If you
seek an office, if you have invented any thing for promoting the welfare
of the country, if you have found any official abuse, or discovered
any conspiracy, then go to Bestuscheff or to Woronzow, or also to
Lestocq--spare me! But when you have a grace to demand, when you need
money, when you desire a title or orders, then come to me, and I will
satisfy your wishes. We have much money, many ribbons for orders, and
as for titles, they are the cheapest and most convenient of all, as they
cost absolutely nothing. Ah, a jest just now occurs to me. We will
amuse ourselves a little to-day. We will have a title-auction. Call our
courtiers, attendants, and servants. We shall have a gay time of it! We
will have a game at dice. Bring the dice! I will at each throw announce
the prize, and the dice shall then decide who is the winner!"
They all gathered around her; the noble gentlemen of her body-guard,
consisting of the grenadiers who had been raised to nobility and created
officers at the commencement of her reign. They came noisily, with
singing and laughing, and saluting their empress, Elizabeth, with a
thundering _viva_.
"First of all, let us drink your health, sir captain!" said she,
ordering wine to be brought, as well as brandy of the costly sort she
had lately received as a present from the greatest distiller of her
capital, to which she herself was very partial.
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