That his military abilities were of the very highest order, may be judged of by the fact that, with the resources of the poor monarchy of Sweden, not at that period containing two millions of inhabitants, he entirely defeated a coalition of Russia, Denmark, and Poland, headed by the vast capacity and persevering energy of Peter the Great, and numbering not less than forty millions of subjects under its various sovereigns. Nor let it be said that these nations were rude in the military art, and unfit to contend in the field with the descendants of the followers of Gustavus Adolphus. The Danes are the near neighbours and old enemies of the Swedes; their equals in population, discipline, and warlike resources. Thirty years had not elapsed since the Poles had delivered Europe from Mussulman bondage by the glorious victory of Vienna, under John Sobieski, over two hundred thousand Turks. Europe has since had too much reason to know what are the military resources of Russia, against which all the power of Western Europe, in recent times, has been so signally shattered; and though the soldiers of Peter the Great were very different, in point of discipline, from those that repelled the legions of Napoleon, yet their native courage was the same, and they were directed by an energy and perseverance, on the part of the Czar, which never has been exceeded in warlike annals. What then must have been the capacity of the sovereign, who, with the resources of a monarchy not equalling those of Scotland at this time, could gain such extraordinary success over so powerful a coalition, from the mere force of indefatigable energy, military ability, and heroic determination!