their forces
by sea and land; but, notwithstanding the repeated instances of the earl
of Stair, they resolved to adhere to their neutrality; they dreaded the
neighbourhood of the French; and they were far from being pleased to see
the English get footing in the Netherlands. The friends of the house
of Orange began to exert themselves; the states of Groningen and West
Friesland protested, in favour of the prince, against the promotion
of foreign generals which had lately been made; but his interest was
powerfully opposed by the provinces of Zealand and Holland, which had
the greatest weight in the republic. The revolution in Russia did not
put an end to the war with Sweden. These two powers had agreed to an
armistice of three months, during which the czarina augmented her forces
in Finland.

She likewise ordered the counts Osterman and Munich, with their
adherents, to be tried; they were condemned to death, but pardoned on
the scaffold, and sent in exile to Siberia. The Swedes, still
encouraged by the intrigues of France, refused to listen to any terms
of accommodation, unless Carelia, and the other conquests of the czar
Peter, should be restored. The French court had expected to bring over
the new empress to their measures; but they found her as well disposed
as her predecessor to assist the house of Austria. She remitted a
considerable sum of money to the queen of Hungary; and at the same time
congratulated the elector of Bavaria on his elevation to the Imperial
throne. The ceremony of her coronation was performed in May, with great
solemnity, at Moscow; and in November she declared her nephew, the duke
of Holstein-Gottorp, her successor, by the title of grand prince of all
the Russias. The cessation of arms being expired, general Lasci reduced
Fredericksheim, and obliged the Swedish army, commanded by count
Lewenhaupt, to retire before him, from one place to another, until at
length they were quite surrounded near Helsingsors. In this emergency
the Swedish general submitted to a capitulation, by which his infantry
were transported by sea to Sweden; his cavalry marched by land to Abo;
and his artillery and magazines remained in the hands of the Russians.
The king of Sweden being of an advanced age, the diet assembled in order
to settle the succession; and the duke of Holstein-Gottorp, as grandson
to the eldest sister of Charles XII., was declared next heir to the
crown. A courier was immediately despatched to Moscow,