New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1897-08-15


Boyd. With Portrait. Octave. PIP. X. 9O-. D.
Appleton q CO.
This book is divided into three parts. ard it is
Only in the third that NJ. Waliszewski begins
q systematic examination Of Peters work as the
founder Of modern Russia. In his preceding
pages h. is chiefly concerned with Peter the
man IL he has much to say about that rulers
suTrOur lings. it is more particularly for the
purpose Of showing the forces at work upon the
development of a great character Our authors
scheme Of proportion is peculiarly just. Peter
Is great figure in history because he made
Russia. hut Russia is great among the nations
because she gave birth to Peter: the reader may
try to think first Of the nation but he ends by
seeing in it only a portrait OF the great auto
crat. cny an image moulded into his likeness
by himself NJ Walszewsk we'll expresses this;
ind ed the value of his book lies in its lucid in
STA. Such an Interpretation must have been
difficult to keep homogeneous and natural.
Peter, for all that he speaks imperously for
the genius of his race. is all the time demand
ing just imperiOusy that the world should
REGARD him for his own sake. that it should see
IL Peter only Peter. 1t is an evidence of NJ
Walis2e" skis art that as he continues to subtly
paint The minutcst detail in the portrait of his
hero he keeps the sense of Russia, of huge
powerful unhappy but triumphant Russia. con-
stanuy in the near background.
Peter is one of the most tremendous contra
dctcns in history. Glance specifically at the
Russia Of his day. and it is as though one were
vouchsafed glimpse into hell. Near the Gar
near DEATH" ran one proverb of the seventeenth
century Yet out Of that death came life. from
that source Of unuterable misery the
impetus which set Russia among the nations
Reforms had been dreamed of if not inaugu-
rated before Peters time. it is true, and Alexis
his father, would appear to have walked near to
the brink Of enlightenment But Peter alone
had the courage to leap over the precipice, to
take that plunge into awakening which seemed
to most Of the contemporaries Of his Garlic st
years like a yeriabe plunge into the dark
Himself finished brute his reforms were bru-
tally accomplished. but reforms they undoubt-
edly were. There is. for example. his emancipa-
ton nf women from the bonds which had held
thu. uatl his time III barbarous state of sub
jccti a. lis attitude toward them personally
N"s IT, altitude of a Wild beast; lie knew
neither decency nor courtesy, and NJ Walls
2ewski tells how young ladies at the banquets
Of the Gar who in the slightest degree an
noyod him ware forced to drink a grenadeT 5
bumper Of raw brandy. Where Napoleon was
content to pinch the ear Of a lady Of his court.
Peter thought nothing of bestowing downright
blows. But in bestowing them in public he took
important step forward. Hitherto women
had lived in the "terem' exclusively. that is to
say. they were shut up in the house and never
the face Of a man. never behed their hus-
bands until their wedding night. Peter changed
all that. He made it possible for men and
women to associate on more or less equal terms,
and paved the way for a more humane mode Of
intercourse between the sexes than Russia had
ever known before. This was his way He
found his country sunk into the mry tradi-
tons of despotism that in the midst Of its
savaGory ii groaned beneath perfect cataclysm
OF really artificial laws. He loosened the bonds
everywhere. Some of them he hacked to pieces
with his sword. others he modified in the tort
ur. chamber: the poor subjects who suffered
beneath them he kicked and buffeted into free
dom. Bat freedom. of sort, they ultima tey
got Where they had merccnary and un-
tramnellcd army he gave them an instrument
Of defence and offence upon which they could
rely Where they had no vessels he gave them
a feet q navy a useful arm. Where they had
a peouiating and cruel ard haphazard admin
iStratf0l h. gave them one as dishonest and as
C,uol but much more systematic. and in that
one detail IS an indication OF what he did for
Russia. He organized it and opened It's gates
t. Western ideas. Was this not its salvation?
At the same time Peter was more liberator
than creator. Like thunderous force of
I.atur. he swept across Russia, fcrtzing her
soil bursting old rotten bikes. opening
channels, Of communication between the North
and the West, making it easier for fruitful ideas
t. come in and work their way. He organized
his country. but he did it as cowboy rounds
up" his cattle; he did not accomplish it in the
way Of the wisest rulers gently, gradually,
sympathctically. and with far-secing com