The King was not yet cured of his wound, and had to have a decayed bone removed from his leg, but as soon as he could mount a horse he renewed his usual exercises, rising at sunrise, tiring out three horses a day, and making his soldiers drill. His only amusement was an occasional game of chess. If details are typical of character, it may be remarked that he always brought out his king in the game; he used him more than his other pieces, and so always lost the game.
At Bender he found plenty of everything about him, rare good fortune for a conquered and fugitive king; for besides more than enough provisions and the 500 crowns a day he got from the Ottoman generosity, he got money also from France, and borrowed of the Constantinople merchants. Part of this money was used to carry on the intrigues in the seraglio, in buying the vizirs or procuring their downfall; the rest he distributed profusely among his officers and the janissaries who guarded him at Bender.
Grothusen, his favourite and treasurer, dispensed these bounties; he was a man who, contrary to the custom of a man of his station, was as eager to give as his master. One day he brought him an account of 60,000 crowns in two lines, “10,000 given to the Swedes and janissaries, and the rest eaten up by me.” “This,” said the King, “is the kind of balance-sheet that I like; Mullern makes me read whole pages for the sum of 10,000 francs, I like Grothusen’s laconic style much better.” One of his old officers, thought to be slightly covetous, complained to the King that he gave everything to Grothusen. “I give money,” answered the King, “to none but those who know how to make use of it.” This generosity often reduced him to such straits that he had nothing to give. Better economy in his liberality would have been more to his advantage and no less honourable, but it was the Prince’s failing to carry all the virtues to excess.
Many strangers hurried from Constantinople to see him. The Turks and the neighbouring Tartars came in crowds; all honoured and admired him. His rigid abstinence from wine, and his regularity in attending public prayers twice a day, spread the report that he was a true Mussulman. They burned to march with him to the conquest of Russia.
During this life of leisure at Bender, which was longer than he had expected, he developed unconsciously a great taste for books. Baron Fabricius, nobleman of the duchy of Holstein, an agreeable youth who had the gaiety and the ready wit which appeals to princes, induced him to read. He had been sent to him as envoy from the Duke of Holstein, to protect the interests of the latter, and succeeded by the amiability of his manner.
He had read all the French authors, and persuaded the King to read the tragedies of Corneille, and of Racine, and the works of Despreaux; the King did not at all enjoy the latter’s satires, which are by no means his best performances, but he appreciated his other writings, and when he read the passage in the eighth satire, where he calls Alexander a “frantic madman,” he tore out the leaf.
Of all the French tragedies Mithradates pleased him most, because the condition of the King, conquered and breathing forth vengeance, was like his own. He pointed out to M. Fabricius the passages that struck him, but he would read nothing aloud, nor venture on a word of French. Even afterwards, when he met M. Desaleurs, the French ambassador to the Porte, a person of distinction, who only knew his mother-tongue, he answered him in Latin, and when the ambassador protested that he did not understand a word of that language he called for an interpreter, rather than express himself in French. Such were the occupations of Charles at Bender, where he was waiting till a Turkish army should come to his assistance.
His ambassador presented memoirs in his name to the Grand Vizir, Poniatowski, and supported them with his readily-acquired prestige. The intrigue succeeded entirely; he wore only Turkish dress, and he insinuated himself everywhere; the Grand Seignior had him presented with a purse containing 1,000 ducats, and the Grand Vizir said to him, “I will take your King with one hand, and a sword in the other, and I will lead him to Moscow at the head of 200,000 men.” But the first minister soon changed his mind. The King could only treat, while the Czar could pay; he did pay, and it was the money that he gave that Charles used; the military chest taken at Pultawa provided new arms against the vanquished. No more mention was made of making war on Russia. The Czar’s influence was all-powerful at the Porte; they granted honours and privileges to his ambassador at Constantinople such as had never been enjoyed by a previous envoy; he was allowed to have a seraglio, that is, a palace in the quarters of the Franks, and to converse with foreign ministers. The Czar even felt strong enough to demand that Mazeppa should be handed over to him, just as Charles had demanded Patkul. Chourlouli-Ali-Pasha now found it impossible to refuse anything to a Prince who made demands with millions behind him. Thus the same Grand Vizir who had solemnly promised to take the King of Sweden to Russia with 200,000 men, had the impudence to propose to him that he should consent to the betrayal of Mazeppa. Charles was enraged at the request. It is hard to say how far the Vizir would have carried the matter had not Mazeppa, who was then seventy years old, died at this juncture.
The King’s grief and resentment increased when he heard that Tolstoy, who had become ambassador from the Czar to the Porte, was served in public by the Swedes who had been enslaved at Pultawa, and that these brave men were daily sold in the market-place at Constantinople. Besides, the Russian ambassador remarked aloud that the Mussulman troops at Bender were there rather as a guard to the King than for his honour.
Charles, abandoned by the Grand Vizir, and conquered by the Czar’s money in Turkey, as he had been by his arms in Ukrania, found himself deluded, scorned by the Porte, and a kind of prisoner among the Tartars. His followers began to despair. He alone remained firm and did not show dejection even for a moment. He thought that the Sultan was ignorant of the intrigues of his Grand Vizir; he determined to inform him, and Poniatowski undertook this bold task. Every Friday the Grand Seignior went to the mosque, surrounded by Solacks, a kind of guard, whose turbans were so high that they hid the Sultan from the people. Any one who had a petition to present to the Sultan, must mingle with these guards, and hold the petition up in the air. Sometimes the Sultan deigned to take it himself, but generally he bade an aga take charge of it, and afterwards, on his return from the mosque, had the petitions laid before him. There was no fear that any one would importune him with unnecessary petitions, or petitions about trifling affairs, for at Constantinople they write less in a year than at Paris in a day. Much less dare any one present petitions against the ministers, to whom the Sultan hands them generally without reading them. But Poniatowski had no other means of conveying the King of Sweden’s complaints to the Grand Seignior. He drew up a strong indictment of the Grand Vizir. M. de Feriol, then Turkish ambassador from France, got it translated into Turkish. A Greek was hired to present it; he mingled himself with the King’s guards, and held up the paper so high, and so persistently, that the Sultan saw it and took it himself.