Stanislas, was also the cause of the fall of the Duke of Holstein, Charles’s nephew, who was dispossessed of his dominions by the King of Denmark. The King of Sweden had a great regard for the father, and was moved and humiliated by the son’s losses. Besides, as he only acted for the sake of glory, the fall of princes which he had himself set up was as vexing to him as his own losses. His enemies vied with each other in profiting by his ruin. Frederic William, the new King of Prussia, who seemed as anxious for war as his father had been for peace, took Stetin and a part of Pomerania for four hundred thousand crowns, which he advanced to the King of Denmark and the Czar. George, Elector of Hanover, now King of England, had the Duchy of Bremen and Verden for three-score thousand pistoles which he had lent to the King of Denmark. Thus was Charles spoiled, and those who had gained these territories as pledges were from their interests as much opposed to him as those who had taken them from him. The Czar was indeed most of all to be feared. His former losses, his victories, and his very mistakes, combined with his diligence to learn, and care to teach his subjects in their turn, and his hard work, made him a remarkable man.
Riga, Livonia, Ingria, Carelia, part of Finland, and all the countries that had been won by Charles’s ancestors, were now subject to Russia. Peter, who had only twenty years before not so much as one ship on the Baltic, had gained control of those seas with a fleet of no fewer than thirty ships of the line. He built one of these ships with his own hands; he was the best carpenter, admiral and pilot in the North. From the Gulf of Bothnia to the ocean he had sounded every league of the way. He had united the labour of a common sailor to the experiments of a theorist, and having become admiral gradually, and by dint of victories, as he had before when he aimed at land command. While Prince Gallitsin, a general made by him, and the best at seconding his plans, was completing the conquest of Poland, by taking Vasa and beating the Swedes, this Emperor put to sea to make a descent on Alan, on the Baltic, about twelve leagues from Stockholm. He went on the expedition in the beginning of July 1714, while his rival Charles was in bed at Demotica. He embarked at Cronslot, a harbour he had built four miles from St. Petersburg. The harbour, the fleet, the officers and sailors were all the work of his own hands, and he could see nothing that he had not made himself.
The Russian fleet found itself off Aland on the 15th of July; it consisted of thirty ships of the line, fourscore galleys, and a hundred half-galleys; it carried twenty thousand men, and was commanded by Admiral Apraxin, the Russian Emperor being Rear-Admiral. The Swedish fleet came up on the 16th, under the command of Vice-Admiral Erinschild, and was weaker by two-thirds; yet they fought for three hours, the Czar himself attacking the flag-ship, and taking it after an obstinate fight. The day of the victory he landed 16,000 men at Aland, and took many of the Swedish soldiers who could not board their own fleet prisoners. Then he returned to his port of Cronslot, with the flag-ship and three smaller ones, a frigate, and six galleys, which he had taken. From Cronslot he went to St. Petersburg, followed by his victorious fleet and the ships he had taken. He was greeted by a salute of 150 guns. Then he made his triumphal entry, which gave him more pleasure than that at Moscow, as it was in his favourite town, where ten years before there was not so much as a shed, and which now possessed 34,000 fine houses. Then, too, he was at the head of a victorious army, and of the first Russian fleet ever seen in the Baltic; and among a people who, before his time, had never known what a fleet was.
At Petersburg the ceremonies were much the same as at Moscow. The Swedish Vice-Admiral was the _pièce de résistance_. Peter appeared as Rear-Admiral, and a Russian, who represented the Czar on these occasions, was set upon a throne surrounded by twelve senators. The Rear-Admiral presented him with an account of his victories, and was then made Vice-Admiral in consideration of his services. It was an odd ceremony, but suited to a country where the Czar had introduced military distinctions as a novelty. The Russian Emperor, having thus got the better of the Swedes by land and by sea, and having helped to expel them from Poland, was master there himself; he made himself mediator between the King and the people, an honour perhaps equal to that of setting up a King. The pomp and fortune of Charles had passed to the Czar; he made a better use of it than his rival, for he used all his successes for his country’s good. If he took a town the chief artisans were transferred to Petersburg. The manners, arts and sciences of any place he took were carried home to enrich and refine his own country. So that of all conquerors he had the best excuse for his conquest. Sweden, on the other hand, had lost all her foreign possessions, and had neither trade, money, nor credit; her veterans were either killed or had died of want. More than a hundred thousand Swedes were slaves in the vast Russian Empire, and as many more had been sold to the Turks and the Tartars. The male population was visibly becoming scarce; but in spite of all this, their hopes revived when they heard that their King had arrived at Stralsund. The sentiment of respect and admiration for him was still so strong that the rustic youth crowded to enlist, leaving the land without cultivators.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.