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By birth
she was not even a Russian, but a princess of Protestant Germany, whom
dynastic considerations made the wife of the heir to the Russian crown.
[Footnote: The marriage was arranged by Frederick the Great in order to
minimize Austrian influence at Petrograd.]
No sooner was she in her adopted country than she set to work to
ingratiate herself with its people. She learned the Russian language.
She outwardly conformed to the Orthodox Church. She slighted her German
relatives and surrounded herself with Russians. She established a
reputation for quick wit and lofty patriotism. So great was her success
that when her half-insane husband ascended the throne as Peter III in
1762, the people looked to her rather than to him as the real ruler,
and before the year was over she had managed to make away with him and
to become sovereign in name as well as in fact. For thirty-four years
Catherine was tsarina of Russia. Immoral to the last, without
conscience or scruple, she ruled the country with a firm hand and
consummated the work of Peter the Great.


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