THE GRAND DUCHESS ELIZABETH
At the risk of rousing a storm of indignation against me, I must say
that one of the misfortunes of the Czarina was to have in Russia an
elder sister already married to a Russian Grand Duke. I know that it is
an established legend that the Grand Duchess Elizabeth is a saint, who
ought to have been canonised in her lifetime. But, in reality, things
were not as represented. The Grand Duchess was a very ambitious woman,
and moreover one who cared for nothing and for nobody in the world
with the exception of her own self. In spite of the report that her
marriage was a very miserable one, she was on the contrary perfectly
happy with her husband, who was quite content to let her live her own
life, and who never interfered with anything it might please her to
do. When he was appointed Governor General of Moscow, she hastened to
go over to the Greek Church, in order to win for herself popularity in
the ancient capital of the Russian Czars, and to a certain extent she
succeeded in doing so. She took advantage of her position as eldest
sister of the young Czarina to try to influence her, and to prejudice
her against those people of whom she thought she had personally reason
to complain. The weakness of the character of Nicholas II. was well
known to his family, long before he ever ascended the throne, and
both the Grand Duke Sergius, who, let it be said by the way, was an
exceedingly clever man, and his wife made up their minds to rule Russia
through the influence of its new Empress, and to become the only really
important personages in the State. They partly succeeded, and this was
the cause of most of the misfortunes which were later on to assail the
unfortunate Czarina.
The latter, in spite of her impetuous and, if the truth need be
said, haughty disposition, stood in awe of her eldest sister, a
feeling out of which the Grand Duchess Elizabeth knew very well how
to make capital. She set herself to persuade her sister that it was
indispensable she should affect a far stronger attachment to the
orthodox faith than she really professed, and that if only the orthodox
clergy should think they had found in her an energetic support, she
would rapidly become popular. It must not be forgotten that at that
time the influence of priests in general was fast waning, and that
they were aware of the fact. It is not surprising, therefore, that
they tried to find a ally among the Imperial family, and that the
Grand Duchess Elizabeth, who made a profession of being absorbed in
the practices of a narrow devotion, became the object of their pet
affection. She was quite conscious of this fact, and being a far
cleverer woman than she looked, she used it to her own advantage and to
the detriment of her sister.
Elizabeth Feodorovna had the reputation of being a semi-saint. In
reality she was nothing of the kind, for she liked the bad as well
as the good things of this world to an inordinate degree. Fond of
admiration, she had not been insensible to the one which she inspired,
and her admirers had been many, to begin with her own husband’s
brother, the Grand Duke Paul. But she had carried all her intrigues
in a grand manner, and had never allowed them to interfere with the
general comfort of her existence. Worldly to her finger tips, she yet
affected the manners of an unworldly woman, and she “took in” most of
those with whom she came into contact by her hypocrisy, for it could
hardly be called anything else.
At heart she was jealous of her sister, just as she had been jealous
of the Empress Marie Feodorovna, during the latter’s reign. It was for
this reason principally that she had been so glad to go to Moscow,
where she knew she would be the first lady in the town, and would enjoy
a semi-Imperial position. She did not care to see any one put before
her, and she applied herself to render the young Czarina unpopular by
every means in her power.
Of course the unfortunate Alexandra Feodorovna, who knew nothing
about Russia and still less about Russian society when she married,
believed all that her sister told her, and the latter gave her a
totally false opinion as to most of the people whom she saw, or with
whom she was thrown into contact—the Empress Dowager to begin with,
and all the other members of the Imperial family. Among the latter
the young Czarina might have found friends but too happy to guide
her, such for instance as her own sister-in-law, the Grand Duchess
Xenia, who was about her own age, and who would have been only too
glad to be of use to her. But the latter’s husband, the Grand Duke
Alexander Michaylovitsch, was credited with ambitious designs, and was
moreover one of the most intelligent men of his day. This was more than
sufficient to eliminate him from the number of the people whom it was
deemed expedient for Alexandra Feodorovna to see much of.
I shall quote one instance of the kind of influence which the Grand
Duchess Elizabeth exercised over her sister. One day the Empress came
to me and told me (this happened during the war) that her sister had
sent her some relics of a famous saint in the Orthodox Church, who was
buried in the cathedral of Rostoff on the Don, telling her at the same
time that she ought to have them dissolved in water and then drink this
water early in the morning before she had partaken of any other food.
Should she do so, success would come to the Russian arms without fail.
