CATHERINE Parr. See Parr.

C atiierine I., Empress of Russia, was the natural daughter of a country girl, and was born at Ringen, a small village upon the Lake Virtcherve, near Dorpt, in Livonia. The year of her birth is uncertain; but according to her own account she came into the world on the 5th of April 1687. Her original name was Martha, which she changed for Catherine when she embraced the Greek religion. Count Rosen, a lieutenant-colonel in the Swedish service, who owned the village of Ringen, supported, according to the custom of the country, both the mother and the child, and was for that reason supposed by many persons to have been her father. She lost her mother when she was only three years old; and as Count Rosen died about the same time, she was left in so destitute a situation that the parishclerk of the village received her into his house. Soon afterwards Gluck, Lutheran minister of Marienburg, happening, in a journey through those parts, to see the foundling, took her under his protection, brought her up in his family, and employed her in attending his children. In 1701, or about the fourteenth year of her age, she espoused a dragoon of the Swedish garrison of Marienburg. Many different accounts are given of this transaction. One author affirms that the bride and bridegroom remained together eight days after their marriage; while another asserts, that on the morning of the nuptials, her husband being sent with a detachment for Riga, the marriage was never consummated. This much is certain, that the dragoon was absent when Marienburg surrendered to the Russians, and Catherine, who was reserved for a higher destiny, never saw him more.

Upon the taking of Marienburg, General Bauer saw Catherine among the prisoners; and being smitten with her youth and beauty, took her to his house, where she superintended his domestic affairs, and was supposed to be his mistress. Soon afterwards she was received into the family of Prince Menzikof, who was no less struck with the attractions of the fair captive. With him she lived until 1704; when, in the seventeenth year of her age, she became the mistress of Peter the Great, and won so much upon his affections, that he espoused her on the 29th of May 1711. The ceremony was secretly performed at Jawerof, in Poland, in the presence of General Bruce; and on the 20th of February 1712 it was publicly solemnized with great pomp at Petersburg.

Peter expired on the morning of the 28th of January 1725. This event being made known, the senate, the generals, the principal nobility and clergy, hastened to the palace to proclaim the new sovereign. It was previously settled by Menzikof and his party that Catherine should be empress; and the guards, who surrounded the palace with drums beating and colours flying, effectually vanquished all opposition. The only circumstance, therefore, which remained, was to give a just colour to her title, by persuading the assembly that Peter intended to have named her his successor. For this purpose Menzikof demanded of that emperor’s secretary whether his late master had left any written declaration of his intentions. The secretary replied, that a little before his last journey to Moscow he had destroyed a will; that he had frequently expressed his design of making another, but had always been prevented by the reflection, that if he thought his people, whom he had raised from a state of barbarism to a considerable degree of power and glory, could be ungrateful, he would not expose his final inclinations to the insult of a refusal; and that if they recollected what they owed to his labours, they would regulate their conduct by his intentions, which he had disclosed with more solemnity than could be manifested by any writing. An altercation now began in the assembly, and some of the nobles having the courage to oppose the accession of Catherine, Theophanes, archbishop of Piescoff, called to their recollection the oath which they had all taken in 1722 to acknowledge the successor appointed by Peter; and added, that the sentiments of that emperor delivered by the secretary were in effect an appointment of Catherine. The opposite party, however, denied that those sentiments were so clear as the secretary chose to insinuate; and insisted, that as their late monarch had failed to nominate his heir, the election of the new sovereign should revert to the state. Upon this the archbishop further testified, that the evening before the coronation of the empress at Moscow, Peter had declared, in the house of an English merchant, that he should place the crown upon her head with no other view than to leave her mistress of the empire after his decease. This attestation being confirmed by many persons present, Menzikof cried out, “What need have we of any testament? A refusal to conform to the inclination of our great sovereign, thus authenticated, would be both unjust and criminal. Long live the Empress Catherine !” These words being instantaneously repeated by the greater part of those who were present, Menzikof, saluting Catherine by the title of empress, paid his first obeisance by kissing her hand; and his example was followed by the whole assembly. She next presented herself at the window to the guards and to the people, who shouted acclamations of “Long live [7:6:243]Catherine !” whilst Menzikof scattered among them handfuls of money. Thus, says a contemporary, the empress was raised to the throne by the guards, in the same manner as the Roman emperors were by the praetorian cohorts, without either the appointment of the people or of the legions.

