1895.] Insanity in Royal Families. 125 
brain could conceive or execute the prodigies of cruelty, de- 
bauchery and lust that characterize the beast within the man 
where it has gained the upper hand. 
There is no doubt that Peter the Great, like other great ge- 
niuses, as for instance Mahomet and Napoleon, suffered from 
epileptiform attacks, and in his fits of frenzy was not respon- 
sible for his acts. Another factor may be taken into account 
in estimating the character of Peter the Great, namely his 
prolonged bouts of drunkenness, during which he would swal- 
low incredible quantities of brandy. In these orgies Peter 
would find pleasure in pouring brandy through a funnel down 
the throat of some wretched courtier who had succumbed 
sooner than himself; a practical joke ending in the death of 
the victim. But the most gruesome incident in the life of 
Peter the Great was the death of his son Alexis. Alexis much 
resembled the ill-fated Don Carlos; his wife, a German prin- 
cess, after five years of misery refused medicine and food, and 
was glad to find an esċapein death ; he was violently reaction- 
ary in his opinions, and Peter honestly believed that his hard- 
ly won reforms would be utterly undone if Alexis were his 
successor. But after the discovery of a formidable plot on the 
part of his son, Peter, determined to extort the whole truth, 
ordered Alexis to be flogged. Finding no one who would 
venture to execute his commands, Peter, mad with rage, pro- 
ceeded to flog Alexis, (as he used formerly to flog his first 
wife,) till he left the wretched prince for dead on the floor; 
when he stalked out exclaiming “ You need not alarm your- 
selves, the devil is not ready for him yet.” During the next 
twenty-four hours the miserable sufferer was again twice flog- 
ged, and under the third application of the knout he died. 
The father’s repentance was terrible and lasting; as chief 
mourner he followed his mangled son to the grave, crying as 
David did for Absalom, that he would willingly have died for 
his son. And when he again lashed himself into insane fury, 
it was to wash out his son’s death in the blood of those who 
had tempted him to crime. 
The next sovereign who calls for remark, Peter III, was 
grandson of Peter the Great through his daughter Anna. If 
