Virginia Rounding Libri

1927. This work is primarily a story wherein Anthony has woven the portrait of a real woman into the pattern of 18th Century politics. The reader is introduced to Catherine, the statesman, who unites Russia, destroys Poland and participates in the American Revolutionary War. The reader also sees Catherine, the jealous mistress of men, who at sixty has a lover of twenty-five. The book has particular interest in its bearing on Catherine's celebrated love life.

Many legends have grown up about the sexual rapacity of Catherine the Great. Unhappily married to the Grand Duke Peter, a man who preferred to play with his toy soldiers in the bedroom, they failed to produce an heir, and Catherine turned her attentions to a certain Sergey Saltykov who fathered the future Tsar Paul I.