So they went immediately to the house of Le Fort, where the Czar then was, and made a confession of the whole affair. They related all the details of the plot, and gave the names of the principal persons concerned in it.
The emperor was at table with Le Fort at the time that he received this communication. He listened to it very coolly--manifested no surprise--but simply rose from the table, ordered a small body of men to attend him, and, taking the names of the principal conspirators, he went at once to their several houses and arrested them on the spot.
The leaders having been thus seized, the execution of the plot was defeated. The prisoners were soon afterward put to the torture, in order to compel them to confess their crime, and to reveal the names of all their confederates. Whether the names thus extorted from them by suffering were false or true would of course be wholly uncertain, but all whom they named were seized, and, after a brief and very informal trial, all, or nearly all, were condemned to death. The sentence of death was executed on them in the most barbarous manner. A great column was erected in the market-place in Moscow, and fitted with iron spikes and hooks, which were made to project from it on every side, from top to bottom. The criminals were then brought out one by one, and first their arms were cut off, then their legs, and finally their heads. The amputated limbs were then hung up upon the column by the hooks, and the heads were fixed to the spikes. There they remained--a horrid spectacle, intended to strike terror into all beholders--through February and March, as long as the weather continued cold enough to keep them frozen. When at length the spring came on, and the flesh of these dreadful trophies began to thaw, they were taken down and thrown together into a pit, among the bodies of common thieves and murderers.
This was the end of the second conspiracy formed against the life of Peter the Great.
Objects of the tour--An embassy to be sent--The emperor to go incognito--His associates--The regency--Disposition of the Guards--The embassy leaves Moscow--Riga--Not allowed to see the fortifications--Arrival at Konigsberg--Grand procession in entering the city--The pages--Curiosity of the people--The escort--Crowds in the streets--The embassy arrives at its lodgings--Audience of the king--Presents--Delivery of the letter from the Czar--Its contents--The king's reply--Grand banquet--Effects of such an embassy--The policy of modern governments--The people now reserve their earnings for their own use--How Peter occupied his time--Dantzic--Peter preserves his incognito--Presents--His dress--His interest in the shipping--Grand entrance into Holland--Curiosity of the people--Peter enters Amsterdam privately--Views of the Hollanders--Residence of the Czar--The East India Company--Peter goes to work--His real object in pursuing this course--His taste for mechanics--The opportunities and facilities he enjoyed--His old workshop--Mode of preserving it--The workmen in the yard--Peter's visits to his friends in Amsterdam--The rich merchant--Peter's manners and character--The Hague--The embassy at the Hague