t to go twice a day to Saint-Sulpice to pray in
the chapel where he was buried. She would never see any other persons
besides those she had seen during the last moments of her husband, and
occupied herself with good works also, consuming herself thus in a few
years without a single sign of hesitation. A vehemence so equal and so
maintained is perhaps an example, great, unique, and assuredly very
respectable.

Peter I., Czar of Muscovy, has made for himself, and justly, such a great
name, in his own country, in all Europe, and in Asia, that I will not
undertake to describe so grand, so illustrious a prince--comparable to
the greatest men of antiquity--who has been the admiration of his age,
who will be that of years to come, and whom all Europe has been so much
occupied in studying. The singularity of the journey into France of so
extraordinary a prince, has appeared to me to deserve a complete
description in an unbroken narrative. It is for this reason that I place
my account of it here a little late, according to the order of time, but
with dates that will rectify this fault.

Various things relating to this monarch have been seen in their place;
his various journeys to Holland, Germany, Vienna, England, and to several
parts of the North; the object of those journeys, with some account of
his military actions, his policy, his family. It has been shown that he
wished to come into France during the time of the late King, who civilly
refused to receive him. There being no longer this obstacle, he wished
to satisfy his curiosity, and he informed the Regent through Prince
Kourakin, his ambassador at Paris, that he was going to quit the Low
Countries, and come and see the King.

There was nothing for it but to appear very pleased, although the Regent
would gladly have dispensed with this visit. The expenses to be defrayed
were great; the trouble would be not less great with a prince so powerful
and so clear-sighted, but full of whims, with a remnant of barbarous
manners, and a grand suite of people, of behaviour very different from
that common in these countries, full of caprices and of strange fashions,
and both they and their master very touchy and very positive upon what
they claimed to be due or permitted to them.

Moreover the Czar was at daggers drawn with the King of England, the
enmity between them passing all decent limits, and being the more bitter
because personal. This troubled not a little the Regent,