Upon which, in all silence, they make for Petersburg, for Moscow; travel rapidly, arrive successfully, in spite of the grim season.

["At Moscow, 7th (18th) February, 1744."] Conversion to the Greek Religion, change of name from Sophie-Frederike to Catherine-Alexiewna ("Let it be Catherine," said Elizabeth, "my dear mother's name!"-- little brown Czarina's, whom we have seen):--all this was completed by the 12th of July following.

And, in fine, next year (September 1st, 1745), Peter Federowitz and this same Catherine-Alexiewna, second-cousins by blood, were vouchsafed the Nuptial Benediction, and, with invocation of the Russian Heaven and Russian Earth, were declared to be one flesh, [Ranke, iii.

129; _Memoires de Catherine II._ (Catherine's own very curious bit of Autobiography;--published by Mr.Herzen, London, 1859), pp.
7-46.]--though at last they turned out to be TWO FLESHES, as my reader well knows! Some eighteen or nineteen years hence, we may look in upon them again, if there be a moment to spare.

This is Marriage first; a purely Russian one; built together and launched on its course, so to say, by Friedrich at Berlin, who had his own interest in it.
Marriage Second, done at Berlin in the same months, was of still more interesting sort to Friedrich and us: that of Princess Ulrique to the above-named Adolf Friedrich, future King of Sweden.