[I] The picture was finished during the troubled times in Russia, and
the empress doubtless thought more of provision for the poor soldiers
than pictures for her drawing-room. Knaus had intended to exhibit it in
America at the Centennial, but did not complete it in time. He wrote
to the late Mr. A. T. Stewart to send a picture in his possession to
Philadelphia, if agreeable to him, but Mr. Stewart replied he could not
allow a Knaus to go out of his hands.