Читать книгу The Secret Dispatch; or, The Adventures of Captain Balgonie онлайн

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This was at ten o'clock; but ere the great oars of the galley were laid in, or the anchor dropped, a sentinel challenged:

"Who comes there?"

"His Imperial Majesty the Emperor," replied the Captain of the galley, who was standing on its gilded prow.

"There is no longer any Emperor!" was the stern reply of some one on the ramparts.

"'Tis false! I am here—I, Peter Antonovitch," said the Emperor, growing pale at these daring and terrible words, as he stood up and threw back his cloak to show himself and his well-known Prussian star, by the clear, lingering twilight of the northern evening.

"Sheer off," shouted the Admiral Talizine, "or, by our Lady of Kazan, I will fire on you!"

"We are going—give us but time," cried the Captain hopelessly, through his speaking-trumpet.

At that moment a thousand voices on the ramparts shouted on the still twilight air—

"Long live the Empress Catharine II.!"

On hearing this, Peter burst into tears, and fell back into the arms of his attendants, saying—

"The conspiracy is general—from the first days of my short reign I have seen it coming!"