Sweden) at Bender under the protection of the Sultan of Turkey. Here his last days were constantly troubled by the fear that he might be delivered up to the agents of the Tsar. For losing sight of more immediate advantages, Peter now showed himself determined to secure the person of the old comrade in arms who had so traitorously deserted him. But the Ottoman Sultan, in spite of bribes of money and offers even more advantageous, remained loyal to the Cossack chieftain. In their misfortune, a warm friendship appears to have united Mazeppa and the fallen hero Charles. All through the last illness of the former hetman, the young monarch continued to encourage the dying veteran with hopes of future success and revenge. Although Charles after a series of extraordinary adventures was at last restored to his native land, Mazeppa was unable to bear the double weight of years and misfortune. At the age of eighty he died in the Turkish camp without learning of the disaster which soon after overtook his great enemy the Tsar, in the full tide of his success at the battle of the Pruth.
CHAPTER VII
THE EXD: LITTLE RUSSIA
NOT the least important result of the battle of Poltava was the subjection of the greater part of the Free Ukraine to the will of the Russian crown. Although a majority of the Cossack inhabitants had refused to follow the lead of Mazeppa and might, therefore, have maintained in all fairness their rights to a continuation of the old privileges, the determination of Peter the Great to carryout his unifying reforms soon set definite boimds to the autonomy of the "settlements."
Even those most loyal to the Russian aUiance could not see without sorrow the abrogation of privileges which dated from the days of Bogdan. Moreover, even in the most Russianized districts, the Tsar's suspicion of these turbulent, half -alien subjects soon led to further vexations and laws restricting their ancient Cossack liberties.
Peter's first act, after a strong military occupation had secured the imperial hold, was to require of the hetman and the principal Cossack dignitaries an oath of allegiance identical in form to that imposed upon the majority of his subjects. Hence-
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forth the Tsar was legally "Autocrat" and the Ukraine became officially known by the hateful title as "the Province of Little Russia."
At the same time a demand was made upon each of the Cossack polki or regiments for a contingent of men to be incorporated among the troops of the Russian army. By this means it was clearly indicated that the Cossacks of the Ukraine were now considered liable to regular military service like any other subjects of the empire. This policy also effectually weakened the power of resistance which the regiments furnished by the stanitzi might have opposed to Peter's "reforms" had they remained at their full strength.
In order to accentuate the changes which the old "Free Cossack" regime had suffered separate courts of justice were established at Joukhoff to administer the new Russian law instead of the old Cossack law based upon the "Institutes of Magdeburg." The only appeal from this tribunal lay in the courts of the empire and not, as heretofore, in the great Cossack reunions or the Council of Elders of each stanitza.
Meanwhile, in his camp at Bender, sometimes treated by the Turk as a distinguished prisoner, again consulted as an ally, Charles XII continued his intrigues against the Tsar and his vehement appeals to the powers of Europe to be allowed to return to his kingdom.
After the death of Mazeppa, Charles had con-
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tinued on terms of friendly intimacy with Peter Orlick, who had been elected Hetman of the Zaporogians. The new chief of the former Free Republic was now wholly under the influence of his Turkish patrons. Although such base sycophancy offended the turbulent orthodoxy of his companions, Orlick affected even the dress of the Ottoman protectors. In order to make his position more secure, he also married a Tartar woman chosen in the seraglio of the Khan of the Crimea. His conduct could not fail to widen the breach which already existed betr^'een the Zaporogians and the Cossacks of the Ukraine.
But Peter still viewed with suspicion the border population of his new province. Any Cossack suspected of intercourse with the Zaporogians was cruelly put to death or transported to the pestilential marshes of Lake Ladoga, where tremendous drainage works were in progress in the neighbourhood of the new capital. This harsh treatment aroused widespread discontent throughout the Ukraine, and aware of this spirit of revolt, both the Turks and Zaporogians were encouraged to attempt once more an invasion of the Russian frontier.