The reign of Catherine may be considered as the reign of Menzikof; for that empress having neither inclination nor abilities to direct the helm of government, placed the most implicit confidence in a man who had been the original author of her good fortune, and the sole instrument of her elevation to the throne. During her short reign her life was exceedingly irregular; she was extremely averse to business; would frequently, when the weather was fine, pass whole nights in the open air; and was particularly intemperate in the use of tokay. These irregularities, joined to a cancer and a dropsy, hastened her end; and she expired on the 17th of May 1727, a little more than two years after her accession to the throne, and in about the fortieth year of her age.

Catherine II. Empress of Russia, whose original name was Sophia Augusta Frederica, was the daughter of Christian Augustus of Anhalt Zerbst, a small district in Upper Saxony, and was born in the castle of Zerbst on the 23d of May 1829. She was educated under the eye of her parents, along with her brother Prince Frederic Augustus, and at an early period displayed a masculine spirit. Her person was at once majestic and handsome, her complexion clear and bright, and the expression of her countenance dignified, yet tempered by a smile of beneficence. But it was early observed that under this exterior she concealed a certain austerity of disposition, and an ambition, which was even then considered as excessive, and which proved afterwards insatiable.

The Empress Elizabeth, who had pitched upon her nephew the duke of Holstein Gottorp Oldenburg as her successor, was also desirous to choose a consort for him, and the princess of Anhalt Zerbst was selected upon this occasion, when only fourteen years of age. She was chiefly indebted for this unexpected honour to the tender regard which her imperial majesty always entertained for the memory of the princess’s uncle, who had been her lover; and in an evil hour she united the fate of the prince, better known afterwards by the name of Peter III. to that of the princess of Anhalt Zerbst. In consequence of a special invitation, the future empress repaired to St Petersburg, accompanied by her mother, and being admitted into the bosom of the Greek church, the ceremonial of marriage, after some delay, took place; upon which these august personages were formally acknowledged, by her imperial majesty and the senate, as Grand Duke and Duchess of Russia.

The empress hoped that the name and pretensions of Prince Iwan would be obliterated by the issue of the grand duke; and the whole empire impatiently wished for and now expected an heir to the throne of Peter the Great. But a marriage of eight years was not productive of any issue; and strange suspicions began to be entertained. This alarmed the court; for a formidable rival, who possessed a superior claim to the throne, still existed; and although he was in bondage, yet, in a country like Russia, the interval is sometimes small between a dungeon and a throne. But the birth of a son and a daughter, soon afterwards, put an end to all apprehensions of this kind, and tended not a little to give stability to the empire.

The grand duke, who at times discovered noble and even magnanimous sentiments, had about this period formed a most unfortunate connection with Elizabeth Voron-soff, a lady of high rank, but celebrated neither for her beauty nor for her talents. He seldom saw his consort in private, and all the hours which were not occupied either by military exhibitions or the pleasures of the table were entirely devoted to his mistress.

The grand duchess, on the other hand, is said to have spent much of her time in company with a young Pole, whose history, like that of Catherine’s, has since been interwoven with the annals of Europe. This was Count Poniatowski, afterwards known as Stanislaus Augustus, king of Poland. He was the third son of a grandee of the same name, the favourite of Charles XII. of Sweden, by the Princess Ezatoryska, who boasted the possession of the noblest blood in Poland, as she traced her descent from the Jagellons, the ancient sovereigns of Lithuania. His person was of exquisite symmetry, his air was noble, his manners were agreeable, and his mind, a circumstance extremely rare, was not less graceful than his person. At this period he was in no higher station than that of a gentleman in the suite of the minister plenipotentiary from England, who had formed an intimacy with his family during a former mission at Warsaw. But being now taught to look higher, he returned to his native country, and appeared soon afterwards at Petersburg as ambassador from the king of Poland. In this new capacity he did not forget to pay his respects at the little court of Oranienbaum; and the young plenipotentiary, with a view of ingratiating himself with the grand duke, smoked, drank, and praised the king of Prussia. At length Paul Petrowitsch received the Polish minister with coolness, and he was actually forbidden to visit at the palace. This, however, it is said, did not deter him from concealing the order of the white eagle, and disguising himself as a mechanic, under which assumed character he repaired one summer evening to the gardens in the neighbourhood of the Gulf of Cronstadt; but he was discovered by his highness, who ordered him to be brought before him, and, after affecting to reprimand the captain of his guard for his disrespect to the representative of a crowned head, told him he was at liberty to depart.

From this moment the grand duchess is said to have changed both her system and her conduct. She had formerly aspired only to direct the counsels of the future emperor; she now resolved, if possible, to obtain the crown for her son, and the regency for herself. Such a task would have discouraged a common mind; for it was impossible to achieve it without prevailing on the empress to consent to dethrone her own nephew. But Bestuchef, the grand chancellor, who hated the heir apparent, joined cordially in the scheme; and Elizabeth, who had herself obtained the crown by means of a revolution, was taught to tremble for her life, in consequence of the designs of her successor, who was represented as having resolved to shorten her days by poison. An unexpected revolution in the ministry, however, put an end to these intrigues. Bestuchef was driven into exile, and Poniatowski was recalled.

A long and melancholy interval now ensued, during which the ambition of the grand duchess was rather suspended than annihilated. In the midst of the gloom which overspread her, however, she had recourse to, and soothed her anguish by means of, books; and it was in her closet that she laid the foundation of her future greatness, and rendered herself in some measure deserving of a throne. During her leisure moments she found means to gain partisans; and she acquired the favour of the soldiery, who did duty around her person, by means of her liberality and condescension. Peter, on the other hand, to the personal exertions of a common soldier added the orgies of a bacchanalian. Surrounded by his male and female favourites, he consumed whole days and nights in intoxication, and forgot that he was a prince. There were some few moments, however, when he appeared great, and even magnanimous[7:6:244]; but unhappily these were of short duration; and it was his misfortune to have a weak woman for his mistress, and an able and ambitious one for his wife.

Such was the situation of the court when Elizabeth died, on the 5th of January 1762. The grand duke now ascended the throne by the name of Peter III. The following answer to a letter from the king of Prussia, who had requested him to be on his guard against the plot which was then hatching, conveys no unfavourable opinion of his heart: “Touching the interest you express for my safety, I request you will rest contented. I am called the father of my soldiers; they prefer a male to a female government. I walk alone constantly in St Petersburg: if any mischief is meditated, it would have been effected long since; but I am a general benefactor. I repose myself on the protection of heaven; trusting to that, I have nothing to fear.”

This false security proved his ruin. Whilst his mind was occupied with plans of reform, and he aspired to rival, nay even to excel, his illustrious predecessor, whose name he had assumed, a person who had sworn fidelity to him at the altar, and who owed him allegiance by the double ties of wife and subject, was actually employed in planning a conspiracy, and organizing a revolt against him. It has been said that he intended to have shut up his consort and son in a convent. But it is known that, so far from this being the intention of Peter, he was preparing for a journey to Holstein, and had actually empowered his consort to act as regent during, his absence.

The mistakes of the emperor did not escape the penetration of his enemies. He purposed to carry his guards into Holstein, with a view to recover the possessions wrested from his ancestors. But the regiments which had hitherto done duty at the palace, and were inured to the indulgences of the capital, revolted at the idea of a foreign war; they had been accustomed to be governed by women, and they were taught to fix their eyes on the consort of the czar.

It is not the least wonderful part of her conduct, that previously to the great catastrophe now meditating, Catherine had contrived to appear abandoned by all the world. She knew how interesting a female, and more especially an empress, appeared whilst in distress; and she took care to heighten the sensibility of the public, by bursting at times into a flood of tears. This artful woman had found means to attach many persons to her destiny; it must be owned, however, that her adherents were neither so powerful nor so numerous as to afford her any well-founded hopes of success. She had gained several subalterns, and some privates, of the guards; but her principal partizans consisted of the Princess D’Aschekof, niece to the new chancellor; Prince Rozamouski, who had risen from obscurity, having been originally a peasant; Odart, an intrigue-ing Italian; and Panin, governor to the grand duke. The arrest of Passick, one of the conspirators, seemed to lead to a discovery which would have proved fatal to the malcontents; but this very circumstance induced them to declare instantly, and in the end crowned an apparently desperate attempt with complete success.

