is servants, was neat and cleanly; nothing
about him shone but his eyes, those gray, piercing eyes with their fiery
side-glances and their now kind and now sly and subtle expression. This
ragged and untidy old man might have been taken for a beggar, had not
his dirty fingers and his faded neck-tie, whose original color was
hardly discoverable, flashed with brilliants of an unusual size, and had
not the arms emblazoned upon the door of his chair, in spite of the dust
and dirt, betrayed a noble rank. The arms were those of the Ostermann
family, and this dirty old man in the ragged cloak was Count Ostermann,
the famous Russian statesman, the son of a German preacher, who had
managed by wisdom, cunning, and intrigue to continue in place under five
successive Russian emperors or regents, most of whom had usually been
thrust from power by some bloody means. Czar Peter, who first appointed
him as a minister of state, and confided to him the department of
foreign affairs, on his death-bed said to his successor, the first
Catherine, that Ostermann was the only one who had never made a false
step, and recommended him to his wife as a prop to the empire. Catherine
appointed him imperial chancellor and tutor of Peter II.; he knew how to
secure and preserve the favor of both, and the successor of Peter II.,
the Empress Anna, was glad to retain the services of the celebrated
statesman and diplomatist who had so faithfully served her predecessors.
From Anna he came to her favorite, Baron of Courland, who did not
venture to remove one whose talents had gained for him so distinguished
a reputation, and who in any case might prove a very dangerous enemy.

But with Count Ostermann it had gone as with Count Munnich. Neither
of them had been able to obtain from the regent any thing more than a
confirmation of their offices and dignities, to which Biron, jealous
of power, had been unwilling to make any addition. Deceived in their
expectations, vexed at this frustration of their plans, they had both
come to the determination to overthrow the man who was unwilling to
advance them; they had become Biron's enemies because he did not show
himself their friend, and, openly devoted to him and bowing in the
dust before him, they had secretly repaired to his bitterest enemy,
the Duchess Anna Leopoldowna, to offer her their services against the
haughty regent who swayed the iron sceptre of his despotic power over
Russia.

A decisive conversation was