Peter also sent fifty men of the highest families in Russia to Italy, Holland, and England, to study the art of ship-building. Peter himself visited Holland and England that he might learn ship-building. “One thing, however, he could not learn there, and that was the construction of galleys and galliots, such as were used in the Mediterranean, and would be serviceable in the Bosphorus and on the coast of the Crimea. For this he desired to go to Venice.”[46] This clearly shows us that Peter had conceived the idea of establishing a strong navy on the Black Sea.
The revolt of the streltsi recalled him home; however, he found no difficulty in suppressing the insurrection.
After this, he sent an envoy to the Ottoman Empire to obtain permission for the Russian fleet to enter the Black Sea, to which the Porte replied: “The Black Sea and all its coasts are ruled by the Sultan alone. They have never been in the possession of any other Power, and since the Turks have gained sovereignty over this sea, from time immemorial no foreign ship has ever sailed its water, nor ever will sail them.”
Meanwhile Charles XII., King of Sweden, began to assume an attitude of hostility to Peter, and the Battle of Narva was fought, where Peter was miserably defeated. After this war, Charles made Russia the great object of his attack instead of Poland. He said, “I will treat with the Czar at Moscow.” Peter replied, “My brother Charles wishes to play the part of Alexander, but he will not find me Darius.” The Battle of Pultawa (1709) soon decided Peter’s superiority, and the Peace of Nystadt (1721) added the Baltic provinces and a number of islands in the Baltic to Russia.
In 1703 “a great window for Russia to look out at Europe”—so Count Algaratti called St. Petersburg—was made by Peter on the marshes of the Neva. This step firmly established Russian power on the Baltic.
But to establish Russian power on the Baltic at all was as great a mistake as ever has been committed by so shrewd a statesman as Peter the Great. The predominance of Russia in the Baltic with her strong navy threatened the interest of the commerce and carrying-trade of the English and Dutch. Hence it was natural enough that England and Holland, two great maritime powers, should have joined to protect their interest in the Baltic as well as the integrity of Sweden against Russian aggression. In the case of the Northern War, England had formed an alliance with Sweden and sent her fleet to the Baltic under command of Admiral Norris to prevent the Russian sway on those waters.