Catherine’s troubles with Saltykov and offensive against the
Shuvalovs; she sees her son a third time; Peter’s Holstein troops at
Oranienbaum; Catherine’s gardener predicts her great future; the
arrival of Sir Charles Hanbury-Williams and Count
Poniatowski, who courts her; Catherine’s pregnancy;
a secret night out with friends
Thus began the year 1755. From Christmas to Lent there were nothing but celebrations at the court and in the city. The birth of my son continued to be the occasion. By turns everyone vied with everyone else to give the most beautiful dinners, balls, masquerades, illuminations, and fireworks possible. I attended none of these, under pretext of illness. Toward the end of carnival Sergei Saltykov returned from Sweden. During Saltykov’s absence, all his news and the dispatches from Count Panin, at the time the Russian envoy to Sweden, were sent to me by Grand Chancellor Count Bestuzhev through Madame Vladislavova, who received them from her son-in-law, the Grand Chancellor’s head clerk, and I sent them back by the same channel. I also learned by this same channel that as soon as Sergei Saltykov returned, it had been decided to send him to Hamburg as the Russian minister to replace Prince Alexander Golitsyn, who was being sent to the army. This new arrangement did not diminish my sorrow. When Sergei Saltykov had returned, he sent Lev Naryshkin to tell me that I should indicate, if I could, a way for him to see me. I spoke about this to Madame Vladislavova, who consented to this interview. He was supposed to go to her residence and from there to mine. I waited for him until three in the morning, but he did not come. I was in mortal agony over what could have kept him from coming. I learned the following day that he had been dragged by Count Roman Vorontsov to a meeting of Freemasons. He claimed that he had not been able to get away without causing suspicion. But I questioned and probed Lev Naryshkin so much that I saw clear as day that he had failed to come due to a lack of enthusiasm and consideration for me, without any regard for what I had suffered for so long solely out of affection for him. Lev Naryshkin himself, although his friend, found little or no excuse for him. In truth, I was very angry. I wrote him a letter in which I complained bitterly about his conduct. He replied and came to my residence. It was not hard for him to appease me, because I was very willing to be appeased. He persuaded me to appear in public.
I followed his advice and I appeared on February 10, the Grand Duke’s birthday and Shrovetide.111 For this day I had made a superb outfit of blue velvet embroidered in gold. As I had had much time for reflection in my solitude, I resolved to make those who had caused me so many sorrows understand that they were answerable to me, that no one mistreated me with impunity, and that cruel conduct would not gain my affection or approbation. Consequently I never failed to show the Shuvalovs how they had disposed me in their favor. I treated them with bitter scorn, I made others aware of their nastiness, their stupidity, I ridiculed them, and everywhere I could, I always had some barb to throw at them, which would then race through the city, and provide malicious amusement at their expense. In a word, I avenged myself on them in every manner I could devise. In their presence I never failed to praise those whom they disliked. As there were a great many people who hated them, I did not lack for loyal allies. The Counts Razumovsky, whom I had always loved, were more flattered than ever. I redoubled my compliments and politeness toward everyone except the Shuvalovs. In a word, I drew myself up and walked with my head high, more like the leader of a very large faction than a humiliated or oppressed person. The Shuvalovs never knew on which foot to dance. They huddled together and resorted to courtiers’ ruses and intrigues.
During this time a gentleman from Holstein, Monsieur Brockdorff, who had once before tried to enter the country, appeared in Russia, having previously been turned back at the Russian border by the Grand Duke’s advisers at the time, Brümmer and Bergholz, because they knew him to be a man of very bad character and given to intrigue.112 This man appeared at exactly the right moment for the Shuvalovs. As a duke of Holstein with a chamberlain’s key from the Grand Duke, he had access to the residence of His Imperial Highness, who in any case was favorably disposed to every clod who came from that country. This man found his way into Count Peter Shuvalov’s entourage, and here is how. In the inn where he lodged, he met a man who only left the inns of Petersburg to go to the home of three rather pretty German girls named Reiffenstein. One of these girls enjoyed the support of Count Peter Shuvalov. The man in question was called Braun. He was some kind of shady dealer in all manner of things. He brought Brockdorff to the girls’ home, where he met Count Peter Shuvalov. Shuvalov made solemn declarations of devotion to the Grand Duke and eventually got around to complaining about me. At the first opportunity Monsieur Brockdorff reported all this to the Grand Duke, who was urged to bring his wife back to her senses, so to speak.
To this end, one day after we had had lunch, His Imperial Highness came into my room and told me that I was becoming intolerably haughty and that he knew how to bring me back to my senses. I asked him what he meant by haughty. He told me that I held myself very erect. I asked him if to please him, one had to keep one’s back bent like some great master’s slave. He grew angry and told me that he well knew how to bring me back to my senses. And I asked him, how? At this he put his back against the wall and drew his sword halfway out and showed it to me. I asked if this meant he wished to fight me. In that case, I would need one too. He put his half-drawn sword back into its scabbard and told me that I had become dreadfully nasty. I asked him, “In what way?” He stammered, “Well, with the Shuvalovs.” I replied that this was only recrimination and that he would do well not to speak of what he did not know or understand. He continued, “You see what happens when you do not trust your true friends—you regret it. If you had trusted me, you would have benefited.” I said to him, “But trust you how?” Then he began to say things that were so extravagant and nonsensical that I, seeing that he talked nonsense pure and simple, let him speak without responding and exploited what seemed to me an auspicious pause to advise him to go to bed because I saw clearly that wine had addled his reason and completely stupefied any common sense. He followed my advice and went to bed. At that time he was already beginning to smell almost continually of wine mixed with smoking tobacco, which was literally intolerable for those who went near him.
That same evening, while I was playing cards, Count Alexander Shuvalov came to convey from the Empress that she had forbidden the ladies to include in their finery many kinds of ribbon and lace as specified in the decree. To show him how His Imperial Highness had chastened me, I laughed in his face and told him he could have dispensed with notifying me of this decree because I never wore any ribbons or lace that displeased Her Imperial Majesty, that besides, I did not make beauty or finery the source of my merit, for when one was gone, the other became ridiculous, and only character endured. He listened to the end, twitching his right eye as was his habit, and left with his usual grimace. I pointed this out to those who were playing with me by imitating him, which made the group laugh.
Some days later the Grand Duke told me that he wanted to ask the Empress for money for his dealings in Holstein, which continued to get worse and worse, and that Brockdorff advised him to do this. I saw clearly that this was bait set for him by the Shuvalovs to raise his hopes. I said to him, “Is there no other way to handle this?” He replied that he would show me what the Holsteiners were reporting to him about the situation. This he in fact did, and after seeing the documents he showed me, I told him that it seemed to me that he could manage without begging for money from Madame his aunt, who had given him one hundred thousand rubles less than six months before and might again refuse him, but he held to his position and I to mine. It is certain that for a long time he was made to hope he would get it and he received nothing.
After Easter we went to Oranienbaum.113 Before we left, the Empress allowed me to see my son for the third time since his birth. I had to pass through all of Her Imperial Majesty’s apartments to arrive at his bedroom. I found him suffocating from the heat, as I have already recounted. Upon arriving at the Oranienbaum estate, we saw something extraordinary. His Imperial Highness’s Holstein retinue continually preached to him about the deficit, and he was told by everyone to cut down this useless retinue, which in any case he could see only furtively and in small groups. He suddenly decided and made so bold as to have an entire detachment of Holstein troops come. This was again a scheme of that miserable Brockdorff, who pandered to this Prince’s dominant passion. He had made it known to the Shuvalovs that in granting their tacit approval to the Grand Duke for this plaything or bauble, they would assure themselves of his favor forever, that they would keep him occupied and would be sure of his approval for everything else that they would undertake. The Empress detested Holstein and everything that came from it, and had seen that such military playthings had undone the Grand Duke’s father, Duke Karl Friedrich, in the eyes of Peter I and of the Russian public.114 It seems that at first the affair was kept hidden from her or that she was told it was a minor matter that was not worth discussing, and besides, Count Alexander Shuvalov’s presence alone was enough to keep things from getting out of hand. Sailing from Kiel, the detachment landed at Kronstadt and came to Oranienbaum. The Grand Duke, who during the time of Choglokov had worn the Holstein uniform