entering, informed me that the carriages I had ordered were ready. I
told him, while handing him my letter for the Empress, that he might
inform the gentlemen and ladies who did not wish to accompany me to the
theatre, that I would dispense with their attendance. The Count received
my letter, winking his usual wink, but as it was addressed to her
Imperial Majesty, he dared not refuse it. He also gave my message to the
equerries and ladies, and it was his Imperial Highness who decided who
was to go with me, and who was to remain with him. I passed through the
ante-chamber, where I found him seated with the Countess Voronzoff,
playing at cards in a corner. He rose, and she also, when he saw me--a
thing which, on other occasions, he never did. In this ceremony I
replied by a low curtsey, and passed on. I went to the theatre, where
the Empress did not come on that occasion. I fancy it was my letter
which prevented her. On my return, Count Schouvaloff told me that her
Imperial Majesty would have an interview with me herself. The Count
would seem to have informed the Grand Duke of my letter and the reply of
the Empress, for, although from that time he never set foot in my room,
he used his utmost endeavours to be present at the interview which the
Empress was to have with me, and it was considered that this could not
well be refused. While waiting for this interview to take place, I kept
myself quiet, in my own apartments. I felt persuaded that if the
Schouvaloffs had had any idea of sending me home, or of frightening me
with the threats of doing so, I had taken the best method of
disconcerting the project; for nowhere were they likely to meet with
greater resistance to it than in the mind of the Empress herself, who
was not at all inclined to strong measures of this kind; besides, she
remembered the old misunderstandings in her own family, and certainly
would not wish to see them renewed in her time. Against me there could
be only one point of complaint, which was, that her worthy nephew did
not appear to me the most amiable of men, any more than I appeared to
him the most amiable of women; and, as regarded this nephew, her
opinions exactly coincided with my own. She knew him so well that for
many years past she could not spend a quarter of an hour in his society
without feeling disgust, or anger, or sorrow, and in her chamber, when
he happened to be the subject of conversation, she would either melt
into tears at the misfortune of having such a successor, or she would be
unable to speak of him without exhibiting her contempt, and often
applied to him epithets which he but too well merited. I have proofs of
this in my hands, having found among her papers two notes written by her
own hand, to whom I do not know, though one of them appears to have been
for John Schouvaloff, and the other for Count Rasoumowsky, in which she
curses her nephew, and wishes him at the devil. In one occurs this
expression, "_My damned nephew has greatly vexed me_;" and in another
she says, "_My nephew is a fool, the devil take him_." Besides, my mind
was made up, and I looked upon my being sent away, or not, with a very
philosophic eye. In whatever position it should please Providence to
place me, I should never be without those resources which talent and
determination give to each one according to his natural abilities, and I
felt myself possessed of sufficient courage either to mount or descend
without being carried away by undue pride on the one hand, or being
humbled and dispirited on the other. I knew that I was a human being,
and, therefore, of limited powers, and then incapable of perfection,
but my intentions had always been pure and good. If from the very
beginning I had perceived that to love a husband who was not amiable,
nor took any pains to be so, was a thing difficult, if not impossible;
yet, at least, I had devoted myself both to him and his interests with
all the attachment which a friend, and even a servant, could devote to
his friend and master. My counsel to him had always been the very best I
could devise for his welfare, and, if he did not choose to follow it,
the fault was not mine, but that of his own judgment, which was neither
sound nor just. When I came to Russia, and during the first years of our
union, had this Prince shown the least disposition to make himself
supportable, my heart would have been opened for him, but when I saw
that of all possible objects I was the one to whom he showed the least
possible attention, precisely because I was his wife, it is not
wonderful I should find my position neither agreeable nor to my taste,
or that I should consider it irksome, or even painful. This latter
feeling I suppressed more resolutely than any other; the pride and cast
of my disposition rendered the idea of being unhappy most repugnant to
me. I used to say to myself, happiness and misery depend on ourselves;
if you feel unhappy, raise yourself above unhappiness, and so act that
your happiness may be independent of all eventualities. With such a
disposition I was born with a great sensibility, and a face, to say the
least of it, interesting, and which pleased at first sight, without art
or effort. My disposition was naturally so conciliating, that no one
ever passed a quarter of an hour in my company without feeling perfectly
at ease, and conversing with me as if we had been old acquaintances.
