n the
circumnavigation of the globe. The scientific expedition to China was
escorted by a corps of eight hundred and ten chosen men, led by one
hundred and seven distinguished officers. The _savans_ were provided
with every thing which could be thought of to promote their comfort
and to aid them in their explorations, and three years were alloted as
the probable term of service required by the mission. At the same time
a naval expedition was fitted out to explore the northern seas, and
ascertain the limits of the Russian empire. But the greatest work of
Catharine's reign was the completion of the canal which united the
waters of the Volga and the Neva, and thus established an inland
navigation through all the countries which lie between the Caspian Sea
and the Baltic.

In the year 1786 the empress announced her intention of making a
magnificent journey to the Crimea, in order to be crowned sovereign of
her new conquests. This design was to be executed in the highest style
of oriental pomp, as the empress was resolved to extend her sway over
all the nations of the Tartars. But the Tartars of those unmeasured
realms, informed of the contemplated movement, were alarmed, and
immediately combined their energies for a determined resistance. The
Grand Seignior was also goaded to the most desperate exertions, for
the empress had formed the design, and the report was universally
promulgated, of placing her second grandchild, Constantine, on the
throne of Constantinople.

The empress set out on her triumphal journey to the Crimea, on the
18th of January, 1787, accompanied by a magnificent suite. The
sledges, large, commodious and so lined with furs as to furnish
luxurious couches for repose, traveled night and day. Relays of
horses were collected at all the stations and immense bonfires blazed
at night all along the road. Twenty-one days were occupied in the
journey to Kief, where the empress was met by all the nobles of that
portion of the empire. Here fifty magnificent galleys, upon the ice of
the Dnieper, awaited the arrival of the empress and the opening of the
river. On the 6th of May the ice was gone, the barges were afloat, and
the empress with her suite embarked. The King of Poland, who had now
assumed his old name of Count Poniatowski, here met, in the barge of
the empress, his rival, Stanislaus Augustus.

The passage down the river, in this lovely month of spring, was like a
fairy scene. The banks of the Dnieper wer