The empress, who was asleep at the castle of Peterhof, received intimation of their design by a common soldier, who soon afterwards returned with a carriage and eight horses. On the faith of this man, and accompanied only by a few peasants, a German female domestic, and a French valet-de-chambre, she arrived at eight o’clock in the morning in the capital, and stopped opposite the batracks of the regiment of Ismailof. There she addressed the soldiers in an eloquent speech, intermingled with sighs and tears, and actually found means to persuade them that she and her son had but that moment escaped from the hands of assassins, sent by the emperor to murder them. This story, by agitating the passions of the troops, had a wonderful effect on them; and they all swore, with the exception of only one regiment, to die in defence of her and the young archduke. Upon this the empress ordered a crucifix to be brought, and commanded the priests to administer a new oath of allegiance. She afterwards repaired to one of the principal churches, where she was met by the Bishop of Novogorod and the clergy, and, having returned thanks to Almighty God, ascended a balcony, and presented her son to the people. In a few hours she was again seen, dressed in the uniform of the guards, riding at the head of a numerous and well-appointed army against her husband.

On the first intelligence of the plot, Munich had repaired to his benefactor, and advised him to march directly to the capital, at the head of his German troops. “I shall precede you,” said the generous veteran, “and my dead body shall be a rampart to your sacred person.” But, on the other hand, the emissaries of the empress, bathing his hands with their hypocritical tears, deprecated resistance, magnified the danger, and invited him to repose in the inviolable fidelity of his consort. In short, on the 14th of July 1762, he was taken prisoner by the orders of his own wife, to whom he had been married fourteen years; prevailed on by the threats and intreaties of Count Panin to renounce his crown; conveyed to the castle of Robscha; and, three days afterwards, put to death. The empress, on her assumption of the crown, now rendered vacant by murder, notified the event to all the courts of Europe, under her new name of Catherine Alexiewna II. But there was still a competitor for the empire; and suspicion never slumbers near a throne. This was Prince Iwan, son of the princess of Mecklenburg, and grand nephew of Peter the Great and the empress Anna Iwanowna, who had destined him as her successor; butin consequence of a former revolution, he had been seized while yet an infant, and doomed to lead a life of captivity. During eighteen years of precarious existence, he had been shut up in the castle of Schlusselburg, and never in all that time had he breathed the open air, or beheld the sky, but once. This prince was visited by Peter HL, who, finding him in an arched room twenty feet square, determined to set him at liberty; but his generous intentions were unavailing; the youth, in consequence of his long and solitary confinement, had been deprived of his senses. In this situation the emperor determined to build a house for him, with a convenient terrace, where he might take the air daily within the fortress. Such, however, are the changes of fortune, that, in three weeks, Peter himself was precipitated from a throne, and suffered a violent death. This event was but the prelude to that of Iwan; for, as orders had been given, in case of an attempt to rescue him, that an end should be put to his life, and as a real or pretended plot had been hatched for this purpose, the motives and details of which have hitherto been involved in the most profound obscurity, the unhappy prince experienced the same fate as his generous protector.

Catherine being now firmly seated on the throne, wisely determined to divert the thoughts of the nation from the late horrid scenes, and fix them upon more agreeable objects. Having soothed Prussia, acquired a preponderance in the cabinet of Denmark, which had for some time been an absolute monarchy, and entered into a league with the popular party in Sweden, not yet bereft of its liberties; she cast her eyes on Courland, then governed by Prince Charles of Saxony, the second son of Augustus III. king of Poland, and, finding that country admirably situated for the increase of her present and the extensión of her future power, she, in 1762, expelled the lawful sovereign, and invested[7:6:245] Biron, a creatute of her own, with the ducal cap. Nor was she content with this; for the new duke, soon reduced to the most abject dependence, was prevented from resigning his precarious power, and the states assembled at Mittau were actually interdicted from nominating a successor. This, however, was only a prelude to scenes of greater importance; for she had scarcely dethroned one sovereign before she undertook to create another. Augustus IL, or, as he is called by some, Augustus III. of Poland, having died at Dresden in 1763, her imperial majesty did not let slip so favourable an opportunity for interfering in the appointment to the vacant throne, and even placing upon it one of her own dependents. Count Poniatowski, on the elevation of Catherine, had sent a friend to Petersburg to sound the disposition of the empress about his return to that capital, where he naturally hoped to participate in her power, and bask in the sunshine of the imperial smiles. But the more prudent German, who was at this very moment meditating a splendid provision for him elsewhere, prohibited the journey from political motives. Accordingly, notwithstanding the opposition of the grand chancellor Bestuclιer, and indeed of all her ministers, she determined to invest him with the ensigns of royalty. The head of the house of Brandenburg, being swayed by his hatred to Saxony and Austria; or, what is still more likely, the Prussian eagle having perhaps, even now, scented his future prey; Catherine was enabled to send into Poland 10,000 men, who, encamping on the banks of the Vistula, overawed the deliberations of the diet, assembled on the 9th of May 1764, and placed Stanislaus Augustus on the throne.

