Then, with a sudden and entirely unconscious pathos, “Europe will not listen to me—I am only the Czar of Muscovy. They do not take me as a power to be reckoned with, Danilovitch.”
“They do not know you, Peter Alexievitch,” replied Mentchikoff.
Peter pursued his own train of thought.
“He breaks all international law—if Patkul had been the envoy of any other country but Russia the world would have cried out against this treatment.”
Despite his passionate nature and his autocratic position he saw shrewdly enough just how Europe held him.
“I will make my protest, but who will take any notice of it?” he continued.
“Peter Alexievitch, you must make your own protest,” said Mentchikoff, in an energetic tone. “Cannot you defeat Sweden?” added this fiery Russian.
“It has been done,” responded the Czar, with a sudden smile. “You beat them at Kalisz!”
He spoke warmly and without a trace of envy of his subject’s success in a war where he had every time failed himself, thereby, had he known it, showing himself greater than Karl, who had not been able to restrain his jealousy on hearing of Mardenfeldt’s victory at Fraustadt.
With equal generosity and selflessness Mentchikoff replied: