He went one day into a church, and being so drunk that he did not know where he was, he stood against the altar, and commenced to ——. All who were present became horrified. Next morning when he was sober, the clergy brought to his mind the misdeed he had committed the day before. "Eh!" said the prince, "we will soon make that good." Thereupon he issued a command to the Jews of the place, to provide at their own expense, fifty stone of wax for burning in the church. The poor Jews were therefore obliged to bring a sin-offering for the desecration of a Christian Church by an orthodox Catholic Christian.
He once took it into his head to drive on the wall round the town. But as the wall was too narrow for a coach with six horses,—and he never drove in any other,—his hussars were obliged, with much labour and peril of their lives, to carry the coach with their hands till he had driven round the town in this way.
Once he drove with the whole pomp of his court to a Jewish synagogue, and, without any one to this day knowing the reason, committed the greatest havoc, smashed windows and stoves, broke all the vessels, threw on the ground the copies of the Holy Scriptures kept in the ark, and so forth. A learned, pious Jew, who was present, ventured to lift one of these copies from the ground, and had the honour of being struck with a musket-ball by His Serene Highness' own hand. From here the train went to a second synagogue, where the same conduct was repeated, and from there they proceeded to the Jewish burial-place, where the buildings were demolished, and the monuments cast into the fire.
Can it be conceived, that a prince could show himself so malicious towards his own poor subjects, whom he was in a position to punish legally whenever they really did anything amiss? Yet this is what happened here.
On one occasion he took it into his head to make a trip to Mohilna, a hamlet belonging to him, which lay four short miles from his Residence. This had to be done with his usual suite and all the pomp of his court. On the morning of the appointed day the train went forth. First marched the army in order according to its usual regimental divisions,—infantry, artillery, cavalry, and so on. Then followed his bodyguard, Strelitzi, consisting of volunteers from the poor nobility. After them came his kitchen-waggons, in which Hungarian wine had not been forgotten. These were followed by the music of his janissaries, and other bands. Then came his coach, and last of all his satraps. I give them this name, because I can compare this train with no other than that of Darius in the war against Alexander. Towards evening His Serene Highness arrived at our public house in the suburb of the town which was His Serene Highness' Residence, Nesvij. I cannot say that he arrived in his own high person, for the Hungarian wine had robbed him of all consciousness, in which alone of course personality rests. He was carried into the house and thrown with all his clothes, booted and spurred, on to my mother-in-law's dirty bed, without giving it a supply of clean linen.
As usual, I had to take to flight. My Amazons, however, I mean my mother-in-law and my wife, trusted to their heroic mettle, and remained at home alone. Riot went on the whole night. In the very room where His Serene Highness slept, wood was chopped, cooking and baking were done. It was well known that, when His Serene Highness slept, nothing could waken his high person except perhaps the trumpet of the Judgment-Day. The next morning, when he wakened, and looked around, he scarcely knew whether to trust his eyes, when he found himself in a wretched public-house, thrown on to a dirty bed swarming with bugs. His valets, pages, and negroes waited on his commands. He asked how he had come there, and was answered, that His Serene Highness had yesterday commenced a journey to Mohilna, but had halted here to take rest, that his whole train had meanwhile gone on, and had undoubtedly arrived in Mohilna by this time.
The journey to Mohilna was for the present given up, and the whole train ordered back. They returned accordingly to the Residence in the usual order and pomp. But the prince was pleased to hold a great banquet in our public-house. All the foreign gentlemen, who happened to be in the place at the time, were invited. The service used on the occasion was of gold, and it is impossible adequately to realise the contrast which reigned here in one house, between Asiatic splendour and Lappish poverty. In a miserable public-house, whose walls were black as coal with smoke and soot, whose rafters were supported by undressed round stems of trees, whose windows consisted of some fragments of broken panes of bad glass, and small strips of pine covered with paper,—in this house sat princes on dirty benches at a still dirtier table, and had the choicest dishes and the finest wines served to them on gold plate.
Before the banquet the prince took a stroll with the other gentlemen in front of the house, and by chance observed my wife. She was then in the bloom of her youth; and although I am now separated from her, still I must do her the justice to allow that—leaving, of course, out of account all that taste and art contribute to the heightening of a person's charms, inasmuch as these had had no influence on her—she was a beauty of the first rank. It was therefore natural that she should please the prince. He turned to his companions, and said, "Really a pretty young woman! Only she ought to get a white chemise." This was a common signal with him, and meant as much as the throwing of a handkerchief by the Grand Sultan. When these gentlemen therefore heard it, they became solicitous for the honour of my wife, and gave her a hint to clear out as fast as possible. She took the hint, slipped silently out, and was soon over the hills and far away.
After the banquet His Serene Highness proceeded again with the other gentlemen into town amid trumpets, kettle-drums, and the music of his janissaries. Then the usual order of the day was followed; that is, a carousal was carried on the whole afternoon and evening, and then the party went to a pleasure-house at the entrance to the prince's zoological garden, where fire-works were set off at great expense, but usually with accidents. As every goblet was drained, cannons were fired; but the poor cannoneers, who knew better how to handle the plough than the cannon, were not seldom injured. "Vivat Kschondsie Radzivil," that is, "Long live Prince Radzivil," shouted the guests. The palm in this Bacchanalian sport was of course awarded to the prince; and those who awarded it were loaded by him with presents, not in perishable coin or golden snuff-boxes or anything of that sort, but in real estate with many hundred peasants. At the close a concert was given, during which His Serene Highness fell gently asleep, and was carried to the castle.
The expenses of such extravagance were of course extorted from the poor tenantry. If this was not sufficient, debts were contracted, and estates sold to wipe them out. Not even the twelve golden statues in life-size,—whether they represented the twelve apostles or the twelve giants, I do not know,—nor the golden table which had been made for himself, were spared on such emergencies. And thus the noble estates of this great prince were diminished, his treasures which had accumulated during many generations were exhausted, and his tenants——But I must break off.