Into execution. Falling into conversation with each other just before

the time, and finding that they agreed in feeling on the subject, they

resolved at once to go and make a full confession to the Czar.

So they went immediately to the house of Le Fort, where the Czar then

was, and made a confession of the whole affair. They related all the

details of the plot, and gave the names of the principal persons

concerned in it.

The emperor was at table with Le Fort at the time that he received this

communication. He listened to it very coolly--manifested no

surprise--but simply rose from the table, ordered a small body of men

to attend him, and, taking the names of the principal conspirators, he

went at once to their several houses and arrested them on the spot.

The leaders having been thus seized, the execution of the plot was

defeated. The prisoners were soon afterward put to the torture, in

order to compel them to confess their crime, and to reveal the names of

all their confederates. Whether the names thus extorted from them by

suffering were false or true would of course be wholly uncertain, but

all whom they named were seized, and, after a brief and very informal

trial, all, or nearly all, were condemned to death. The sentence of

death was executed on them in the most barbarous manner. A great

column was erected in the market-place in Moscow, and fitted with iron

spikes and hooks, which were made to project from it on every side,

from top to bottom. The criminals were then brought out one by one,

and first their arms were cut off, then their legs, and finally their

heads. The amputated limbs were then hung up upon the column by the

hooks, and the heads were fixed to the spikes. There they remained--a

horrid spectacle, intended to strike terror into all beholders--through

February and March, as long as the weather continued cold enough to

keep them frozen. When at length the spring came on, and the flesh of

these dreadful trophies began to thaw, they were taken down and thrown

together into a pit, among the bodies of common thieves and murderers.

This was the end of the second conspiracy formed against the life of

Peter the Great.

CHAPTER VI.

THE EMPEROR'S TOUR.

1697

Objects of the tour--An embassy to be sent--The emperor to go

incognito--His associates--The regency--Disposition of the Guards--The

embassy leaves Moscow--Riga--Not allowed to see the

fortifications--Arrival at Konigsberg--Grand procession in entering the

city--The pages--Curiosity of the people--The escort--Crowds in the

streets--The embassy arrives at its lodgings--Audience of the

king--Presents--Delivery of the letter from the Czar--Its contents--The

king's reply--Grand banquet--Effects of such an embassy--The policy of

modern governments--The people now reserve their earnings for their own

use--How Peter occupied his time--Dantzic--Peter preserves his

incognito--Presents--His dress--His interest in the shipping--Grand

entrance into Holland--Curiosity of the people--Peter enters Amsterdam

privately--Views of the Hollanders--Residence of the Czar--The East India

Company--Peter goes to work--His real object in pursuing this course--His

taste for mechanics--The opportunities and facilities he enjoyed--His old

workshop--Mode of preserving it--The workmen in the yard--Peter's visits

to his friends in Amsterdam--The rich merchant--Peter's manners and

character--The Hague--The embassy at the Hague

At the time when the emperor issued his orders to so many of the sons of

the nobility, requiring them to go and reside for a time in the cities of

western Europe, he formed the design of going himself to make a tour in

that part of the world, for the purpose of visiting the courts and

capitals, and seeing with his own eyes what arts and improvements were to

be found there which might be advantageously introduced into his own

dominions. In the spring of the year 1697, he thought that the time had

come for carrying this idea into effect.

The plan which he formed was not to travel openly in his own name, for he

knew that in this case a great portion of his time and attention, in the

different courts and capitals, would be wasted in the grand parades,

processions, and ceremonies with which the different sovereigns would

doubtless endeavor to honor his visit. He therefore determined to travel