Anne entered into an elaborate explanation, and assured the czar that the insult did not originate from any wrong intended by her or her ministers, but arose from the rudeness of a tradesman. But his Russian highness was by no means satisfied, so he wrote a very formidable document requesting "the high and mighty Princess Anne, Queen of Great Britain and Ireland, to return him, by bearer, the head of Morton, the lace dealer of Covent Garden, together with the heads and hands of any of his aids and abettors in the assault upon Prince Matveof that her majesty might have incarcerated in her dungeons and prisons." The queen was perfectly amazed at this demand for the heads and hands of her subjects, and requested her secretary "to assure the czar that she had not the disposal of {465}any heads in her kingdom excepting those forfeited by the infraction of certain laws, which Mr. Morton and his assistants had not trespassed." The czar either could not, or would not, understand that Englishmen did not have their heads and hands chopped off at the caprice of the crown, and an angry correspondence was continued between the Russian and English governments for two years. At last a happy idea struck the queen, and she sent Mr. Whitworth, a gentleman who understood Russian customs, to say, "that although nothing had been acted against Prince Matveof but what the English law allowed, yet those laws were very bad and inhospitable ones, and that her majesty had had them repealed, so that his imperial highness's ambassadors could never again be subjected to such an injury." This was no compliment, but a fact; for from that incident laws were caused to be made that protected ambassadors and their suites from arrest, which are in force to the present day. Such laws were sadly needed during Queen Anne's reign to prevent scenes of violence; for ambassadors took precedence according to the supposed rank of the sovereigns they represented. This being the case, the representatives of France and Spain, the two countries that were always at war, had a regular fight, aided by their retinues, at all public processions; they even went so far as to cut the traces of each other's coaches, lest the line should be broken and one dash in before the other. It is needless to say that the London populace immensely enjoyed such contests, and the "roughs" invariably gathered where the "mounseers," as they called them, were most likely to begin the fight. Sometimes they were quite serious, and more than one man lost his life while combating for position. {466} CHAPTER XIV.