Naturally indulgent, I won the confidence of those who had any relations
with me, because every one felt that the strictest probity and
good-will were the impulses which I most readily obeyed, and, if I may
be allowed the expression, I venture to assert, in my own behalf, that I
was a true gentleman, whose cast of mind was more male than female,
though, for all that, I was anything but masculine, for, joined to the
mind and character of a man, I possessed the charms of a very agreeable
woman. I trust I shall be pardoned for giving this candid expression of
my feelings, instead of seeking to throw around them a veil of false
modesty. Besides, this very writing must prove what I have asserted of
mind, disposition, and character.
I have just said that I was pleasing, consequently half the road of
temptation was already traversed, and it is in the very essence of human
nature that, in such cases, the other half should not remain untracked.
For to tempt, and to be tempted, are things very nearly allied, and, in
spite of the finest maxims of morality impressed upon the mind, whenever
feeling has anything to do in the matter, no sooner is it excited than
we have already gone vastly farther than we are aware of, and I have yet
to learn how it is possible to prevent its being excited. Flight alone
is, perhaps, the only remedy; but there are cases and circumstances in
which flight becomes impossible, for how is it possible to fly, shun, or
turn one's back in the midst of a court? The very attempt would give
rise to remarks. Now, if you do not fly, there is nothing, it seems to
me, so difficult as to escape from that which is essentially agreeable.
All that can be said in opposition to it will appear but a prudery quite
out of harmony with the natural instincts of the human heart; besides,
no one holds his heart in his hand, tightening or relaxing his grasp of
it at pleasure.
But to return to my narrative. The morning after the play, I gave out
that I was unwell, and kept my room, waiting patiently for the decision
of her Imperial Majesty upon my humble request. However, the first week
in Lent I judged it prudent to go to my duty, in order to show my
attachment to the Orthodox Church. The second or third week of Lent
brought me another bitter affliction. One morning after I had risen, my
servants informed me that Count Alexander Schouvaloff had sent for
Madame Vladislava. This I thought somewhat strange. I waited her return
anxiously, but in vain. About an hour after noon, Count Schouvaloff came
to apprise me that her Majesty the Empress had thought fit to remove
Madame Vladislava from me. I burst into tears, and said, that of course,
her Imperial Majesty had a right to remove or place with me whomsoever
she pleased, but that I was grieved to find, more and more, that all who
came near me were so many victims devoted to the displeasure of her
Imperial Majesty; and that in order that there might be fewer such
victims, I begged and entreated him to request her Majesty to send me
home to my relations as soon as possible, and thus put an end to a state
of things which compelled me to be continually making some one or other
miserable. I also assured him that the removal of Madame Vladislava
would not serve to throw any light upon anything whatever, because,
neither she nor any one else possessed any confidence. The Count was
about to reply, but hearing my sobs, he began to weep with me, and told
me that the Empress would herself speak to me on the subject. I
entreated him to hasten the moment, which he promised to do. I then went
to my attendants, related what had occurred, and added that if any
duenna I happened to dislike took the place of Madame Vladislava, she
might make up her mind to receive from me the worst possible treatment,
not even excepting blows; and I begged them to repeat this wherever they
pleased, so as to deter all who might wish to be placed about me from
being in too great haste to accept the charge, for that I was tired of
suffering, and as I saw that my mildness and patience had produced no
other result than that of making everything connected with me go from
bad to worse, I had made up my mind to change my conduct entirely. My
people did not fail to repeat all I wished.
The evening of this day, during which I had wept a great deal, walking
up and down my room, much agitated both in mind and body, one of my
maids, named Catherine Ivanovna Cheregorodskaya, came into my bed-room,
where I was quite alone, and said to me very affectionately, and with
many tears, "We are all very much afraid you will sink under these
afflictions; let me go to-day to my uncle--he is your own confessor as
well as the Empress'--I will talk to him, and tell him everything you
wish, and I promise you he will speak to the Empress in a manner that
will give you satisfaction." Perceiving her good disposition towards me,
I told her without reserve the state of matters; what I had written to
her Imperial Majesty, and everything else. She went to her uncle, and,
having talked the matter over, and disposed him to favour my cause, she
returned about eleven o'clock to tell me that her uncle advised me to
give out in the course of the night that I was ill, and wanted to
confess, and thus send for him, in order that he might be able to repeat
to the Empress what he should hear from my own lips. I very much
approved of this idea, and promised to carry it out, and then dismissed
her, thanking both herself and uncle for the attachment they displayed
for me. Accordingly, between two and three o'clock in the morning, I
rang my bell. One of my women entered. I told her I felt so unwell that
I wished to confess. In place of a confessor, Count Alexander
Schouvaloff came running to me. In a weak and broken voice I renewed my
request that my confessor should be sent to me. He sent for the doctors,
and to these I said that it was spiritual succour I stood in need of;
that I was choking. One felt my pulse, and said it was weak; I replied
that my soul was in danger, and that my body had no further need of
doctors. At length my confessor arrived, and we were left alone. I made
him sit by the side of my bed, and we had a conversation of at least an
hour and a-half in length. I described to him the state of things past
and present; the Grand Duke's conduct to me, and mine towards him; the
hatred of the Schouvaloffs, and the constant banishment, or dismissal,
of my people, and always of those who had grown most attached to me,
and, finally, the hatred of her Imperial Majesty, drawn upon me by the
Schouvaloffs; in short, the whole present position of affairs, and what
had led me to write to the Empress the letter in which I demanded to be
sent home, and I begged him to procure me a speedy reply to my prayer. I
found him with the best disposition possible for serving me, and by no
means such a fool as he was reported to be. He told me that my letter
did and would produce the effect I wished; that I must persist in my
demand to be sent home, a demand which most certainly would not be
complied with, because such a step could not be justified in the eyes of
the public, who had their attention directed towards me. He agreed that
I had been treated very cruelly; that the Empress, having chosen me at a
very tender age, had abandoned me to the mercy of my enemies; and that
she would do far better to banish my rivals, and especially Elizabeth
Voronzoff, and keep a check upon her favourites, who had become the
blood-suckers of the people, by means of the new monopolies which the
Schouvaloffs were every day devising, besides which, they were daily
giving the people cause to complain of their injustice, as witness the
affair of Count Bestoujeff, of whose innocence the public were
persuaded. He concluded by telling me that he would immediately proceed
to the Empress' apartments, where he would wait until she awoke, in
order to speak to her on the subject; and that he would then press for
the interview which she had promised me, and which ought to be decisive;
and that I would do well to keep my bed: he would add, he said, that
grief and affliction might cause my death, if some speedy remedy were
not applied, and I was not removed, by some means or other, from my
present condition where I was left, alone and abandoned by every one. He
kept his word, and painted so vividly to the Empress my unfortunate
state, that she summoned Count Alexander Schouvaloff, and ordered him to
inquire if my condition would allow me to come and speak to her the
following evening. Count Schouvaloff came to me with this message, and I
told him for such an object I would summon all the strength I had left.
Towards evening I rose, and Schouvaloff informed me that, after
midnight, he would accompany me to the apartments of her Imperial
Majesty. My confessor sent me word by his niece, that everything was
going on well, and that the Empress would speak to me that evening. I
therefore dressed myself about ten o'clock at night, and lay down fully
dressed upon a couch, where I fell asleep. About half-past one, Count
Schouvaloff entered the apartment, and told me that the Empress had
asked for me. I arose, and followed him. We passed through several
ante-chambers, entirely empty, and on arriving at the door of the
gallery, I saw the Grand Duke enter by the opposite door, and perceived
that he too was about to visit the Empress. I had never seen him since
the day of the play; even when I had given out that my life was in
danger, he neither came nor sent to inquire after my health. I
afterwards learned that on this very day he had promised Elizabeth
Voronzoff to marry her if I happened to die, and that both were
rejoicing greatly at my condition.
Having at last reached her Imperial Majesty's room, I there found the
Grand Duke. As soon as I perceived the Empress, I threw myself at her
feet, and begged her earnestly, and with tears, to send me back to my
relations. The Empress wished to raise me, but I remained at her feet;
she appeared more grieved than angry, and said to me, with tears in her
eyes, "Why do you wish me to send you home? Do you not remember that you
have children?" I replied, "My children are in your Majesty's hands, and
cannot be better placed, and I trust that you will not abandon them."
She then said to me, "But what excuse should I give to the public in
justification of this step?" "Your Imperial Majesty," I replied, "will
state, if you think fit, the causes which have brought upon me your
Majesty's displeasure, and the hatred of the Grand Duke." "But how will
you manage to live when you are with your relatives?" I replied, "As I
did before your Majesty did me the honour of bringing me here." To this
she answered, "Your mother is a fugitive; she has been compelled to
retire, and has gone to Paris." "I am aware of this," I said; "she was
thought to be too much attached to the interests of Russia, and the King
of Prussia has therefore persecuted her." The Empress again bid me rise,
which I did, and she walked away from me to some distance, musing.
The apartment in which we were was long, and had three windows between
which stood two tables, containing the gold toilet-service of the
Empress. No one was in the room but myself, the Empress, the Grand Duke,
and Alexander Schouvaloff. Opposite the Empress were some large screens,
in front of which was a couch. I suspected from the first that John
Schouvaloff certainly, and perhaps also his cousin Peter, were behind
these. I learnt afterwards that my conjecture was in part correct, and
that John Schouvaloff actually was there. I stood by the side of the
toilet-table, nearest to the door by which I entered, and noticed in the
toilet-basin some letters folded up. The Empress again approached me,
and said, "God is my witness how I wept when you were dangerously ill,
just after your arrival in Russia. If I had not liked you, I should not
have kept you." This I looked upon as an answer to what I had just said
in reference to my having incurred her displeasure. I replied by
thanking her Majesty for all the kindness and favour she had shown me
then and since, saying that the recollection of them would never be
effaced from my memory, and that I should always regard my having
incurred her displeasure as the greatest of my misfortunes. She then
drew still nearer to me, and said, "You are dreadfully haughty: do you
remember, that at the Summer Palace, I one day approached you, and asked
if you had a stiff neck, because I noticed that you hardly bowed to me,
and that it was from pride you merely saluted me with a nod." "Gracious
heavens! madame," I said, "how could your Majesty possibly suppose that
I should be haughty to you? I solemnly declare that it never once
occurred to me that this question, asked four years ago, could have
reference to any such thing." Upon this she said, "You fancy there is no
one so clever as yourself." "If I ever had any such conceit," I
replied, "nothing could be better calculated to undeceive me than my