Having thus conferred the crown of Poland on an amiable and accomplished prince, who, on account of his youth, his poverty, and even his dependence on Russia, would have been excluded from that painful pre-eminence had the free suffrages of the nation been collected, and who, in consequence of the hatred of his countrymen, was still more subjected to the dominion of the empress, she began to prepare for a war against the Turks, which was accordingly declared in 1768. During this contest the Greek cross was triumphant both by sea and land.

In the mean time a dangerous insurrection broke out in the very heart of her dominions, instigated by a Cossack of the name of Pugatschef, who pretended to be Peter III. After displaying great valour and considerable talents, which had enabled him, at the head of raw and undisciplined levies, to contend against veteran troops and experienced generals, this unfortunate man was at length seized, inclosed in an iron cage, and beheaded at Moscow on the 21st of July 1775.

On the 21st of July in the preceding year, a peace had been concluded with the porte, which proved highly honourable to Russia; but it was productive of little benefit to the latter; for the liberty of navigating the Black Sea, and a free trade with all the ports of the Turkish empire, which would have afforded inestimable advantages to a civilized people, proved of but little consequence to a nation unacquainted alike with commerce and manufactures.

Accordingly, we find her imperial majesty still unsatisfied. Scarcely had four years elapsed, when, after an armed negociation, a new treaty of pacification was agreed to by the reluctant sultan, on the 21st of March 1789, by which the Crimea was declared independent; an event not calculated to allay ancient jealousies, but, on the contrary, to produce fresh dissensions, as it afforded an opening into the very heart of the Turkish empire, and a ready pretext for future interference. New claims and new concessions immediately followed. Russia insisted on establishing consuls in the three provinces of Moldavia, Wallachia, and Bessarabia; which she was accordingly permitted to do by the treaty of 1781. But mortifying as this compliance was, it produced only a short respite. The emperor Joseph was now brought upon the political stage, and the Roman and Russian eagles, after hovering over the carcass of the Turkish empire, and meditating to devour the whole, were at last content with part of the prey. The empress, as it may be readily believed, was not inattentive to her own interests; and by the treaty of Constantinople, signed on the 9th of January 1784, the entire sovereignty of the Crimea, which then received its ancient name of Taurica, the isle of Taman, and part of Cuban, were ceded to Russia.

Thus, in the fifty-eighth year of her age, and the twentyfifth of her reign, Catherine may be said to have attained the very summit of her wishes. Knowing the effect of splendour upon ignorance, she ushered in the year 1787 with a brilliant journey to Cherson. Accompanied thither at once by a court and an army, with foreign ambassadors, an emperor and a king, in her train, she intended to have assumed the high-sounding titles of Empress of the East, and Liberator of Greece. At Kiow, where she remained during three months, she was received under triumphal arches; and, having heard the petitions of the deputies from distant nations, and extended the walls of that city, she inscribed in Greek characters, on the quarter next to Constantinople, “Through this gate lies the road to Byzantium.”

