PETER THE GREAT

More than in any other period of Russian history or the history of any other country, the end of the seventeenth and beginning of the eighteenth centuries was a era of great events and changes for which a single man was mostly responsible. To posterity Peter seems like a superhuman colossus bestriding half a continent. To contemporaries he seemed much the same. He is indeed a unique personality in history.

Intellectually Peter the Great was one of those simpleminded people who can be read at a glance and are easily understood. Physically Peter was a giant of just under seven feet, and at any gathering he towered a full head above everybody else. Not only was Peter a natural athlete, but habitual use of ax and hammer had developed his strength and ''manual dexterity to such an extent that he was able to twist a silver platter into a scroll. Indeed so dexterous was he that if a piece of cloth was thrown into the air he could cut it in half with his knife before it landed.

Peter at eleven was a lively, handsome boy. But traces of a serious nervous disorder due either to the memories of the bloody scenes of 1682, or to his all too frequent debaucheries, or to a combination of both, ruined his health. So that in later years Peter made a different impression. By the time he was twenty he began to suffer from a nervous twitch of the head. When he was lost in thought, or during moments of emotional stress, his round, handsome face became distorted with convulsions. This, together with a birthmark on his right cheek, and a habit of gesticulating with his arms as he walked, made everybody notice him.

In 1697, some Dutchmen who were waiting in a barber shop in Haarlam, and who had been obligingly informed of these characteristics by some of their compatriots who had been in Moscow, easily recognized the carpenter who had just come in to be shaved as the Tsar of Muscovy. At times Peter's face and eyes took on such a savage aspect that nervous people were likely to become demoralized in his presence.

Parisian observers described Peter as an imperious-looking sovereign who, in spite of his fierce and savage looks, could be most amiable to those who were likely to be of use to him. Peter had such a sense of his own importance [hat he paid no attention whatsoever to the elementary rules of behavior, and behaved on the seine as he behaved on the Neva. Leaving his Paris hotel one day, he took possession of a carriage that did not belong to him and calmly drove away.