present condition and this very conversation, since I see that I have
been stupid enough not to understand, till this moment, what you were
pleased to say to me four years ago." During my conversation with her
Majesty, the Grand Duke was whispering to Count Schouvaloff. She
perceived this, and went over to them. They were both standing near the
middle of the room. I could not very well hear what they were saying, as
they did not speak loud, and the room was large. At last I heard the
Grand Duke raise his voice and say, "She is dreadfully spiteful, and
very obstinate." I then perceived they were talking about me, and,
addressing the Grand Duke, I observed, "If it is of me you are speaking,
I am very glad to have this opportunity of telling you, in the presence
of her Imperial Majesty, that I am indeed spiteful to those who advise
you to commit injustice, and that I have become obstinate because I see
that I have gained nothing by yielding, but your hostility." He
immediately retorted, "Your Majesty can see how malicious she is by what
she says herself." But my words made a very different impression on the
Empress, who had infinitely more intellect than the Grand Duke. I could
plainly see as the conversation progressed, that although she had been
recommended, or had herself, perhaps, resolved to treat me with
severity, her feelings softened by degrees in spite of herself and her
resolutions. She, however, turned towards him, and said, "Oh, you do not
know all she has told me against your advisers, and against Brockdorff,
relative to the man you have had arrested." This must naturally have
appeared to the Duke a formal treason on my part. He did not know a word
of my conversation with the Empress, at the Summer Palace, and he saw
his dear Brockdorff, who had become so precious in his eyes, accused to
her Majesty, and that by me. This, therefore, was to put us on worse
terms than ever, and perhaps render us irreconcilable, as well as
deprive me, for the future, of all share in his confidence. I was
thunderstruck when I heard her relating to him, in my presence, what I
had told her, and, as I believed, for his own good, and found it thus
turned against me like a weapon of destruction. The Grand Duke, very
much astonished at this disclosure, said, "Ah! here is an anecdote quite
new to me; it is very interesting, and proves her spitefulness." I
thought to myself, "God knows whose spitefulness it proves." From
Brockdorff her Majesty passed abruptly to the connection discovered
between Stambke and Count Bestoujeff, and said to me, "I leave you to
imagine how it is possible to excuse him for having held communication
with a state-prisoner." As my name had not appeared in this affair, I
was silent, as if the matter did not concern me. Upon which the Empress
approached me, and said, "You meddle with many things which do not
concern you. I should not have dared to have done so in the time of the
Empress Anne. How, for instance, could you presume to send orders to
Marshal Apraxine?" I replied, "I, madame? Never has such an idea entered
my head." "What!" she said, "will you deny having written to him? There
are your letters in that basin," and she pointed to them as she spoke.
"You are forbidden to write." "True," I replied, "I have transgressed in
this respect, and I beg your pardon for it; but since my letters are
there, these three letters will prove to your Imperial Majesty that I
have never sent him any orders; but that in one of them I informed him
of what was said of his conduct." Here she interrupted me by saying,
"And why did you write this to him?" I replied simply, "Because I took a
great interest in the Marshal, whom I like very much. I begged him to
follow your orders. Of the two other letters, one contains only my
congratulations on the birth of his son; and in the other I merely
presented to him the compliments of the new-year." Upon this she said,
"Bestoujeff asserts that there were many others." I replied, "If
Bestoujeff says that, he lies." "Very well, then," she said, "since he
has told lies concerning you, I will have him put to the torture." She
thought by this to frighten me, but I answered that she could, of
course, act according to her sovereign pleasure, but that I had never
written more than those three letters to Apraxine. She was silent, and
appeared to be meditating.