Scarcely, however, had the empress, after visiting Moscow, returned to her capital, when the Porte thought proper to declare war. Her majesty, long prepared for an event which was far from being displeasing, called forth the stipulated succours of her ally the emperor; and the combined army under the Prince de Cobourg made itself master of Choczin after a siege of three months. Oczakow, after a still more obstinate resistance, was assaulted and taken by the Russians alone. Having concluded a final treaty of peace with the Turk on the 9th of January 1792, by which the river Dniester became the boundary of the two empires, and was to be navigated by both, the empress had more time to apply her mind to European politics. Part of Poland had been dismembered and partitioned during the year 1792; not only in contravention of the unalienable rights of nations, but in direct opposition to the most solemn treaties on the part of Russia, Prussia, and Austria. The revolution which took place in that ill-fated country on the 3d of May 1791, and which afforded the prospect of a happy and stable government to the remains of the republic, was the signal of its annihilation. The imperial and royal spoilers seized this opportunity to fall once more in concert on their prey, which was in no condition to resist this detestable confederacy; and they shared it at their pleasure. Another great object had for some time engaged the attention of Catherine. This was the French revolution. With a treasury nearly exhausted by the war with the Ottoman porte, which had not then terminated, and at a distance from the scene of action, the empress could not well engage in the contest; but she readily entered into the coalition, and soon afterwards subsidized the king of Sweden. She also launched forth a menacing manifesto against France, and prepared for a new war. Afterwards, at the instigation of Zuboff, she formed the design of giving effectual assistance to the confederated kings; and, as a proof of her intentions, issued orders for a squadron of men-of-war to join the English fleet, and commanded a levy of 60,000 troops. But she at the same time prosecuted a war on the frontiers of Persia, where her army, under the command of a near relation of the grand master of the artillery, had experienced [7:6:246] a most humiliating defeat; and she was now preparing to send fresh succours to his assistance.

But while the mind of Catherine was occupied with projects for the overthrow of the French republic, and the subjugation of the distant Persians, she was smitten by the hand of death. On the morning of the 9th of November she rose at her usual hour, and breakfasted, according to custom, on coffee. Some time afterwards she retired to her closet; and her long absence exciting the suspicion of her attendants, they entered the apartment and found her lying speechless. Dr Rogerson, lier physician, being sent for, treated her disease as apoplexy,, and considerable relief seemed to ensue after the application of the lancet. But the empress never entirely recovered her senses, and did not utter a single word during the remainder of her life, which was prolonged till ten o’clock in the evening of the 10th of November 1797.

Catherine was the only sovereign of Russia who ever exhibited a taste for letters. Nor was this all. She was an author herself, and did not disdain to compose little treatises for her grandchildren, whose education she superintended. She also possessed an exquisite relish for music, and brought Gabrielli and a number of singers of great note from Italy, allowing them liberal salaries, and treating them with great attention. Throughout the whole of her long reign Catherine also evinced a marked predilection for painting. In the midst of a war with the Turks she purchased pictures in Holland to the amount of 60,000 rubles, all of which were lost by the ship which carried them being wrecked on the coast of Finland. This, however, served rather to stimulate her to fresh exertions, and her agents accordingly procured whatever was to be found in Italy worthy of notice. The Houghton collection from England was also transferred, by an act of her munificence, to the shores of the Baltic; and, whilst it added to her glory, lowered this nation in the eyes of foreigners. Her conduct to learned men was truly worthy of a woman of genius. She was proud of the correspondence and friendship of Voltaire; she invited Diderot to her court, and lived with him while there in habits of the utmost familiarity; to D’Alembert she looked up as to a superior being, and endeavoured, although in vain, to induce him to fix his residence at St Petersburg. Her political character has been variously estimated; and no sovereign of modern times has attracted a greater share of censure and eulogium than Catherine. As a female she appears at times the slave of lust and the puppet of her courtiers; as a sovereign we behold her towering like an immense colossus, with one foot placed on Cherson, and another on Kamtschatka, waving her iron sceptre over the subject nations, and regulating the destiny of a large portion of mankind. The world, however, shudders at the untimely fate of Peter and of Iwan, and posterity will not easily pardon the partition of Poland and the massacres of Ismailof and of Praga.

Catherine, St, Order of, in modern history, belongs to ladies of the first quality in the Russian court. It was instituted in 1714, by Catherine, wife of Peter the Great, in memory of his signal escape from the Turks in 1711. The emblems of this order are a red cross, supported by a figure of St Catherine, and fastened to a scarlet string edged with silver, on which are inscribed the name of St Catherine, and the motto Pro fide et patria.