Of the heads that dropped by orders of Elizabeth it is needless to speak; but of one that was spared there is an interesting account.  Ostermann, a German, had been vice chancellor to the Empress Anna, and had also brought about the downfall of Biron the Regent.  Now his turn had come.  He was taken to the place of execution with the rest; his gray head was laid upon the block, his collar unbuttoned and gown drawn back by the executioner—­when a reprieve was announced.  Her Gracious Majesty was going to permit him to go to Siberia.  He arose, bowed, said:  “I pray you give me back my wig,” calmly put it on the head he had not lost, buttoned his shirt, replaced his gown, and started to join his company of friends—­and of enemies—­in exile.

Elizabeth was a vain voluptuary.  If any glory attaches to her reign it came from the stored energies left by her great father.  The marvel is that in this succession of vicious and aimless tyrannies by shameless women and incompetent men, Russia did not fall into anarchy and revolution.  But nothing was undone.  The dignity of Moscow was preserved by the fact that the coronations must take place there.  But there was no longer a reactionary party scheming for a return to the Ancient City.  The seed scattered by Peter had everywhere taken hold upon the soil, and now began to burst into flower.  A university was founded at Moscow.  St. Petersburg was filled with French artists and scholars, and had an Academy of Art and of Science, which the great Voltaire asked permission to join, while conferring with Ivan Shuvalof over the History of Peter the Great which he was then engaged in writing.  There were no more ugly German costumes; French dress, manners and speech were the fashion.  Russia was assimilating Europe:  it had tried Holland under Peter, then Germany under Empress Anna; but found its true affinity with France under Elizabeth, when to write and speak French like a Parisian became the badge of high station and culture.

So of its own momentum Russia had moved on without one strong competent personality at its head, and had become a tremendous force which must be reckoned with by the nations of Europe.  In every great political combination the important question was, on which side she would throw her immense weight; and Elizabeth was courted and flattered to her heart’s content by foreign diplomatists and their masters.  Frederick the Great had reason to regret that he had been witty at her expense.  It was almost his undoing by turning the scale against him at a critical moment.  Elizabeth did not forget it and had her revenge when she joined Maria Theresa in the final struggle with Frederick in 1757.  And Frederick also remembered it in 1760, when, as he dramatically expressed it, “The Barbarians were in Berlin engaged in digging the grave of humanity.”

But all benefit from these enormous successes was abandoned, when the commanding Russian officer Apraxin mysteriously withdrew and returned with his army to Russia.  This was undoubtedly part of a deeply laid plot of which Frederick was cognizant, and working in concert with a certain distinguished lady in Elizabeth’s own court—­a clever puller of wires who was going to fill some important chapters in Russian history!