[1789 A.D.] The secretary of the king's embassy in St. Petersburg delivered such an extremely absurd ultimatum that no other answer was given than an order from the commandant to take his departure from the capital. Gustavus commanded armaments to be prepared and a commissariat to be provided, but left the whole superintendence to others, who neglected everything, and instead of preparing means to oppose entered into secret correspondence with the Russians. All this immediately appeared when the king at length resolved to storm the fortress of Friedrichsham. He found himself destitute of heavy artillery and other materials of war, which he supposed were all in readiness, and whilst the artillery was being slowly brought up by land, the nobles were devising the most shameful treason.

It was arranged that Friedrichsham should be at once attacked both by sea and by land; and Siegeroth had actually landed his troops and commenced operations when he suddenly received counter orders, because the troops which were with the king refused obedience. In these circumstances, Gustavus had no other alternative than to return to Stockholm, in order there to recover his royal dignity and power which he had lost at Friedrichsham. He entered Stockholm in September, and thenceforth occupied himself in preparing a coup d' état, which he accomplished on the 17th of February in the following year. Meanwhile, his traitorous nobles had concluded a truce with Russia, which was so far advantageous to Gustavus that it liberated his fleet from its captivity in the bay of Sveaborg. He was now dictator and autocrat; he had at command the means of prosecuting the war with Russia: but the favourable moment was past, and the Russians had already completed all their preparations by land and sea for the defence of their provinces bordering upon Sweden. Gustavus' project of burning the Russian fleet in the harbour of Copenhagen was discovered beforehand, and brought him nothing but disgrace. When he again joined the army in Finland, his Swedes gave evidence of their attachment and courage; but he himself again contrived to injure the success of the war by his interference in its conduct. In the murderous fights which ensued from the middle of June till the end of July, both the Russians and Swedes lost great numbers of men, without any other gain on either side than military renown. The Swedes in the meantime were unfortunate at sea, and could not have profited by their success had they been victorious by land.

Admiral Ehrenswerd commanded the Swedish flotilla of flat-bottomed boats, constructed for navigating the rocky shallows of the coast, whilst the similar Russian fleet was under the orders of the prince of Nassau-Siegen, who had shortly before been commander of the Russian fleet in the Black Sea, and had fallen into disputes with Potemkin, which led to his being sent to the Baltic. The Russian ships of the line were under the command of Admiral Tchitchakov, and had on board a considerable number of British naval officers of experience. This fleet had on the 26th of June fallen in with that of the Swedes, which was so injured in an engagement between Bornholm and Gothland as to be obliged to return to Karlskrona. The unfortunate issue of the battle was generally ascribed to disloyalty on the part of some of the naval officers.

The king still persisted in his determination of opening up a way for himself to St. Petersburg, and therefore of storming Friedrichsham. He himself directed the execution of the project, although he was, properly speaking, merely a volunteer with his army. By his interference he exposed the Swedish army to considerable loss, on the same day (August 24th) on which the Russian flotilla gained an important victory over the Swedes at Rogensalm.

[1790 A.D.]

Friedrichsham, according to the king's command, was to be stormed by the three generals, Siegroth, Kaulbart, and Platen; the assault, however, failed of success, and the Swedes were obliged to retire: their flotilla was twice beaten. The first victory of the Russians at Rogensalm was attributed to the prince of Nassau-Siegen, who, however, was accompanied by three or four persons who rendered him the same service which the British officers did to Admiral Tchitchakov. On the 1st of September the Swedish flotilla experienced a defeat at Högfors, and the land army, commanded by the king, was there also compelled to retreat. The loss in human life was indeed great, but the real injury small, for the Swedish army continued till the beginning of winter to occupy its quarters on the frontiers of Russia.

The Campaign of 1790; the Treaty of Varela

During the winter, Gustavus withdrew from his army, but he resumed his duties as commander in March, 1790, and was now careful to supply all the deficiencies of the two previous years. On the 15th of April, in Finland, he reduced the two important posts of Kärnakoski and Pardakovski near Vilmanstrand; his Swedes were victorious at Valkiala; and on the 30th repulsed the Russians in their attempt to recover the two posts just mentioned. On the 4th and 5th of May the Swedes were afterwards beaten at Aberfors by the Russian general Numsen, and lost twelve pieces of cannon. The king having again taken Pardakovski, the key of Savolax, immediately caused a portion of his land forces to embark in the flotilla, of which he himself assumed the command, and ordered the remainder of the army to press forward by the shore towards St. Petersburg, relying on the assistance of the fleet, which was to receive them on board in case of a defeat. The fleet consisted of nineteen large ships, twenty-seven galleys, and a number of gunboats, which in all mounted about two thousand guns. It was absolutely necessary to the execution of this adventurous undertaking that Friedrichsham should in all haste be reduced by storm. The king, having been successful on the 15th in a naval engagement, made his third attempt at storming the fortress on the 17th and 18th of May, and notwithstanding a great loss in men failed in effecting his object. Although the way by land thus remained barred, he nevertheless persisted in his design of terrifying the empress in her capital.

