The same night he started for Russia. The journey did not seem as terrible as he had expected. His imagination triumphed over fact. The further he got from Paris the nearer and more vivid seemed to him all the objects he was leaving for ever.
Imperceptibly he reached the Russian frontier. Autumn had already set in, but the hired relays, notwithstanding the badness of the roads, brought him with the swiftness of the wind, and on the seventeenth morning he arrived at Krasnoe Selo, through which at that time passed the high road.
There remained twenty-eight versts' journey to St. Petersburg. While the horses were being changed Ibrahim entered the posting-house. In a corner a tall man, in a green caftan and a clay pipe in his mouth, sat leaning against the table reading the Hamburg Gazette. Hearing some one enter he raised his head.
"Oh, Ibrahim!" he exclaimed, rising from the bench. "How do you do, godson?"
Ibrahim recognised Peter, and in his delight rushed at him, but stopped respectfully. The monarch approached, put his arms round him, and kissed him on the forehead.
"I was told of your coming," said Peter, "and drove off to meet you. I Pave been waiting for you here since yesterday."
Ibrahim could not find words to express his gratitude.
"Tell them," added the Tsar, "to let your carriage follow us, while you get in by my side and drive to my place."
The Tsar's calèche was announced; he and Ibrahim got in and started at a gallop. In an hour and a half they reached St. Petersburg. Ibrahim looked with interest at the new-born city, which had sprung up by the will of the Tsar. The bare banks, the canals without quays, the wooden bridges, everywhere bore witness to the recent triumph of human will over the elements. The houses seemed to have been hurriedly built. The whole town contained nothing magnificent but the Neva, not yet decorated with its granite framework, but already covered with ships of war and merchantmen. The Tsar's calèche drew up at the palace, i.e. at the Tsaritsa's garden. On the door-steps Peter was met by a woman about thirty-five, handsome, and dressed in the latest Parisian fashion. Peter kissed her, and, taking Ibrahim by the hand, said: