Chapter 17 017 Will the garden construction presented to the Tsar finally be settled in Gatchina?

Chapter 17 017 Will the garden construction presented to the Tsar finally be settled in Gatchina?
Tsar Paul was not happy about winning money from playing cards, but he also said that Kutuzov had to show his true ability. Then he suffered consecutive defeats. He lost a lot of money, but was very happy about it. This made Rostopchin very happy too, at least he won back a lot, and since the emperor was happy, he would definitely reward him.

Kutuzov and Rostopchin each received a silver pocket watch. Many of the items in the Tsar's palace were made in large quantities during the reign of Empress Catherine. A lot of these luxurious items of life also cost a lot of money, and money was spent like water.

At least after Paul ascended the throne, he found that Russia's financial situation was not optimistic. He had melted a lot of silver products to issue silver rubles, and at the same time burned invalid banknotes to curb inflation, but the effects were not good.

The Tsar still had to be extravagant, but reforms had to go on. The rewards he gave to his close ministers were essentially no different from those of previous Tsars, and he still spent money like water.

After all, he is an emperor and always has to maintain his own appearance.

Count Bobulinski was not surprised by the scene of his brother playing cards. When Paul was still the crown prince, he often played cards and chess. He knew that he was bad at chess, but his card playing skills were not high. If everyone at the card table played randomly, no one would be able to tell their level.

"Ah, Alyosha, here you come."

"Your Majesty, I am here."

"Don't tell me yet. Let me guess what you want. If you don't have enough money, I can increase your pension. If you are not satisfied with the house in Petersburg, I can change it to a better one. If there are not enough serfs in the manor, this is not allowed now. I just issued a law."

Count Bobulinski just shook his head when he heard his brother say this.

"neither?"

"Your Majesty, I have lived a good life in Upper Palen and St. Petersburg. If there is any flaw, it is that I want to build a garden in the manor, and I want a Chinese-style garden. But after I got the blueprint of the Voronzovo Manor, a grenadier adjutant who helped me said that it was not a real Chinese-style building, from the pagoda to the garden, it was not suitable."

After listening to it, Paul was quite interested. After all, Chinese style was popular in French culture. There were many French masters in the Enlightenment who played Chinese roles, especially Voltaire.

Also, he himself considered himself to be an admirer of Prussian culture, while old Fritz from Prussia said that he was an admirer of French culture.

"Will such a thing happen?"

"Yes, Your Majesty."

If it were a more relaxed occasion, without the presence of courtiers and the two generals, Count Bobulinski might have been able to speak more freely, even in his address.

“What are the problems?”

"Your Majesty, what Count Bobulinski said is a kind of unauthentic Chinese style. It's like the pickled cucumbers and pickled fat of the peasants in the countryside. The peasants would say that it's okay for us to eat these things, but the masters and the emperor are not used to eating them."

Kutuzov came out to interrupt at this time and made Tsar Paul laugh. You have to know that those generals did not have this kind of sense of humor. Although Suvorov had some sense of humor, he was against Paul all day long. His apprentice was extremely cunning and good at making his leader happy. Otherwise, Paul would still be willing to employ the old marshal who had never lost a battle. Other veterans were not very suitable.

"That's true, Mikhail Illarionovitch, but you must have eaten pickles and lard, whatever you can get in a war."

His poker partner Rostopchin said unhappily that Kutuzov did not forget to eat and drink even during the war.

"Well, that's it. If I sit at home, or sit with the emperor, I can also eat some good food."

Kutuzov and Rostopchin did not say much, but they showed an optimistic attitude as always. In order to win the favor of the emperor, they always tried to find ways to make jokes. Anyway, as long as the emperor was happy, they would live a comfortable life. Paul even felt deep sympathy for the serfs sometimes, but his temper was unpredictable, which was not a good habit.

Paul was very happy because he won the money, the ministers told him the truth again, and his brother came to the court again. The atmosphere was very relaxed at this time.

"No wonder you always look for food there. Well, Mikhail Illarionovich, what do you think of the garden?"

"You know, Your Majesty, my father is a lieutenant general of engineers. If it's building a fortress, it's fine. Gardening requires art, and art requires some inspiration." "But war is also an art, and King Frederick the Great loves music. It can be said that military and art have something in common."

"But your majesty, being on the battlefield and smelling the smoke and corpses is another matter. People who have never been to the battlefield, or even to the royal parade ground, will not feel it."