Gustavus, having now embarked a greater number of Swedish troops than before, reached Viborg, and on the 2nd of June, 1790, disembarked a division of his army at Blörke, about forty miles from St. Petersburg. The whole success of this rash enterprise depended on his remaining master of the sea. In order to maintain this superiority, Duke Charles was to prevent the junction of the two Russian fleets, one of which was lying in Kronstadt and the other in Revel, and on the 3rd of June he was ordered to engage the division of the fleet in the former harbour. The Swedish fleet was no sooner thus withdrawn from its position than an opportunity was afforded to the Russians to form a junction between their two fleets, which actually took place on the day the duke entered the sound of Viborg (June 6th). The Swedish fleet was blockaded by the Russian squadrons, consisting, when united, of thirty ships of the line and eighteen frigates; the former, however, continued to keep up its connection with the flotilla. It appears that both the Swedish fleets would have been entirely lost had the two Russian admirals been qualified for such a command. Captain Pélissier, who had served in Holland, is said to have given Admiral Tchitchakov advice which he ought to have followed,

[1790 A.D.]

had he not been too obstinately attached to his own opinions; Pélissier even pointed out to generals Suchtelen and Soltikov the places where they ought to have erected their batteries in order effectually to bar the egress of the Swedish fleet from the bay; no attention, however, was paid to his advice. The prince of Nassau-Siegen proved himself to be in no respect superior as a commander to Tchitchakov. On the other hand, if the advice of Duke Charles had been adopted, the Russians would have been victorious without a battle; King Gustavus and Stedingk, however, rescued the honour of the Swedish name.

The Swedes had now been closely shut up in the bay of Viborg for three weeks, and at the end of June were reduced to extremities; in the beginning of July a grand council of war was held. Duke Charles and many other members of the council recommended a capitulation, but the king and Stedingk were in favour of making a desperate effort to force their way through the enemy's line. The attempt was accordingly made on the 3rd of July, and through Tchitchakov's neglect it was so far successful, as it enabled the Swedish fleet to bring the blockading squadron to an engagement. But the Swedes lost in it not only seven ships of the line, three frigates, and more than thirty galleys and gunboats, but almost the whole of the royal guards, the queen's regiment, and that of Upland, amounting to six thousand or seven thousand men, which had been put on board the fleet. Whilst the larger Swedish ships thus endeavoured to gain the open sea, the flotilla had withdrawn for safety into an arm of the gulf, which runs parallel to the shore and stretches towards Friedrichsham. This inlet, called the sound of Suenske, is extremely difficult of access on the side towards Friedrichsham, in consequence of a group of rocky islands at its mouth, but it may be safely reached through the open harbour of Asph. By this way the prince of Nassau-Siegen determined to pass into the sound with the Russian flotilla, and attack the Swedes in their place of refuge.

The latter were well protected from the attack of the Russian fleet by rocks, and when the prince gave orders for the assault, on the 9th, the sailors were so exhausted and his orders for battle were so unskilful that the king of Sweden gained a splendid victory on that and the following day. The loss of the Russians was so great as to have surpassed any which they had suffered since the Seven Years' War. Fifty-five vessels were captured, a number of others destroyed, and fourteen thousand Russians either taken prisoners or slain. In spite of this signal victory, the king of Sweden now awoke from his dream of humbling the pride and glory of Russia; already he began to cast his eyes towards France, and in the following year he dreamed his monarchical dream in favour of the French émigrés. The idea of becoming the Godefroy de Bouillon of the aristocratic and monarchical crusade, which Burke at that time proclaimed in the English parliament and in his work on the French Revolution, had been awakened in his mind in 1790, and the empress of Russia found means of confirming him in his visionary projects. Moreover his means were exhausted, and he therefore lent a favourable ear to the proposal of Galvez, the Spanish ambassador, who began to mediate for a peace between Sweden and Russia.

This peace, concluded at Varela on the Kimmene on the 14th of August, 1790, served to show how empty all Gustavus' splendour was, and how unreal and inefficient were all the efforts he had made. It was now seen that all the blood had been shed to no purpose, and all the treasures of his very poor kingdom mischievously squandered, for everything remained on the footing on which it had been in the spring of 1788.

[1790 A.D.]

PROGRESS OF THE AUSTRO-RUSSIAN WAR WITH TURKEY

We now return to the war in which Austria and Russia were jointly engaged against Turkey. The whole Austrian army was ready to take the field at the end of the year 1787: it formed an immense cordon stretching from the mountains on the coast of the Adriatic Sea to the Carpathians, and consisted of a main body and five divisions. Unhappily, the emperor Joseph was desirous of commanding the main army in person, under the unskilful direction of Lacy, his military Mentor, who, like his pupil Mack, was a good drill-sergeant, but no general. The main body consisted of 25,000 infantry and 22,000 horse, and the whole of the troops together amounted to 86,000 cavalry and 245,000 foot, accompanied by 898 pieces of artillery.

