Note 143 — NAPOLEON'S RETREAT FROM MOSCOW.
Reading edition
Mazeppa: a Pole, who having been detected in a crime was bound to the back of a wild horse and carried by the animal to the country of the Cossacks. There he became head of the Cossack forces, and when Peter the Great attempted to seize that country, Mazeppa formed an alliance with Charles XII. of Sweden for the independence of the Cossacks.