The poor Empress was torn asunder between her conviction that her duty
required her to obey her sister and her distaste for the abominable
beverage she was expected to swallow. I tried my best to persuade her
that the whole thing was nonsense, but then Rasputin, who was one of
the instruments of the Grand Duchess Elizabeth, interfered, and, after
much hesitation, the unfortunate Czarina at last made up her mind to
drink the dirty relics as she had been ordered, and, as a consequence,
was abominably sick.
It was also Elizabeth Feodorovna who was responsible for the
introduction of Rasputin into the immediate circle of the Imperial
family. Before that she had presented to her sister a Frenchman, called
Philippe, who was supposed to be one of the first mediums in Europe,
and for a short time this Philippe was quite an important personage
at Court. It was about the time the Japanese war broke out, and the
intriguing Frenchman did his best to consolidate his influence and
power, by making all kinds of prophecies as to the course the struggle
was about to take. Events, however, gave the lie to his predictions,
because instead of the brilliant successes which he had prophesied,
defeat attended the course of the campaign, and the Russian armies
were routed. This shook the reputation of the medium, and, finally,
after another failure of a private nature (he had promised the Empress
she would give birth to a son in the course of the next six months,
which did not happen) he was dismissed, principally at the request of
the Grand Duke Nicholas, who called upon the Czar and revealed to
the latter the many intrigues of which Philippe had been guilty. When
he was gone the Empress spent her time turning tables alone or with a
few chosen friends, and she at last got her nervous system into such a
condition that it is no wonder she fell an easy prey to Rasputin when
the latter was presented to her by her sister, with the assurance that
he was one of the greatest saints the Russian Orthodox Church had ever
known.
This influence of the Grand Duchess Elizabeth was exercised not only
in religious and political matters, but also in purely frivolous ones.
For instance, she introduced into the Imperial Palace a dressmaker
from Moscow who used to make her own gowns, and to whom she had
promised she would procure the Empress as a client. This dressmaker,
who, I have always felt convinced was a German spy, became quite an
important personage at Court, and soon my mistress did not dare to
order a gown from any one else but this woman. This of course caused
great dissatisfaction among her former modistes, both in Petrograd
and in Paris, who, after having enjoyed her patronage for a number
of years, found it hard to be set aside for a newcomer. I tried more
than once to remonstrate and to urge the expediency of not offending
former friends, if such an expression can be used in the like case,
but I was immediately silenced, with the result that the Empress spent
twice as much on her clothes as she had done during the first years of
her marriage and was dressed with much less taste. Under the pretext
that she ought to wear Russian silks, gowns of inferior materials were
made for her, and made abominably into the bargain. This was the more
shameful that Moscow possesses silk manufactories, the produce of
which is not a bit inferior to the loveliest French silks, but my poor
mistress never got the chance to have them, and the cheapest and most
vile satin and velvets were those which her famous Moscow dressmaker
selected for her. Worth, who for years had had the privilege of making
the dresses of the Russian Empresses, became very angry at the neglect
with which his offers were treated, and soon the Empress came to be
called stingy, not only in St. Petersburg but also in Paris, where
proprietors of the many establishments where she had formerly got her
clothes became her enemies, and took to calling her German, for the
only reason that she did not any longer buy her dresses and other
things from them. It would have been easy to avoid all this had one
been possessed of a strong and independent will and not set trembling,
as my poor mistress was, whenever her sister swept down upon her with
a complaint or in an excitement of some kind or another. When the
little Grand Duchesses grew up, their aunt also interfered with their
education. She believed herself to be an excellent pedagogue, and was
convinced that she had brought up admirably the two motherless children
of her brother-in-law, the Grand Duke Paul, Dmitry and Marie, who was
later on to become the wife of a Swedish Prince from whom she was
divorced a short time afterwards. In reality she had done nothing of
the kind, and neither the nephew nor the niece over whose childhood she
was supposed to have watched with such care, did her any honour, nor
proved in any way the excellence of the training which she was supposed
to have given them. In regard to the children of the Czar and of the
Czarina, her influence proved quite mischievous, and might have become
even dangerous if the strong common sense of the two eldest girls had
not saved them from the danger of the superstitious atmosphere with
which their aunt wanted to surround them.
[Illustration: _International Film Service_
RASPUTIN]
The Empress was the best and most tender of mothers. Indeed her
affection for her children was almost too fervent, for she was always
anxious on their account and would hardly ever allow them to mix with
other people for fear of anything evil befalling them. She thought,
quite naturally, that she could trust her sister and share with her the
responsibilities of the education of her family. In reality she could
not have made a worse choice, because between ambition and superstition
the Grand Duchess Elizabeth was about the last person who ought to have
been permitted free access to girls of the impressionable temperament
of the young daughters of Nicholas II.