[55] Mozart was appointed to the Emperor’s chapel in 1780. Joseph II. was very fond of him, and although his salary was very small, he always refused the advantageous offers made by other sovereigns, among others the King of Prussia. Haydn was also attached to the Emperor’s chapel.
[56] Salieri, chapel-master and music-director to the Emperor at Vienna.
[57] The Comte François-Joseph de Dietrichstein, born 28th April 1767, was private counsellor and chamberlain to the Austrian Emperor. He filled the post of Major-General in the Engineers during the first wars against the French republic, and it was he who in 1800 concluded with Moreau the armistice of Parsdorf.
IX
The Prince de Ligne’s departure for St. Petersburg—Journey through Tauris—Interview at Kherson—War declared against the Turks—Alliance between Austria and Russia—The Prince de Ligne as Russian General—Potemkin and Romanzoff—The taking of Sabacz—Prince Charles at the storming of Sabacz—Letters from the Emperor Joseph to the Prince-father—Letters from the Prince de Ligne to his son—The Governor of Kaminiecz—The Prince’s return to Vienna—Siege of Belgrade.
In the autumn of the year 1786 the Prince de Ligne received an invitation from the Czarina, asking him to join her at St. Petersburg, and accompany her in a journey she was about to undertake in the Crimea. This invitation was secretly intended to prepare an interview that was to take place at Kherson between Catherine and Joseph II. Turkey had ceded the Crimea and Kouban to Russia in January 1784. These acquisitions had only aggravated Catherine’s thirst for further conquest. She already betrayed her ambition in the smallest details: one of her grandsons had been named Alexander, and the other Constantine; the Crimea was now again called Tauris; but her ambitious designs did not end there. The Empress received the Prince de Ligne as if he had only left her the day before, informed him of her plans, and at the end of December sent him back to Joseph with the itinerary of her journey and the result of his secret mission.
Under the pretext of visiting her new dominions the Czarina undertook on the 15th of January 1787 a journey through the southern provinces of her empire. She was accompanied by her favourite, Count Momonoff, and by the ambassadors of France, Austria, and England, and by the Prince de Ligne, who met her at Kief. “I occupied,” he says, “the position of a diplomatic jockey.”
She was also accompanied by a considerable number of princes and Russian lords. Her flotilla consisted of eighty-four ships, manned by three thousand seamen.
The King, Stanislaus-Augustus, awaited the Czarina at Kanew. She slowly descended the Borysthenes in a galley as magnificent as that of Cleopatra. The Prince de Ligne left the flotilla in a small Zaporavian canoe to announce Catherine’s arrival to the King. An hour later the great lords of the empire came to fetch him in a gunboat brilliantly decorated. Whilst stepping on board he said, with the inexpressible charm of manner and pleasant tone of voice so peculiar to him: “Gentlemen, the King of Poland has requested me to commend to you Comte Poniatowski.” The dinner was very gay, and while the King’s health was drunk, three salutes were fired by the artillery of the whole fleet. Afterwards the King gave a supper to all the nobles of his retinue. The fleet had cast anchor before the palace improvised for him; no sooner had night closed in than a general conflagration on the neighbouring shores of the Borysthenes simulated an eruption of Vesuvius, lighting up the valleys, the mountains, and the river in a most glorious manner. The glare of the fires lit up the fantastic display of the brilliant squadrons of Polish cavalry. Stanislaus had spent three months and three millions in order to see the Czarina for three hours. She had loved him, but, long ago, this love had been replaced by others; and now she slowly and cruelly tore from him the shreds of the kingdom she had formerly bestowed. They separated with all the appearance of friendliness, but during their short meeting the King had had time to perceive that there was no hope of reviving the past.
This was the last interview that took place between Catherine and Stanislaus. Eight years later she dethroned him with her own hands.