only in his room and somewhat furtively, was already wearing this uniform every day but court days, though he was a lieutenant colonel in the Preobrazhensky regiment and in addition had a regiment of cuirassiers in Russia. On Monsieur Brockdorff ’s advice, the Grand Duke kept the transport of these troops completely hidden from me. I admit that when I learned of it, I shuddered at the terrible impression that the Grand Duke’s action would make on the Russian public, and indeed, on the mind of the Empress, since I was not at all unaware of her sentiments. Monsieur Alexander Shuvalov watched this detachment pass the balcony of Oranienbaum twitching his eye; I was next to him. Personally he disapproved of what he and his relatives had agreed to tolerate. The Oranienbaum castle was guarded alternately by the Ingerman regiments and that of Astrakhan. I learned that when they saw the Holstein soldiers pass by, they had said, “These cursed Germans have all been sold to the King of Prussia. A troop of traitors has been brought to Russia.” In general the public was shocked by their arrival. The most devoted subjects shrugged their shoulders, the most moderate found the affair ridiculous. Basically it was a very imprudent bit of childishness. For my part, I held my tongue, and when it was mentioned to me, I clearly implied that I did not at all approve, that in fact no matter how I looked at it, I regarded it as thoroughly harmful to the Grand Duke’s well-being, for what other opinion could one have after examining the matter? His pleasure alone could never compensate for the harm that this would do him in public opinion. But His Imperial Highness, full of enthusiasm for his troops, went to lodge with them in the camp he had had set up and did nothing but drill them thereafter. They had to be fed, and no one had even thought of this. However, the matter was pressing and there were a few arguments with the Marshal of the Court, who was not prepared to meet the request. Finally he gave in, and court lackeys along with castle guards from the Ingerman regiment were employed to carry food from the palace kitchen to the camp for the new arrivals. This camp was not very close to the household, and nothing was given to either the lackeys or the soldiers for their trouble. One can imagine the fine impression that such a wise and prudent arrangement must have made. The soldiers of the Ingerman regiment said, “Here we are, the valets of these cursed Germans.” The court servants said, “We are employed to serve a bunch of worthless peasants.” When I saw and learned of what was happening, I very firmly resolved to keep myself as far away as I could from this dangerous child’s game. The gentlemen of our court who were married had their wives with them. This made for a rather large group, and the gentlemen had nothing to do with the Holstein camp, from which His Imperial Highness no longer budged. As I was therefore amid this group of people from the court, I would go for walks with them as often as I could but always in a direction away from the camp, to which we gave a wide berth.
At the time, I took it into my head to make a garden at Oranienbaum, and since I knew that the Grand Duke would not give me an inch of land for this, I asked Princess Golitsyna to sell or give me a piece of uncultivated land, two hundred yards in length and long abandoned, which they owned, right next to Oranienbaum. This land belonged to eight or ten people in their family, and they gave it to me willingly, asking nothing to boot. I thus began to draw up plans for building and planting, and as this was my first foray into plants and buildings, it became an enormous project. I had an old French surgeon named Guyon, who, seeing this, said, “What good is all this? Remember what I say. I predict that one day you will abandon this project.” His prediction came true, but at the time, I needed an amusement, and this was one that exercised the imagination. At first, I employed the gardener of Oranienbaum, Lamberti, to plant my garden. He had served the Empress when she was still a Princess on her estate of Tsarskoe Selo, from which she had him moved to Oranienbaum. He dabbled in predictions, and among others, one about the Empress had come true. He had predicted to her that she would ascend to the throne. This same man said to me and repeated as often as I wished that I would become Sovereign Empress of Russia, that I would see sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons, and I would die at a grand old age of more than eighty. He did more. He set the year of my ascension to the throne six years before it occurred. He was a very curious man who spoke with an assurance that nothing could deter. He claimed that the Empress wished him ill because he had predicted what had happened to her and that she had sent him from Tsarskoe Selo to Oranienbaum because she feared him, with no throne anymore to promise her.
