Note 40 — Chapter II
Reading edition
Ch. MSS. In his Mémoires Secrets, &c. (London, 1781), Petit de Bachaumont states that D’Eon was sent as fencing-master to the Grand-Duke Peter, who had wished for one; a piece of information he obtained in all probability from the Count de Guerchy, who told George III. a similar story. He adds that D’Eon was at the same time entrusted to arrange with the grand-duke for the reception of a French ambassador at St. Petersburg; as manifest an absurdity, there being at the Russian Court no person more hostile to French interests than Peter.