Negotiating with the Russians

On March 10, 1785, a thirty-two-year-old French ambassador, LouisPhilippe Segur, arrived at Saint-Petersburg to present his credentials at the court of the fifty-six-year-old Catherine II. In view of the record of failures to establish closer ties between France and Russia, particularly in commerce, the attraction of a charming young man at the court was perhaps the sole hopeful omen for this mission. Indeed, not even the most sanguine would have expected this latest effort to bear fruit. From the time of the abortive treaty negotiations in 1717, through the extended period of treaty proposals of 1745 and 1761, both the French and the Russians had tried without success to trade directly with one another and to rid themselves of Dutch and English intermediaries.1 Countless projects and counterprojects had gathered dust in the archives of both governments. Choiseul, the French secretary for foreign affairs during the Seven Years' War, summed up candidly the sorry record of such proposals a quarter of a century before S6gur's departure for Russia

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