duke appealed to Russia, France and Prussia for aid. The emperor had
bought over Russia and France. Frederic of Prussia, though seventy-four
years of age, encouraged the duke to reject the proposal, and promised
his support. The King of Prussia issued a remonstrance against this
despotic act of Austria, which remonstrance was sent to all the courts
of Europe. Joseph, on encountering this unexpected obstacle, and finding
Europe combining against him, renounced his plan and published a
declaration that he had never intended to effect the exchange by force.
This disavowal, however, deceived no one. A confederacy was soon formed,
under the auspices of Frederic of Prussia, to check the encroachments of
the house of Austria. This Germanic League was almost the last act of
Frederic. He died August 17, 1786, after a reign of forty-seven years,
in the seventy-fifth year of his age.

The ambitious Empress of Russia, having already obtained the Crimea, was
intent upon the subversion of the Ottoman empire, that she might acquire
Constantinople as her maritime metropolis in the sunny south. Joseph was
willing to allow her to proceed unobstructed in the dismemberment of
Turkey, if she would not interfere with his plans of reform and
aggrandizement in Germany.

In January, 1787, the Empress of Russia set out on a pleasure excursion
of two thousand miles to the Crimea; perhaps the most magnificent
pleasure excursion that was ever attempted. She was accompanied by all
the court, by the French, English and Austrian ministers, and by a very
gorgeous retinue. It was mid-winter, when the imperial party, wrapped in
furs, and in large sledges richly decorated, and prepared expressly for
the journey, commenced their sleigh ride of a thousand miles. Music
greeted them all along the way; bonfires blazed on every hill; palaces,
brilliant with illuminations and profusely supplied with every luxury,
welcomed them at each stage where they stopped for refreshment or
repose. The roads were put in perfect order; and relays of fresh horses
every few miles being harnessed to the sledges, they swept like the wind
over the hills and through the valleys.

The drive of a few weeks, with many loiterings for pleasure in the
cities on the way, took them to Kief on the Dnieper. This ancient city,
the residence of the grand dukes of Russia, contained a population of
about twenty-six thousand. Here the imperial court established itself in
the ducal palaces, and