This Peter Tolstoy held a commission in the Guards, and fought in the Azof campaign of 1696; but later on he went abroad to study shipbuilding when Peter the Great was seeking volunteers for that purpose. He was sent in 1701 as Ambassador to the Sublime Porte, and in the years 1710-1713, when political affairs were critical, he twice suffered severe imprisonment in the Seven Towers--the stronghold wherein the Sultan occasionally confined the ambassadors of States with whose conduct he felt dissatisfied. Returning to Russia in 1714, Tolstoy obtained the favour of Prince Ménshikof and became a Minister of State. He married; but his wife does not appear to have been of sufficient importance for any one to have said anything about her. He accompanied Peter the Great to Holland and France, and rendered him an important though discreditable service. Peter the Great's son, the refractory Alexis, who disliked his father's reforms, had escaped from Russia and was living with his mistress Euphrosyne at St. Elmo, near Naples. By threats and promises, and by the aid of this woman, Tolstoy induced the unfortunate Tsarévitch to return to Russia, and when he had got him there, took a leading part in his trial and secret execution. 30 Aug. 1725 For this service Tolstoy received large estates and was promoted to the headship of the Secret Chancellery. On the day of the coronation of Peter's second wife, Catherine, Tolstoy was made a Count. His coat of arms shows seven towers, in memory of his imprisonment by the Sultan, and is appropriately supported by two wolf-hounds rampant, looking outwards. 6 May 1727, 1729 On the death of Peter the Great, Tolstoy actively supported Ménshikof in securing the throne for Catherine the First, and he was one of the seven members of the Upper Secret Council which practically ruled Russia. On the question of choosing a successor to Catherine, he ventured however to oppose Ménshikof. The latter was too powerful for him; and forfeiting his title of Count and deprived of all offices rewards and estates, Tolstoy, at the age of eighty-two, was banished for life to the Solovétz Monastery, situated on an island in the White Sea. Here, two years later, he died. Ménshikof himself, one may remark in passing, finished his life that same year in Siberia, having been banished by an order signed by the boy he had placed on the throne. To be a Russian Minister of State in those days was almost as dangerous as it is in our times to be a revolutionary conspirator. The title of Count was revived in the family in 1770, for the benefit of Peter Tolstoy's grandson; whose son, Count Elias Tolstoy (he figures in _War and Peace_ as the elder Count Rostóf), was the grandfather of Leo Tolstoy, whose life this book narrates.