Paul often went to the parade ground, because he was the Tsar and had few opportunities to go out to fight. It was not like the time of Peter the Great, and few of the Tsars before him led the troops to fight in person.

After all, he was just watching the troops on the parade ground at home, but he had smelled the smell of gunpowder many times on the training ground in Gatchina, so these words were not an offense to him. He was always somewhat tolerant of his favorite ministers and generals.

"Besides, a war that determines the fate of a country has nothing to do with art! If we had been able to send troops to France a few years ago, we wouldn't be facing such a situation now! And we shouldn't be involved in a war now. There must be a good reason to fight a war. Alyosha, you have been to France, what is it like there?"

"Your Majesty, I've also been to Italy. To be honest, Paris isn't that great. Otherwise, our diplomats wouldn't always want to go to Italy and Spain, or to our mortal enemies, the damn Turks. These places are more civilized. Unfortunately, the capital of France, which is obviously the center of culture, is sometimes not what we imagined."

"No wonder French nobles like to live in villas in the countryside or palaces in the suburbs of Paris. According to what you said, Paris is indeed not as good as those cities in Italy, and it is far inferior to Petersburg."

"The simplest thing, Your Majesty, is that Paris is not easy to get water. For a city like this, the water supply system is not very good."

"Indeed, but I have thought about it, friends," Paul said in a strong tone, and gestured to the court servants, "Sit down, sit down, it's best to drink tea at this time, and then have some jam and bread, people always need to fill their stomachs. And, Mikhail Illarionovich, you have been playing cards, and you, Count, need some snacks to relieve this. As for the gardens we mentioned, and the water supply in Paris, it is indeed necessary to pay attention to it. The water supply in Voronzovo is good. It has its own pond and running water, which is much better than being crowded in Paris."

"So."

Count Bobulinski was about to speak when Tsar Paul spoke directly.

"If you want to build a garden, that's fine. I also want to build one in Gatchina as a place for the royal family to escape the summer heat."

At the latitude of St. Petersburg, the days are long in the summer and the nights are short. The light is long but it is very cool, which is a good place to go in the summer. The Chinese garden is the place that Tsar Paul wanted to imitate Frederick the Great. It is also the work that every Tsar must do when he is in power. The civil engineering work carried out is not only palaces, but sometimes also manors and cities, as well as some villages.

There are also considerations for who will build it. Paul let his brother put his name here, which was an opportunity for him to gain benefits. All the czars in history would do this. Building a palace, garden or other houses and parks is still a good thing. If Paul's other son was in power, the Russian state-owned railways would become a place for abusing power to benefit his family.

In comparison, in 1797, the masters at that time had a relatively simple and robust way of making money. They did not have as many cunning schemes as people later on. They just took on a project and made money. It was a kind of institutional and technical adjustment.

"Well, Your Majesty, I have thought about building such a garden. It would be best if we could transform a swamp on the edge of the Imperial Village without affecting the surrounding environment. At the same time, we could bring in water. I already have the blueprint."

"I told you, Alyosha, you must have thought it through before you came here. It's not like when mother was still alive, when you saw a pretty maid and said you liked her."

When it comes to pursuing young girls, Paul is more envious of his younger brother, after all, he can freely choose who he likes.

As for contracting this project, Count Bobulinski still found a professional construction team. He had to show his ability in front of his royal brother. He was the illegitimate son of Peter III's enemy and the empress. Although his royal brother attached more importance to family affection and treated him very well, and rewarded him almost continuously in the past few months, he always had to behave himself and do things seriously sometimes, or find a place where he could not be seen and be a happy manor owner.

After he got the job, he called back Solovyov, who was still in Upper Palen and building a factory on his estate. After all, he understood Chinese construction.

Solovyov himself had to put down his work. The count was the big moneymaker at this stage, and everything that needed to be done in Upper Palen had been done. What remained was to ensure that the transportation from the manor to Tallinn or St. Petersburg could be smoothly connected to regular roads. The Baltic coast was a "German-speaking area" after all, and the roads here were much better than those in inland Russia.

As for when he arrived in St. Petersburg, Count Bobulinsky asked him to go to Tsarskoye Selo and start choosing a location.

"You want me to do this, but I'm afraid I can't do it."

"It doesn't matter. Just come and check on me every few months."

(End of this chapter)