These many useful innovations were received with applause by the wiser part of the nation; and the murmurings and complaints of those who adhered to the ancient customs were drowned in the acclamations of men of sound judgment.
While Peter was thus beginning a new creation in the interior part of his state, he concluded an advantageous truce with the Turks, which gave him the liberty to extend his territories on another side. Mustapha the Second, who had been defeated by prince Eugene, at the battle of Zeuta, in 1697, stripped of the Morea by the Venetians, and unable to defend Azoph, was obliged to make peace with his victorious enemies, which peace was concluded at Carlowitz, (Jan. 26, 1699,) between Peterwaradin and Salankamon, places made famous by his defeats. Temeswaer was made the boundary of the German possessions, and of the Ottoman dominions. Kaminieck was restored to the Poles; the Morea, and some towns in Dalmatia, which had been taken by the Venetians, remained in their hands for some time; and Peter the First continued in possession of Casaph, and of a few forts built in its neighbourhood.
It was not possible for the czar to extend his dominions on the side of Turkey, without drawing upon him the forces of that empire, before divided, but now united. His naval projects were too vast for the Palus Mæotis, and the settlements on the Caspian Sea would not admit of a fleet of men of war: he therefore turned his views towards the Baltic Sea, but without relinquishing those in regard to the Tanais and Wolga.
A grand scene was now opened on the frontiers of Sweden. One of the principal causes of all the revolutions which happened from Ingria, as far as Dresden, and which laid waste so many countries for the space of eighteen years, was the abuse of the supreme power, by Charles XI. king of Sweden, father of Charles XII. This is a fact which cannot be too often repeated, as it concerns every crowned head, and the subjects of every nation. Almost all Livonia, with the whole of Esthonia, had been ceded by the Poles to Charles XI. king of Sweden, who succeeded Charles X. exactly at the time of the treaty of Oliva. It was ceded in the customary manner, with a reservation of rights and privileges. Charles XI. shewing little regard to these privileges, John Reinhold Patkul, a gentleman of Livonia, came to Stockholm in 1692, at the head of six deputies from the province, and laid their complaints at the foot of the throne, in respectful, but strong terms.[56] Instead of an answer, the deputies were ordered to be imprisoned, and Patkul was condemned to lose his honour and his life. But he lost neither, for he made his escape to the country of Vaud, in Switzerland, where he remained some time; when he afterwards was informed, that Augustus, elector of Saxony, had promised, at his accession to the throne of Poland, to recover the provinces that had been wrested from that kingdom; he hastened to Dresden, to represent to that prince, how easily he might make himself master of Livonia, and revenge upon a king, only seventeen years of age, the losses that Poland had sustained by his ancestors.