In February, 1788, Russia and Austria had simultaneously declared war against the Turks; but in August of that year England and Prussia entered into an alliance, the main object of which was to place Prussia in a situation to prevent the aggrandisement of Austria, if necessary, by force of arms. This, however, was superfluous in 1788, because the diversion effected by the king of Sweden prevented the Russians from proceeding with their usual rapidity, and the emperor Joseph by his presence with the army frustrated the effect of his immense armaments. The dissatisfaction with the whole conduct of the war became so general that Joseph was at length obliged earnestly to entreat Laudon, who had been the popular hero of the Austrians since the time of the Seven Years' War, and whom the emperor had hitherto neither employed nor consulted, to assume the command of the army in Croatia.

Successes of Laudon (1788 A.D.)

Laudon, having made an express stipulation that the emperor was not to interfere with his plans marched against the Turks, defeated them under the walls of Dubitza the very day after he joined the army, and reduced that fortress; then, pushing into the heart of Bosnia, he compelled Novi to surrender, whilst the emperor himself was obliged to hasten to the aid of the army in the Bannat, which was very hard pressed by the Turks. The division under Wartensleben, which should have supported it, had been driven back by the Turks, who succeeded, in consequence of an incomprehensible neglect on the part of the Austrians, in getting complete possession of the rocky bed through which the Danube has forced a passage at a distance of six-and-twenty miles above New Orsova. The pass, which is not more than a pistol-shot in width, is commanded by a fortified cleft in the rock, called Veterani's Hole, and this post the Austrians should and could have maintained when the main body of the Turks appeared at Old Orsova on the 7th of August; this, however, they neglected to do. The Austrian general suffered himself to be defeated and lost thirteen pieces of cannon, and as his communications with the main army were cut off, he was obliged to retreat so far that the garrison of this important post was left to its fate. The Turks sacrificed great numbers of men in order to seize this fastness, by the possession of which they immediately became masters of the whole navigation of the Danube as far down as Belgrade. As soon as the Danube was lost, the imperial army found itself threatened in the rear.

Nothing but disaster attended the operations of Joseph and Wartensleben. The army under the prince of Coburg was somewhat less unfortunate. Khotin, which the Russians had captured in the last war without firing a shot, was

[1790 A.D.] reduced by it after a most heroic resistance of three months; and this was the last exploit of a campaign in which thirty thousand Austrians fell in desultory skirmishes, and forty thousand were swept off by pestilence losses but poorly compensated by the capture of Szabatch, Khotin, Dubitza, and Novi. Circumstances, however, afterwards proved more favourable. Jassy was taken; in October, the Russians were in possession of five districts of Moldavia and of several passes in Wallachia, and the main army was again able to extend the limits of its operations. Wartensleben sat down with a part of the army before Mahadia; and the emperor kept possession of the country from Pantchova to Semlin.

Victories of Suvarov (1788-1789 A.D.)

After the massacre perpetrated by Suvarov upon the Turks on the promontory of Kinburn, the Russians had remained for a long time quiet; but by their possession of the coasts they effectually prevented the Turks from landing any troops, and by the capture of the island of Beresam wholly excluded them from the mouth of the Dnieper. It was not till late in the year 1788 that Potemkin summoned Suvarov from Kinburn to conduct the siege of Otchakov, where, however, he was wounded, and after his return to Kinburn the siege made very little progress. The avarice of Potemkin deprived the soldiers of the necessary supplies; and the dreadful cold and disease proved far more injurious to them than the attacks of their enemies. At length the frost became so intense that the men were obliged to excavate pits for dwellings, but the same frost also opened up a means of attacking the fortress and reducing it after the Russian fashion, that is, without regard to the sacrifice of thousands of men, a few weeks earlier than they could otherwise have done. The city is completely protected on the side towards the Black Sea by a marshy lake called Liman; and now that the lake was frozen, Potemkin issued orders to storm the fortress from the sea side, where it was weakest. The Russians were cruelly sacrificed: one regiment was no sooner mowed down than another was compelled to advance, and above four thousand men were slain before the storming of Otchakov was effected (December 16th), an exploit which was afterwards extolled to heaven. The Russians, having at length borne down all resistance and forced their way into the city, were compensated for their losses and sufferings during the siege by three days' murder and pillage; they put citizens and soldiers, men, women, and children to the sword without mercy or distinction. It is said that twenty thousand Turks perished in this massacre; but this piece of Russian heroism, which was not performed by Potemkin himself but by others at his command, was also rewarded after the Russian fashion. Every soldier who had taken part in the siege received a medal of honour, whilst Potemkin, who had contributed nothing to its success, derived the only real advantage. The empress had previously deprived Razumovski of the office of hetman, which she now conferred upon Potemkin, who received in addition a present of 100,000 rubles, besides what he had appropriated to himself out of the moneys destined for the besieging army, and what he had seized out of the rich booty which fell into his hands after the capture of the city.

The death of the sultan Abd-el-Habed in April, 1789, made no change in the relations between the Turks and Russians. His successor, Selim, continued to prosecute the war, and Suvarov having recovered from the effects of his wound again joined Potemkin's army, and was put at the head of the division which was to co-operate with the Austrians. Laudon had now the