“Sometimes he discovered the gene! of an eagle, sometimes the frivolity of a child,” Segur wrote further about him.
Whereas objects forced him to act, little things stopped his actions; no one drew up any project as quickly as he did; no one carried out his projects so slowly and refused to have them completed as easily as he did. Having been busy setting up factories, he didn’t care about them: having bought something, he was now ready to sell this thing; often he overturned what only he himself had built. Music or some poem distracted him from occupying himself with any political issue; with his frivolity he often deprived himself of the trust necessary for matters requiring consistency and constancy." Vorontsov complained that he left the most important papers on his desk, so that state affairs did not remain secret. This is some kind of bundle of anti-corruption, you involuntarily think, reading the description of Potemkin made by de Line. In the dfl itself, this is how he describes Catherine’s chief minister: “Showing the appearance of a liar, he works incessantly; does not have a table, the edge of his flasks, another comb, the edge of his nails; he always lies down, but does not indulge in sleep, neither day nor night; restless before the onset of danger, and rejoices when it has come; despondent in pleasures; unhappy from what is happy; impatiently desires - and soon gets bored with everything; a thoughtful philosopher, a skillful politician, and instead a spoiled 9-year-old child; he loves God, fears Satan, whom he reveres much more powerfully and powerfully than himself.
myself; crosses himself with one hand and greets women with the other; accepts countless awards, and immediately distributes them; It is better to love to give than to pay debts; extremely rich, but never has money; talk about theology with generals, and about military affairs with bishops; in turn he has the appearance of an eastern satrap, or an amiable courtier of Louis XG, and instead of a pampered sybarite. What is his magic? Geny, then and another genius; natural intelligence, excellent memory, sublimity of soul, cunning without malice, cunning without guile, a happy mix of quirks, great generosity in distributing rewards, extreme subtlety, the gift of guessing what he himself does not know, and the greatest knowledge of people; this is truly a portrait of Alcibiades." He can be compared either with Achilles," says de Ligne, "or with Thersites. “There is a lot in him that is gigantic, romantic and barbaric.” “A great man, great in mind, great in stature,” Suvorov said about Potemkin, and added that his attic was well furnished. “A half-educated and half-wild genius, Potemkin filled the world with his glory,” another of his contemporary, gr. Ribopierre.
And Potemkin’s appearance is full of the same contradictions, the same duality. He is the strongest favorite of the most fickle of women, and yet he is not at all good-looking, even more “he is scary and disgusting,” his contemporaries say about him. Huge in stature, disproportionately built, with dark skin; his legs are crooked, one eye is askew,
another slBpoy - he lost it in a quarrel with Alexey Orlov, it is unknown how; “The one-eyed cyclops,” the courtiers call him. It is no wonder that he could not be persuaded to allow a portrait to be painted of himself, as Catherine testifies. And his manners are not graceful; In the Hermitage, special humorous rules were developed for visitors to the empress’s close circle on how to behave; there was a special paragraph for Potemkin: “They ask you to be cheerful, but not to destroy, break or bite anything.” In moments of blues one could wait for the most holy thing...
X.
RUSSIAN PRINCE AND FRENCH COUNT.
The French king's ambassador, Count Segur, did not forget his first attack with Potemkin. The Swedish prince received him unusually. “I asked the prince in writing to give me an audience,” says Segur: “On the day appointed for me, I showed up, told him to report about myself, and sat in the reception hall, where several Russian nobles and Count Kobenzel were waiting. It was unpleasant for me to wait. A quarter of an hour passed, and the door was still not open.” I opened the door; I once again announced myself. They announced that the prince could not receive me yet; then I said that I had no time to wait, to the surprise of those present, and calmly went home.