Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1877-08-01
nemanees I'D .he nemanon..

kOhnouces OF the AOheAOu
New York Tribune.l
During one of his campaign
against Charles XII, the soldiers o
Peter the Great captured the town
of Marienburg after a short defencI
by the garrison. Among the pri
soners Of war was q Livonian peas
ant girl, seventeen years old, grace
full rather than pretty. She wa
weeping bitterly, for the soldier
whom she had married only the da,
before had persisted in the battle.
This young girl became the En-.
press of Russia. She could neither
read nor write, but her temper was
so smooth that she could control
the most ungoyernable of rulers.
even in those bursts of passion
which made him almost Il mailman.
he followed him TO his camp, and
shared with him the dangers of war.
When his army was starving on the
banks of the Pruth, and disaster
was staring him in the face, she
brought salvation to the camp by
bribing the Turkish commander
with her Jewels. Not long after
ward the Emperor went to Berlin,
accompanied by his peasant wife,
and the ladies of the Prussian court
said that her clothes were so be-
decked with silver tinsel that she
must have bought them in a doll
shop. She wore few Jewels, but was
decorated with portraits of saints
and relics, which made a great clat-
ter when she walked. "a painted
actress, pious but coarse" was the
verdict Of the princesses. But the
Car was not ashamed of her. She
had saved his camp.
After Peter the Great came those
warrior queens, Ann and Catherine,
who nearly drove the Turks ont of
Europe. they did not themselves
lead their armies, but their COM
manders, Munich, Romanzof,
Potemkin and Suwarrow, felt the
pressure of an iron handed mistress
at st. Petersburg. The discipline
which Munich enforced in the
army was as unreasonable and hard
hearted as the caprice Of the En-
press. When the hospitals were
full, he issued an order prohibiting
any soldier to be sick under penalty
of beng burned alive; and when
his troops were unwilling to storm
a town he turned his own batteries
upon them and forced them to adj
vance. "You will take Ismail, cost
what it may" were the orders
which SuwarrOw received, and thir-
ty thousand Turks persisted in the
siege and massacre before the dis
patch was sent to Catherine, "Moth-
er, Ismail is at your feet" The
determination of the Semiramis Of
the north was as inviucible as the
courage of Suwarrow. The wives
of Alexander and Nicholas were
gentler souls. When Alexander
was heir to the throne, he went
from court in quest of a wife. The
Grand Duke Louis of Hesse-D Darn
stadt had several daughters, but
only one of them pleased the Rus
sian Prince. While her sisters
were arrayed in jewels and silks,
the youngest sat apart in o simple
white dress. 1t was Marie Alexan-
drovna, the present Empress of.
Russia. She has always been in
hearty accord with the Cars policy
toward his people, and her place is
by his side at the Cabinet if not in
camp. She may not have the gen
ius for a jewel bargain which the
wife Of Peter the Great displayed
on the banks of the Pruth, but she
can at least play the part of Cor
nelia, and point to her jewels in the
camp-iiye sons fighting under the
Greek cross.