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New combinations of armies arose and new labyrinths of intrigue were woven, and for several years wars, with their usual successes and disasters, continued to impoverish and depopulate the nations of Europe. At length the tzar effected a peace with Sweden, that kingdom surrendering to him the large and important provinces of Livonia, Esthonia, Ingria and Carelia.
Hanover received Bremen and Verden; Prussia, the largest part of Pomerania; Sweden gave up its freedom from custom duties in the Sound. Augustus was recognized as king of Poland. Russia, by the Peace of Nystadt , obtained Livonia, Esthonia, Ingermannland, and a part of Carelia, but restored Finland. Sweden no longer had a place among the great powers.
Patgul hastened from Poland to Moscow, and urged Peter to unite with Augustus, in a war against Sweden, assuring him that thus he could easily regain the provinces of Ingria and Carelia, which Sweden had wrested from his ancestors. Denmark also, under its new sovereign, Frederic IV., was induced to enter into the alliance with Russia and Poland against Sweden.
The Swedes, still encouraged by the intrigues of France, refused to listen to any terms of accommodation, unless Carelia, and the other conquests of the czar Peter, should be restored. The French court had expected to bring over the new empress to their measures; but they found her as well disposed as her predecessor to assist the house of Austria.
They had visited the sacred islands near the coast of Carelia, the convent of Solovetsk, the convent of Troitsa, those of Saint Antony and Saint Theodosia, at Kiev, that of Kazan, as well as the church of the Old Believers, and they were now on their way to Irkutsk, wearing the robe, the cowl, and the clothes of serge.
Finland, Ingria, Livonia, Esthonia, Carelia, and other districts east of the Baltic, then were Swedish provinces; and the possession of Pomerania, Rugen, and Bremen, made her an important member of the Germanic empire. These territories are now all reft from her; and the most valuable of them form the staple of her victorious rival's strength.
Sweden, when he came to the throne, had risen to a high rank among the powers of Europe. In addition to its original dominion, it possessed the whole of Finland, the finest part of Pomerania, on the southern shores of the Baltic, and also Livonia, Carelia, Ingria, Wismar, Viborg, the Duchies of Bremen and Verden, and other realms, all of long possession and secured by conquest and treaty.
Everywhere else all along the Baltic coast, in Esthonia, in Carelia, and in Courland though the Swedes might be driven out, the Germans still remained firmly settled; the neighborhood of their native country and of the springs of Teutonic culture enduing them with an invincible power of resistance.
The event of his reign, however, which most completely changed the relative situation of Russia, and established her as a commercial nation, was the conquest from Sweden of Livonia, Ingria, and Carelia. Scarcely were these provinces secured to him, when he built, first Cronstadt, and then St. Petersburgh.
In the meantime, the peace between Russia and Sweden was concluded, on condition that the czar should retain Livonia, Ingria, Estonia, part of Carelia, and of the territory of Wyburg, Riga, Revel, and Nerva, in consideration of his restoring part of Finland, and paying two millions of rix-dollars to the king of Sweden.
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