I believe that on Pentecost we were taken from Oranienbaum to the city. It was around this time that the Ambassador from England, Sir Williams, came to Russia. In his entourage he had Count Poniatowski, the son of the Poniatowski who had belonged to the faction of Charles XII, King of Sweden.115 After a short stay in the city, we returned to Oranienbaum, where the Empress ordered the celebration of the Feast of St. Peter. She did not come herself, because she did not want to celebrate my son Paul’s first name day, which falls on the same day. She stayed at Peterhof. There she sat herself at a window, where apparently she remained all day, because all those who came to Oranienbaum said that they had seen her at this window. A great many people came. We danced in the salon at the entrance to my garden and then we had supper. The ambassadors and foreign ministers came. I remember that the Ambassador from England, Sir Hanbury-Williams, was my neighbor at supper and that we had a conversation as pleasant as it was merry. As he had great wit and knowledge and was familiar with all of Europe, it was not difficult to have a conversation with him. Later I learned that at this supper he had been as amused as I and that he spoke of me with praise, which I always elicited from those minds or wits that squared with mine, and at that time I had fewer people who were envious of me, so I was generally spoken of with a fair amount of praise. I was known for having intelligence, and many people who knew me more intimately honored me with their confidences, trusted me, and asked me for advice and benefited from what I told them. The Grand Duke had long been calling me Madame Resourceful, and however upset or sulky he was toward me, if he found himself in any distress, he ran as fast as he could, as was his habit, to my apartment to get my opinion, and as soon as he had got it, he ran away again as fast as his legs could carry him.
I still recall that at this celebration of the Feast of St. Peter at Oranienbaum, while watching Count Poniatowski dance, I spoke with Sir Williams about the Count’s father and about the harm that he had done to Peter I. The English Ambassador told me many good things about the son and confirmed what I knew, to wit, that at the time, his father and his mother’s family, the Czartoryskis, made up the Russian faction in Poland and that they had sent this son to Russia and had entrusted him to the English Ambassador so as to nourish in him the parents’ sentiments for Russia, and that he hoped that this young man would succeed in Russia. He might have been twenty-two or twenty-three at the time. I replied that in general I thought that for foreigners Russia was like a touchstone for their merit and that he who succeeded in Russia could be sure of succeeding in all of Europe. I have always considered this observation infallible because nowhere are people more skillful than in Russia at noticing the weakness, ridiculousness, or faults of a foreigner. One can be assured that nothing will get past a Russian, because every Russian naturally, viscerally, dislikes all foreigners. Around this time I learned that Sergei Saltykov’s conduct had been as indiscreet in Sweden as in Dresden, and in addition, in both countries he had wooed every woman whom he had met. At first I did not want to believe any of it, but in the end I heard it repeated from so many sides that even his friends could not exculpate him.
During this year I formed a closer friendship than ever with Anna Nikitichna Naryshkina. Lev, her brother-in-law, contributed greatly to this. He was almost always with us, and his antics were endless. At times he would say, “To the one who behaves the best, I promise a jewel for which you will thank me.” We let him talk and were not even curious to ask him what this jewel was. In autumn, the Holstein troops were sent back to sea, and we returned to the city and went to reside in the Summer Palace. During this time, Lev Naryshkin fell ill with a severe fever during which he wrote me letters that I saw clearly were not by him. I replied to him. In his letters he asked me at times for sweetmeats, at other times for similar trifles, and then thanked me for them. These letters were perfectly well written and quite pleasant; he said that he employed his secretary to write them. Finally I learned that this secretary was Count Poniatowski, that he had become intimate with the house of Naryshkin, and that he did not budge from their residence.
At the beginning of winter we were moved from the Summer Palace to the new Winter Palace that the Empress had built from wood on the site where the Chicherins’ house presently stands.116 This palace occupied the entire neighborhood up to the house of Countess Matiushkina, which at the time belonged to Naumov. My windows were opposite this house, which was occupied by the maidens of the court. Upon arriving there, I was quite struck by the height and size of the apartments that were assigned to us. Four large antechambers and two rooms with an alcove had been prepared for me and the same for the Grand Duke. My apartment was rather well situated, so that I did not have to bear the proximity of those of the Grand Duke. This was a great advantage. Count Alexander Shuvalov noticed my contentment and immediately went to tell the Empress that I had greatly praised the beauty, the size, and the number of the rooms that had been assigned to me. He later told me this with a kind of satisfaction, accented by his twitching eye and accompanied by a smile.
