stman, No. 136.

The king had promised Peter that there should be no impediment in his
way of engaging, and taking with him to Russia, such English
artificers, and scientific men, as he might desire, with such
instruments as their trade or profession required.

The number of all descriptions of persons that finally left England,
when the Tzar returned to Holland, is stated to have been nearly as
follows:--Three captains of ships of war, twenty-five captains of
merchant ships, thirty pilots, thirty surgeons, two hundred gunners,
four mast-makers, four boat-builders, two master sail-makers and
twenty workmen, two compass-makers, two carvers, two anchor-smiths,
two lock-smiths, two copper-smiths and two tinmen; making, with some
others, not much less than five hundred persons. However uncouth the
manners of Peter may have been, he was a great favourite with King
William, and the Tzar had also a high opinion of his Majesty, whom he
visited frequently, and consulted on all important occasions. The king
engaged him to sit for his portrait to Sir Godfrey Kneller, who
painted a very good picture, said to be a strong likeness, which is
now at Windsor, and the portrait at the head of this volume is
engraved from it.

(The reader will recollect Peter at Zaandam. In after-life he visited
this place,) and the little cottage in which some nineteen years
before he had dwelt, when learning the art of ship-building: he found
it kept up in neat order, and dignified with the name of the _Prince's
House_. This little cottage is still carefully preserved. It is
surrounded by a neat building with large arched windows, having the
appearance of a conservatory or green-house, which was erected in 1823
by order of the present Princess of Orange, sister to the late Emperor
Alexander, who purchased it to secure its preservation. In the first
room you still see the little oak table and three chairs which
constituted its furniture when Peter occupied it. Over the
chimney-piece is inscribed

PETRO MAGNO
ALEXANDER,

and in the Russian and Dutch,

"_To a Great Man nothing is little._"

The ladder to the loft still remains, and in the second little room
below are some models and several of his working-tools. Thousands of
names are scribbled over every part of this once humble residence of
Peter the Great.

On entering this cottage, Peter is said to have been evidently
affected. Recovering himself, he ascended the loft, where was