ted to organize any resistance to Peter's plans. Indeed, most of
the principal leaders had been executed or banished to Siberia. As to
Ottokesa, the first wife of the Czar, and the mother of Alexis, who was
proved to have been privy to his designs, she was sent away to a strong
castle, and shut up for the rest of her days in a dungeon. So close
was her confinement that even her food was put in to her through a hole
in the wall.

It remains only to say one word in conclusion in respect to Afrosinia.
When Alexis was first arrested, it was supposed that she, having been
the slave and companion of Alexis, was a party with him in his
treasonable designs; but in the course of the examinations it appeared
very fully that whatever of connection with the affair, or
participation in it, she may have had, was involuntary and innocent,
and the testimony which she gave was of great service in unraveling the
mystery of the whole transaction. In the end, the Czar expressed his
satisfaction with her conduct in strong terms. He gave her a full
pardon for the involuntary aid which she had rendered Alexis in
carrying out his plans. He ordered every thing which had been taken
away from her to be restored, made her presents of handsome jewelry,
and said that if she would like to be married he would give her a
handsome portion out of the royal treasury. But she promptly declined
this proposal. "I have been compelled," she said, "to yield to one
man's will by force; henceforth no other shall ever come near my side."

[1] This incident shows to what a reckless and brutal state of
desperation Alexis had been reduced by the obstinacy of his opposition
to his father, and by the harshness of his father's treatment of him.
He confessed, on another occasion, that he had often taken medicine to
produce an apparent sickness, in order to have an excuse for not
attending to duties which his father required of him.

[2] There were, in fact, a great many rumors put in circulation, and
they spread very far, and were continued in circulation a long time.
One story was that Alexis was poisoned. Another, that his father
killed him with his own hands in the prison. It was said in London
that he beat him to death with an iron chain. The extent to which
these and similar stories received currency indicates pretty clearly
what ideas prevailed in men's minds at that time in respect to the
savage ferocity of Peter's character.

CHAPTER XIX.