There have been fought more than two hundred pitched battles in Europe, since the commencement of this century to the present year. The most signal, and the most bloody victories, have produced no other consequences than the reduction of a few provinces ceded afterwards by treaties, and retaken again by other battles. Armies of a hundred thousand men have frequently engaged each other in the field; but the greatest efforts have been attended with only slight and momentary successes; the most trivial causes have been productive of the greatest effects. There is no instance, in modern history, of any war that has compensated, by even a better good, for the many evils it has occasioned: but, from the battle of Pultowa, the greatest empire under the sun has derived its present happiness and prosperity.
[CHAP. XIX.]
Consequences of the battle of Pultowa.—Charles XII. takes refuge among the Turks.—Augustus, whom he had dethroned, recovers his dominions.—Conquests of Peter the Great.
1709.
The chief prisoners of rank were now presented to the conqueror, who ordered their swords to be returned, and invited them to dinner. It is a well known fact, that, on drinking to the officers, he said, 'To the health of my masters in the art of war.' However, most of his masters, particularly the subaltern officers, and all the private men, were soon afterwards sent into Siberia. There was no cartel established here for exchange of prisoners between the Russians and Swedes; the czar, indeed, had proposed one before the siege of Pultowa, but Charles rejected the offer, and his troops were in every thing the victims of his inflexible pride.
It was this unseasonable obstinacy that occasioned all the misfortunes of this prince in Turkey, and a series of adventures, more becoming a hero of romance than a wise or prudent king; for, as soon as he arrived at Bender, he was advised to write to the grand-vizier, as is the custom among the Turks; but this he thought would be demeaning himself too far. The like obstinacy embroiled him with all the ministers of the Porte, one after another, in short, he knew not how to accommodate himself either to times or circumstances.[80]
The first news of the battle of Pultowa produced a general revolution in minds and affairs in Poland, Saxony, Sweden, and Silesia. Charles, while all powerful in those parts, had obliged the emperor Joseph to take a hundred and five churches from the catholics in favour of the Silesians of the confession of Augsburg. The catholics then no sooner received news of the defeat of Charles, than they repossessed themselves of all the Lutheran temples. The Saxons now thought of nothing but being revenged for the extortions of a conqueror, who had robbed them, according to their own account, of twenty-three millions of crowns.
The king of Poland, their elector, immediately protested against the abdication that had been extorted from him, and being now reconciled to the czar (Aug. 3.), he left no stone unturned to reascend the Polish throne. Sweden, overwhelmed with consternation, thought her king for a long time dead, and in this uncertainty the senate knew not what to resolve.
Peter in the mean time determined to make the best use of his victory, and therefore dispatched marshal Sheremeto with an army into Livonia, on the frontiers of which province that general had so often distinguished himself. Prince Menzikoff was sent in haste with a numerous body of cavalry to second the few troops left in Poland, to encourage the nobles who were in the interest of Augustus to drive out his competitor, who was now considered in no better light than a rebel, and to disperse a body of Swedes and troops that were still left in that kingdom under the command of general Crassau.