Meanwhile, Peter and his party of sixty-one persons, including Golovkin, Shafirov, Peter Tolstoy, Vasily Dolgoruky, Buturlin, Osterman and Yaguzhinsky, traveled slowly through the Low Countries. As was his custom, the Tsar stopped often to visit towns, examine curiosities and study the people and their way of life. Although he had again adopted the partial facade of traveling incognito to minimize the time wasted in official ceremonies, he was pleased to hear church bells rung and cannon fired in his honor as he passed by. Catherine accompanied him as far as Rotterdam; to simplify the journey, she would wait at The Hague while he visited France. He felt that her presence would demand additional time-consuming ceremonies which by himself he could avoid.
From Rotterdam, Peter traveled by boat to Breda and up the
Shceldt to Antwerp, where he climbed the cathedral tower to gaze out over the city. In Brussels, he wrote to Catherine: "I wish to send you lace for fontange and engagements [that is, lace ribbons to be clustered in the hair and across the bodice—the latest style in Paris], for the best lace in all Europe is made here, but they make it to order only. Therefore, send the pattern and what name or arms you wish worked on it." From Brussels, Peter moved on to Ghent, Bruges, Ostend and Dunquerque, finally reaching the French frontier at Calais, where he rested for nine days to observe the last week of Lent and to celebrate Russian Easter.
At Calais, the Russian travelers met Liboy and the French welcoming escort. For Liboy, this first exposure to the Russian character was traumatic. The guests complained about the carriages to which they were assigned, and they spent freely, every ecue of which had to be paid by Liboy. In desperation, he urged Paris that the Tsar and his suite be put on a fixed daily allowance, not to be exceeded, allowing them to argue among themselves how the sum would be spent.
Liboy had been ordered to report to Paris on the habits of the visitors and to ascertain the purpose of their visit. He found it impossible to understand Peter, who, instead of doing anything serious, seemed only to be idly amusing himself, ambling along, examining things which, in Liboy's eyes, were irrelevant. "This littl court," he wrote of the Russian party of twenty-two persons of rank and thirty-nine orderlies, "is very changeable and irresolute and from the throne to the stable, very subject to anger." The Tsar, he reported, "is of very great stature, a little stooped, with the habit of holding his head down. He is dark and there is a fierceness in his expression. He appears to have a lively mind and a ready understanding, with a certain grandeur, in his movements, but with little restraint." Elaborating in a subsequent report, Liboy continued:
In the Tsar, one does indeed find seeds of virtue, but they are wild and very mixed with failings. I believe that he lacks most of all uniformity and constancy of purpose and that he has not arrived at that point where one can rely on what would be concluded with him. I admit that Prince Kurakin is polite; he appears to be intelligent and to desire to arrange everything to our mutual satisfaction. I do not know if it is by temperament or through fear of the Tsar, who appears, as I have said, very hard to please and quick-tempered. Prince Dolgoruky appears a gentleman and to be much esteemed by the Tsar; the only inconvenience is that he understands absolutely no language but Russian. In this respect allow me to remark that the term "Muscovite" or even "Muscovy" is deeply offensive to all this court.
The Tsar rises very early, dines about ten o'clock, sups about seven and retires before nine. He drinks liquors before meals, beer and wine in the afternoon, sups very little and sometimes not at all. I have not been able to perceive any sort of council or conference for serious business, unless they discuss affairs while tippling, the Tsar deciding alone and promptly whatever is presented. This prince varies on all occasions his amusements and walks and is extraordinarily quick, impatient and very hard to please. ... He likes especially to see the water. He lives in the great apartments and sleeps in some out-of-the-way room if there by any.
To counsel the French mais d'hotel and chefs who would be preparing food for the Russian visitor, Liboy forwarded specific recommendations:
The Tsar has a head cook who prepares two or three dishes for him every day and who uses for this purpose enough wine and meat to serve a table of eight.
He is served both a meat and a Lenten dinner on Fridays and Saturdays.
He likes sharp sauces, brown and hard bread, and green peas. He eats many sweet oranges and apples and pears. He generally drinks light beer and dark vin de nuits without liquor.
In the morning he drinks aniseed water [kummel], liquors before meals, beer and wine in the afternoon. All of them fairly cold.
He eats no sweetmeats and does not drink sweetened liquors at his meals.
On May 4, Peter left Calais on the road to Paris, characteristically refusing to follow and expected route. A formal reception had been prepared for him at Amiens; he skirted the city. At Beauvais, where he saw the nave of the largest cathedral in France, still unfinished since the thirteenth century, he spumed a banquet which was offered. "I am a soldier," he told the Bishop of Beauvais, "and when I find bread and water I am content." Peter was exaggerating; he still liked wine, although he preferred his favorite Hungarian Tokay to the French varieties. "Thanks to the Hungarian wine, which here is a great rarity," he wrote to Catherine from Calais. "But there is only one bottle of vodka left. I don't know what to do."
At noon on May 7, at Beaumont-sur-Oise, twenty-five miles northeast of Paris, Peter found the marshal de Tesse waiting for him with a procession of royal carriages and an escort of red-coated cavalry, of the Maison de Roi. Tesse, standing beside the Tsar's carriage, made a deep, low bow, flourishing his hat, as Peter stepped out. Peter greatly admired the Marshal's carriage and chose to ride in it as he entered the capital through the Porte St.
Denis. But he did not want Tesse in the carriage with him, preferring instead three of his own Russians. Tesse, whose duty was to please, followed in another carriage.
The procession arrived at the Louvre at nine p.m. Peter entered the palace and walked through the late Queen Mother's apartments which had been prepared for him. As Kurakin had predicted, the Tsar found them too magnificent and too brilliantly lighted. While there, Peter looked at a dinner table which had been superbly set for him and sixty people, but he only nibbled some bread and radishes, tasted six kinds of wine and drank two glasses of beer. Then he returned to his carriage and, with his suite following, drove to the Hotel Lesdiguieres. Peter liked this better, although here, too, he found the rooms assigned to him to be too large and luxuriously furnished and ordered his own camp bed to be placed in a small dressing room.