That Czarina was no longer
Elizabeth Petrowna, it was Catharine the Second; a princess who did not
often err so injuriously (injuriously for herself as much as for
others) in the measures of her government. She had soon ample reason
for repenting of her false policy. Meantime, how much it must have co-
operated with the other motives previously acting upon Oubacha in
sustaining his determination to revolt; and how powerfully it must have
assisted the efforts of all the Tartar chieftains in preparing the
minds of their people to feel the necessity of this difficult
enterprise, by arming their pride and their suspicions against the
Russian Government, through the keenness of their sympathy with the
wrongs of their insulted prince, may be readily imagined. It is a fact,
and it has been confessed by candid Russians themselves, when treating
of this great dismemberment, that the conduct of the Russian Cabinet
throughout the period of suspense, and during the crisis of hesitation
in the Kalmuck Council, was exactly such as was most desirable for the
purposes of the conspirators; it was such, in fact, as to set the seal
to all their machinations, by supplying distinct evidences and official
vouchers for what could otherwise have been at the most matters of
doubtful suspicion and indirect presumption.
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