B o O K once punilhed by the emprefs Elizabeth as high treafon ; and it
—-v-—> is ftill more difficult to imagine how ihe could fecrete it from the
knowledge of her guards during her long imprifonment in Ruf-
fia. She alone, of her brothers and filters, could fpeak a little
German, and ferved as an interpreter between them and prince
Ferdinand of Brunfwick, who came more than once to vifit his
nephews and nieces. She is reported to have died of chagrin j
but, as far I could colled:, her death was occafioned by a violent
fever, which was foon attended with a delirium, and hurried her
to the grave on the fixteenth day of her illnefs.
But though we were unfuccefsful in our attempt to be pre-
fented, we did not however quit Horfens without feeing their
peribns ; as on the day after , our arrival there was a great fair, and
many people were aliembled in the market-place, the princes frequently
appeared at the windows of their palace to look at them.
The princefs feemed pale and thin j the princes were about the
middle fize, fair complexioned, with ftrong features, light hair,
and expreffive eyes.
As I beheld thefe auguft defcendants of the Tzar Ivan, I
felt extreme fatisfadlion, in refledting that they were enlarged
from the precindts of a Ruffian prifon and admired the humanity
and magnanimity of Catharine the Second, who ventured
to releale from a long confinement of more than forty
years, peribns- whofe parents had died in prifon, whofe brother
had once filled the Ruffian throne, and clofed his unfortunate
life by the hand of violence. The emprefs of Ruffia
allows
allows them an annual falary of £ . 5000 fterling. In my
former publication* I expreffed my doubts whether Ivan had
ever been confined at Kolmogori; but I can now affert, with
as much certainty as the circumftance will allow, that he was
imprifoned there for feveral years, but feparately and unknown
to the reft of his family.
Prince Antony Ulric and his four children were confined in a
houfe with a large court-yard, about an Engliffi mile in circumference,
furrounded with high pallifadoes : within this precinft
they were permitted to walk and ride without moleftation, but
were never fuffered to pafs the limits bounded by the pallifadoes.
They inftantly perceived a great difference in their treatment
from the moment of the prefent emprefs’s acceffion to the
throne. They had a large fuite of domefticsj feveral horfes, and
were ferved off plate. They were inftrudted in reading and
writing. Their father had for a long time been greatly afflidled
with the gout, and for a year before his death was totally blind.
The country from Horfens to Aarhuus is moftly open, fertile
in com and pafture, and occafionally dotted with woods of fmall
beech and oak, in the midft whereof were pleafantly fituated
country houfes and noblemen’s feats. The villages were very
few; many farm-houfes were fcattered in the fields j and the
churches built of brick or ftone, roofed with red tiles, Handing
feparately, and at a diftance from the villages, were pidturefque
objedts.
* B o o k V. c. ii.
Finding