During this period and for a long time thereafter, the Grand Duke’s principal toy in the city was an excessive number of little toy soldiers made of wood, lead, papier-mâché, and wax, which he arranged on very narrow tables that occupied an entire room. One could barely move between these tables. He had nailed thin strips of brass along the length of these tables. Strings were attached to these brass bands, and when one pulled them, the brass strips made a noise that according to him imitated the running fire of rifles. With great frequency, he celebrated court ceremonies by making these troops shoot their rifles. In addition, every day the guard was changed, which meant that the figures who were supposed to mount the guard were taken from each table. The Grand Duke attended this parade in uniform with boots, spurs, high collar, and scarf, and those servants admitted to this lovely exercise were obliged to dress in the same manner.
Toward winter that year I believed that I was pregnant again; I was bled. I had, or rather thought I had, gumboils under both my cheeks, but after suffering for a few days, four wisdom teeth appeared in the four corners of my mouth. As our apartments were very spacious, the Grand Duke instituted a weekly ball on Thursdays and concerts on Tuesdays. The only ones who came to these were our maids of honor and the gentlemen of our court, with their wives. These balls could be interesting depending on the people who came to them. I very much liked the Naryshkins, who were more sociable than others. I include in their number Mesdames Seniavina and Izmailova, sisters of the Naryshkins, and the wife of the elder brother, whom I have already mentioned. Lev Naryshkin, always crazier than before and regarded by everyone as a man of no importance, which indeed he was, had gotten into the habit of running continually from the Grand Duke’s room to mine without stopping anywhere for long. When entering my room he had the habit of meowing like a cat in front of my door, and when I replied, he would enter.
On December 17, between six and seven in the evening, he announced himself in this way at my door. I told him to enter. He began by giving me regards from his sister-in-law, telling me that she was not doing very well, and then he said, “But you should go see her.” I said, “I would do so willingly, but you know that I cannot go out without permission and that I will never be permitted to go to her house.” He replied, “I will take you there.” I retorted, “Have you lost your mind? What do you mean, go with you? You will be put in the fortress, and God knows what trouble I will be in.” “Oh,” he said, “no one will know about it. We will take our precautions.” “How’s that?” Then he said, “I will come to get you an hour or two from now. The Grand Duke will be eating supper” (for a long while I had been keeping to my room under the pretext of not wanting supper), “he will be at table for a good part of the night, will only leave very drunk, and will go to bed.” Since my confinement, he had been sleeping in his room most of the time. “To be on the safe side, dress as a man and we will go to Anna Nikitichna’s together.” The adventure was beginning to tempt me. I was always alone in my room with my books and without any company. Finally, after debating with him this plan, which was itself mad and which had seemed so to me from the first, I began to find it plausible and agreed so as to give myself a moment of amusement and pleasure. He left. I called for a Kalmuck hairdresser who was in my service and told him to bring me one of my men’s outfits and everything that went with it because I needed to make a present of it to someone. This boy never opened his mouth, and it was more difficult to make him talk than it is to make others be quiet. He promptly carried out my commission and brought me everything I needed. I pretended to have a headache and went to bed earlier than usual. As soon as Madame Vladislavova had put me to bed and withdrawn, I got up and dressed from head to toe in the man’s outfit. I arranged my hair as best I could. I had been doing this for a long time and was not clumsy at it. At the appointed time Lev Naryshkin came through the Grand Duke’s apartment and meowed at my door, which I opened for him. We passed through a little antechamber into the vestibule and got into a carriage without anyone seeing us, laughing like fools at our escapade. Lev was living with his brother and sister-in-law in the same house, which was also occupied by their mother. When we arrived, Anna Nikitichna, who suspected nothing, was there. We found Count Poniatowski there too. Lev introduced me as one of his friends and asked them to receive me well, and the evening passed in the merriest manner one can imagine. After visiting for an hour and a half, I left, and returned to the palace the happiest person in the world without meeting a living soul. At the morning court and the evening ball on the following day, the Empress’s birthday, none of us who shared the secret could look at one another without bursting with laughter at the previous day’s madness. A few days later Lev proposed a second visit that would take place in my residence, and as before he escorted his group into my room so that no one caught wind of this.