The Princess Tarakanova: A Dark Chapter of Russian History

_Gregory Petrovitch Danilevski was born at Danilovki, an estate in the government of Kharkov, on April 14th, 1829. He died last winter at St. Petersburg, on December 6th. His ch...

A storm has been raging for already three days. We have been so tossed about that it has been impossible to write. Our frigate, the _Northern Eagle_, is not far from Gibraltar....

At first I was kept shut up in one of the wings of a seven-towered castle, but afterwards I was chained and confined in one of the three hundred mecheti (mosques) of Stamboul. I...

My grandmother was not less struck by this than I. One day, about a week later, calling me to her, she said: “You have guessed who your rival is? One distantly related to the Ra...

A dark, handsome, spirited Frenchman, the commanding officer of the schooner, soon showed me that he was a worthy subject of the nation to which he belonged. Seeing in me a Russ...

“I know that you have highly distinguished yourself. Your name made a noise in the world after Chesma,” she continued; “and to crown all, you have suffered a long imprisonment.”

“Well now, you see, should the Empress Ekaterina be willing to act conscientiously and without strife peacefully to divide the empire with me,”--the Princess uttered this very s...

“What does it all mean? Who is she? What is she? A pretender, or a Russian grand duchess?” thought I, as, full of contending thoughts, I left the room of the Princess, and with...

I landed at Ancona. From there I started for Bologna, which I had heard the commander had chosen for his headquarters. The Count Alexis Orloff, although the hero of Chesma, hate...

The words of the count filled me with astonishment. Involuntarily I remembered then the intelligence the Princess had given me of the fallen favours of the Orloffs, of the exile...

“Is it possible the count can be a traitor?” The thought flew like lightning through my brain. Impossible. Celebrated patriot, celebrated hero of the _Coup d’État_,[29] right ha...

It was the 12th of February. The day was very cold and northern-like, but withal very bright. The Princess, her suite and servants, took their seats in several carriages. At the...

The exhausted commander sleeps soundly. Only the sentinels and I are on watch. I shall begin now to relate the saddest experience of all my life. This experience is the principa...

The 22nd of February was lovely, almost like summer in its warmth, not a cloud in the skies, the sea calm as a mirror, a holiday feeling in the air. The English consul had invit...

I glanced round. Captain Litvenoff addressed himself by turn to all the adjutants and others in the count’s retinue, demanding their swords. The deck was covered with armed sail...

I fell down on the shore. Oh! my God! what anguish! Tears blinded me. Sobs stifled me. I hated, I cursed the whole world. “How,” thought I, “could such a dastardly, godless deed...

Several wretched, unbearable days passed. Livorno really rose, and began to threaten us with an open attack. The indignant populace by night and by day surrounded the palace of...

The Empress Ekaterina spent the summer of 1775 in the _alentours_ of Moscow, honouring with her presence the village of Kolomensk, and then that of Chërnaya-griaz, which she had...

The fresh and clear atmosphere of the Muscovite environs began to be foggy. Clouds were gathering, lightning darting, thunder rolling. The Court also had its storms. Ekaterina h...

“How is this?” she reasoned. “I have conquered Turkey; Pougachoff has been caught, has acknowledged his imposture, and been publicly executed; … and that miserable, puny woman,...

“Very well,” said the empress; “let the dead rest in peace; we will talk about the living. I think General Potemkin has sent you the examination, and the evidence taken in respe...

Worn out with her long sea voyage and imprisonment, the captive dragged on a miserable existence in the fortress. An acute fever, a sharp cough, accompanied by frequent hemorrha...

The words seemed to burst from her throat, and die upon her lips. She threw herself back on the bed to the farthest side of the wall, where with flaming eyes she looked ready to...

The peace with Turkey was publicly celebrated at Moscow on July 13th. Galitzin was not forgotten, and, for having cleared Moldavia of the Turks, received from Petersburg a rich...

Meanwhile, the position of the Princess Tarakanova had remained the same. During the celebration of the peace with Turkey, in Moscow, she had been forgotten. However, when all h...

In the autumn of 1775 he was expecting from Tchernigoff, his niece and god-daughter Vâra. She had written to her uncle, that she would arrive in Petersburg with a companion, a y...

Father Peter retired to his chamber, drew the curtains, put the candle on the night-table, threw himself without undressing on the bed, unrolled the crumpled manuscript of blue...

The evening of the 1st of December, 1775, was particularly wet and windy. The snow which had fallen in the morning was now all melted; there were pools of water everywhere; the...

The carriage stopped at the house of the Commander-in-Chief Galitzin. The prince was informed of the arrival of the priest, and ordered him to be brought to his bedroom, where h...

The priest carefully put the chalice on the table, drew a chair near the bed, passed his fingers through his bushy hair, and glancing at the image over the head of the sick girl...

Father Peter returned home in a very agitated frame of mind. “Is she a usurper?” thought he. “Of course, man will stick to anything in his own interests. But dying--almost with...

“Oh! I myself have sinned against her in my reports,” thought Galitzin, on his way to the fortress. “I fell under the influence of others, hastened on everything without judgmen...

Five years passed by, and in May, 1780, Rakitina was again in Petersburg. Her friend Vâra was already married and in Moscow. Father Peter was, as before, priest of the Cathedral...

There was still no news. It was the beginning of the year 1781. With the retirement of Prince Gregory Orloff, and the fallen fortunes of the tutor of the Tzarevitch, Pânin, the...

“The apparition disappeared at my approach. I was just leaving at that time your banker, Sutherland. You did not notice me, but I saw you both, and I involuntarily startled the...

Fifteen years had passed away; the year 1796 was drawing to its end. It was in the beginning of the reign of Pavel I. All Petersburg was hailing joyfully the liberation of the c...