His first toys were drums and swords, and he first studied history from colored German prints; and as he grew older never wearied of reading about Ivan the Terrible.
His delight was to go out upon the streets of Moscow and pick up strange bits of information from foreign adventurers about the habits and customs of their countries.

He played at soldiers with his boy companions, and after finding how they did such things in Germany and in England, drilled his troops after the European fashion.

But it was when he first saw a boat so built that it could go with or against the wind, that his strongest instinct was awakened.

He would not rest until he had learned how to make and then to manage it.

When this strange, passionate, self-willed boy was seventeen years old, he realized that his sister was scheming for the ruin of himself and his mother.