ONE:Owing to her brilliant success, to the affection and friendship which surrounded her wherever she went, to her absorbing interest in her art, the delightful places and society in which she spent her time, and also to her own sunny, light-hearted nature, her long life, in spite of certain serious domestic drawbacks and sorrows, was a very happy one. Her wonderful capacity for enjoyment, her appreciation of beauty in nature and art, the great interest she took in matters intellectual and political, her pleasure in the society of her numerous friends, and her ardent devotion to the religious and royalist principles of her youth, continued undiminished through the peaceful old age which terminated her brilliant career.The troops marched to Oranienbaum, the Emperor fled and proposed to abdicate and retire to Holstein with the Countess Woronsoff, but he was persuaded to go to Peterhoff in order to make arrangements, was seized by the conspirators, thrown into prison, where six days afterwards he was murdered by the Orloff, who held the supreme power in their hands. [46] Whether or not Catherine was consenting to this is not certain, though very probable. She hated Peter, by whom she had been oppressed, threatened, and ill-treated, and who had purposed to divorce her and disinherit her son.
THREE:Married or single, the five sisters were all strongly [189] attached to one another. The married ones were a great deal with their family, either at Paris or Versailles, while Pauline and Rosalie, between whom there was only a years difference, were inseparable.
THREE:She had bought a farm near Morat, which she managed herself, which paid very well, gave her the occupation she required, and supported several helpless people. Her husband, M. de Tess, grand dEspagne de premire classe, chevalier des orders, lieutenant-gnral des armes du Roi, premier cuyer de la Reine, &c., a quiet man, remarkably silent in society; M. de Mun, an old friend, whose wit and conversation she found necessary for her amusement, [241] and his son, had composed the family before the arrival of her niece; there were also three old exiled priests whom she supported by the produce of her kitchen garden.The climate of Russia Lisette became gradually accustomed to. The absence of spring and autumn, the short, hot summer, not beginning until June and ending in August, were at first very strange to her. The first May she spent there the half-melted snow was on the ground and the windows still closed up, while enormous blocks of ice came crashing down the Neva with a noise like thunder.
THREE:Had not this been sufficient to put a stop to all idea of going to France, the sights which met them as the little party entered Turin would have done so.
