with him the company of servants which the king had provided,
and also the few private friends who had been with him all the time
since leaving Moscow, he sailed from a certain port in the
south-western part of Holland, called Helvoetsluys, about the middle of
the month of January.

He arrived without any accident at London. Here he at first took up
his abode in a handsome house which the king had ordered to be provided
and furnished for him. This house was in a genteel part of the town,
where the noblemen and other persons belonging to the court resided.
It was very pleasantly situated near the river, and the grounds
pertaining to it extended down to the water side. Still it was far
away from the part of the city which was devoted to commerce and the
shipping, and Peter was not very well satisfied with it on that
account. He, however, went to it at first, and continued to occupy it
for some time.

In this house the Czar was visited by a great number of the nobility,
and he visited them in return. He also received particular attentions
from such members of the royal family as were then in London. But the
person whose society pleased him most was one of the nobility, who,
like himself, tools: a great interest in maritime affairs. This was
the Duke of Leeds. The duke kept a number of boats at the foot of his
gardens in London, and he and Peter used often to go out together in
the river, and row and sail in them.

Among other attentions which were paid to Peter by the government
during his stay in London, one was the appointment of a person to
attend upon him for the purpose of giving him, at any time, such
explanations or such information as he might desire in respect to the
various institutions of England, whether those relating to government,
to education, or to religion. The person thus appointed was Bishop
Burnet, a very distinguished dignitary of the Church. The bishop
could, of course, only converse with Peter through interpreters, but
the practice of conversing in that way was very common in those days,
and persons were specially trained and educated to translate the
language of one person to another in an easy and agreeable manner. In
this way Bishop Burnet held from time to time various interviews with
the Czar, but it seems that he did not form a very favorable opinion of
his temper and character. The bishop, in an account of these
interviews which he subsequently wrote, said that Peter was a man