TheCodeBreakers
Thus the French ambassador, Marquis de la Chetardie, knew well
that his dispatches were being opened. But they were enciphered, and, in
the manner of diplomats everywhere, he felt safe because he thought that
the Russians were too dumb to break his cipher. He may have been right
about Russians, but three Germans in the black chamber were making
mince pie out of it. He erred in writing home with a deplorable lack of
gallantry about the Czarina, remarking that she was "given entirely to
her pleasures" and was "so frivolous and so dissipated." The
interceptions were seen as a matter of course by Count Aleksey
Bestuzhev-Ryumin, grand chancellor of the imperial court. He had been
waiting to strike back at Chetardie, who had organized a cabal against
him because of his Anglophile tendencies. He showed the solutions to
Elizabeth, who, blinded by her own French leanings, refused to believe
them until he deciphered them in her presence
annaabi.ee 