I relate the most salient points of this conversation which have
remained in my memory; but it would be impossible for me to recollect
all that was said in the course of an interview which lasted an hour and
a-half at the least. The Empress walked to and fro in the apartment,
sometimes addressing herself to me, sometimes to her nephew, but more
frequently to Count Alexander Schouvaloff, with whom the Grand Duke
conversed the greater part of the time, while the Empress was speaking
to me. I have already said that I remarked in her Majesty's manner less
of anger than of anxiety. As to the Grand Duke, during the whole
interview he manifested much bitterness, animosity, and even passion
towards me. He endeavoured as much as he could to excite the anger of
her Majesty against me, but as he did it so stupidly, and displayed more
anger than justice, he failed in his object, and the penetration and
sagacity of the Empress disposed her rather to take my part. She
listened, with marked attention and a kind of involuntary approval, to
my firm and temperate replies to my husband's outrageous statements,
from which it was perfectly evident that his object was to clear out my
place, in order to establish in it the favourite of the moment. But this
might not be to the Empress' liking, neither might it suit the fancy of
the Messrs. Schouvaloff to give themselves Count Voronzoff for a master;
but all this transcended the judicial penetration of his Imperial
Highness, who always believed in what he wished, and never would listen
to anything which appeared the dominant idea of the moment; and on this
occasion he dwelt so much upon it that the Empress approached me and
said, in a low voice, "I have many other things to say to you, but I do
not wish you to be embroiled more than you are already." And with a look
and a movement of her head, she intimated that it was on account of the
presence of the others that she would not speak. Perceiving this mark of
sincere good-will at so critical a moment, my heart was moved, and I
said to her, in a similar tone, "And I also am prevented from speaking,
however earnest my desire to open to you my mind and heart." I saw that
this made a favourable impression on her. Tears came into her eyes, and
to conceal her emotion, and the extent to which she was moved, she
dismissed us, observing that it was very late; and, in fact, it was
nearly three o'clock in the morning. The Grand Duke went out first, I
followed, and just as Alexander Schouvaloff was passing out after me,
her Majesty called him back, and he remained with her. The Grand Duke
strode on rapidly, as usual, but on this occasion I did not hurry myself
to follow him. He entered his apartments, and I mine. I was beginning to
undress, in order to go to bed, when I heard some one knocking at the
door by which I had entered. On asking who was there, Schouvaloff
replied that it was he, and begged me to admit him, which I did. He
desired me to dismiss my maids. They left the room. He then told me that
the Empress had called him back, and that, after talking to him for some
time, she had charged him to bear to me her compliments, and to tell me
not to distress myself, and that she would have another conversation
with me quite alone. I made a low bow to the Count, and begged him to
present my most humble respects to her Imperial Majesty, and thank her
for her kindness, which had restored me to life. I told him that I
should look forward to this second interview with the utmost impatience,
and entreated him to hasten its time. He requested me not to speak of it
to any one whatever, especially the Grand Duke, who, her Majesty saw,
with regret, was greatly irritated against me. This I promised; though I
could not help thinking to myself, "But if she regrets his irritation,
why increase it by repeating our conversation at the Summer Palace,
concerning those people whose society was brutalizing him?"
This unexpected restoration of the favour and confidence of the Empress,
gave me, however, great pleasure. The next day I desired my confessor's
niece to thank her uncle from me, for the signal service he had rendered
me, by procuring for me this interview with her Majesty. On her return
she told me that her uncle had heard that the Empress had called her
nephew a fool, but said that the Grand Duchess had a great deal of
sense. This remark came to me from more quarters than one, as well as
that her Majesty, among her intimate associates, was constantly
extolling my talents, often adding, "She loves truth and justice; she is
a woman of great sense; but my nephew is a fool."
I still continued to keep my room, as before, under the pretext of bad
health. I recollect that I read at this time, with the map before me,
the first five volumes of the "Histoire des Voyages," and that I was
both amused and instructed by the perusal. When tired of these, I turned
over the early volumes of the "Encyclopedia," while waiting until it
should please her Majesty to admit me to a second interview. I renewed,
from time to time, my request to Count Schouvaloff, telling him that I
was very anxious to have my destiny decided. As to the Grand Duke, I
heard nothing more about him. I only knew that he was impatiently
waiting for my dismissal, and that he confidently calculated on
afterwards marrying Elizabeth Voronzoff. She came into his apartments,
and already did the honours there. It appeared that her uncle, the
Vice-Chancellor, who was a hypocrite, if ever there was one, had become
aware of the projects of his brother, perhaps, or rather, it may be, of
his nephews, who were then very young, the eldest being only twenty, or
thereabouts, and fearing that his newly-revived credit with her Majesty
might suffer by it, he intrigued for the commission of dissuading me
from demanding my dismissal; for this is what occurred.