THE PRINCES AT PLAY
I thanked His Majesty warmly for this unusual courtesy, and the second
morning after Señor de Torres called for me at my hotel just before ten
o’clock and we drove together to the Reserve in the Casa de Campo. The
Marquesa de Salamanca, who is the First Royal Governess, passed us in an
automobile near the entrance. The Marquesa de Puerta, who is the Second
Governess, was not there that morning. We arrived a brief moment behind
the nursery. The Princes and their nursemaids were still in the mule
coach driven by Corral, the favourite nursery coachman. Behind was the
little open carriage drawn by the two donkeys “Sol” and “Luna,” and the
tiny Shetland pony, “Belaye,” of the Crown Prince.
As we approached, the Marquesa de Salamanca lifted the Prince of
Asturias from the carriage and brought him in her arms toward us,
presenting him as the Little Crown Prince. Anticipating her, however,
the little fellow cried out: “Kaulak--Kaulak, is coming.” Now, Kaulak is
a Madrid photographer who takes most of the photographs of the Royal
family and the Prince had noticed the cameras in my hand. The Marquesa
told him, as she put him down at our feet, that I was not Kaulak,
though I had cameras and could take his picture. He surveyed me
critically for a moment and then came and posed himself before me with
his little right hand at salute, asking that I first take him that way.
He wore the same broad-brimmed white straw hat encircled by a pale blue
ribbon and the cunning little white flannel suit in which I had first
seen him going out to drive. He tried valiantly to wrestle with my name
but this proved too much of a mouthful.
The two English governesses and the French maid gathered the children’s
toys from the coach and we started for a stream of water where the
children wanted to play. As we started the Infante Don Jaime was brought
over. He is a dear boy with a wonderfully sweet and friendly smile. It
was evident from the first moment that he, at least, had no intention of
standing on ceremony. The wee Infanta Beatrice was too sleepy to pay
much attention, so she was put to rest in an ordinary baby carriage and
was soon trundled fast asleep.
The Prince of Asturias first took up the sand pail and shovel that had
recently been given him by his mother the Queen for his third birthday.
Don Jaime, however, found more interest in the water. He splashed the
stream for a few minutes then toddled off to a spring and began tossing
stones into the water, laughing with delight at each splash. When he had
used all of his stones he asked me to recover them. This was a task,
but I rolled up my sleeves, and getting down on my knees I began to
pick them from the bottom one by one and arrange them around the spring
wall. Just as I finished the Prince of Asturias ran up and seizing the
largest stone of all splashed it violently back into the water, wetting
me from head to foot. This gave them both great pleasure and they
laughed tremendously. “See,” exclaimed the Infante, “I have given you a
bath!”
The next moment the Prince decided that my dress was incomplete, as I
had no flower in my buttonhole. He asked me if I wouldn’t like him to
get me a nice flower. I told His Royal Highness that I should be very
pleased. So away he went to the flower beds. He was critical in his
selection. A number of flowers were successively rejected. Finally he
plucked a beautiful white rose and bringing it back placed it (with a
little assistance) in my buttonhole. Don Jaime, in the meantime watched
his brother with evident interest and decided that it was his turn to do
something toward entertaining me. So he went off to the strawberry bed
and picked some luscious ripe berries to feed me.
The morning was unusually dark and gloomy for Madrid in June, and I am
very much of an amateur at photography, consequently dependent upon
bright light. About eleven o’clock the clouds lightened somewhat and I
got out my cameras. Instantly both Princes were interested. The Prince
of Asturias particularly seemed to enjoy having his picture taken. I
snapped him repeatedly and found that he never seemed to weary of posing
for me.
The Infanta Beatrice had now waked up, so she joined us. Corral, ever
attentive and watchful, took great delight in catching the eye of the
small Princess so that her face should be turned toward the camera. She
showed a silent interest in the performance, but her little eyes were
still heavy with sleep and it was evident that she would much have
preferred to remain in her perambulator. She grew alert, however, when
the donkey carriage was brought round. She enjoys her rides about the
gardens, sitting by the side of her brother Don Jaime.
Don Jaime climbed into the carriage by himself and picked up the whip.
The Infanta thought that she should hold this and straightway reached
out her hand to grasp it. The two wrestled back and forth until between
them they dropped it onto the ground. Then there was storm and tears.
When I looked round the Prince was proudly seated on Belaye. Belaye is
one of the smallest of Shetland ponies, and his saddle precisely like a
toy. It is not quite a real saddle for it has a seat and straps to
secure the little rider. But these are the first lessons of the Prince
in riding. By the time he is six he will doubtless mount a real saddle
and ride just like a little man.
Besides his Shetland pony he has two little donkeys, so tiny that any
man could carry one under each arm. These are harnessed to a little
cart and the young Prince takes his first lessons in driving in the
beautiful and extensive park behind the Royal Palace, known as the _Casa
de Campo_. Formerly he had a third donkey called “Astra,” but Astra
died. Sometime after this distressing event the Prince was asked about
Astra by someone in the Palace, and he made answer with a certain manner
of mystery, “Oh! he is gone away. He is in the Casa de Campo eating
strawberries.”
In amusing contrast to these dwarf donkeys are four sturdy mules which
are attached to the big nursery coach in which ride not only the Prince
of Asturias but also his brother Don Jaime, his sister Infanta Beatrice
and two of their nurses. Beside the carriage, ride two splendidly
mounted equerries and behind, two Royal grooms. On the whole, it is an
imposing cavalcade, this nursery out a-airing.
The two Princes--aged three and two respectively--sit on the main seat.
A brace for their feet has been adjusted to the carriage and two leather
belts keep them securely in place. One day I was going into the Palace
just as the nursery was about to start out. The little Prince and the
Infante were in their seats and the baby Infanta was just being brought
downstairs. As I passed the carriage, I raised my hat to the wee boys,
both of whom were dressed in white with broad-brimmed straw hats.
Instantly, two little hands were raised to their right temples, elbows
out, eyes front--all with military precision. No soldier could have
given a truer salute. It was so charming, so unexpected, that I laughed
outright. On later days when I saw them out driving, I noticed that each
time they passed a flag they saluted it, and each time an officer or
soldier saluted them, the salute was returned.
The morning wore on till noon time when Don Jaime grew overpoweringly
sleepy, and the Prince grew anxious for his morning story--preliminary
to his noon nap. We drove and rode and picked more flowers and threw
more stones into the water and made more sand piles--and we were all
very happy. I found them wholesome, hearty children, normal in all
respects, bright beyond their years, and well developed. How the
baseless stories concerning their supposed infirmities and defectiveness
ever started, is a mystery to me, unless political enemies of the
monarchial parties set them in circulation with malice aforethought.
After my morning with them in the Casa de Campo some people at my hotel
said to me: “What a pity that the Princes are not right in their
faculties!”
“But they are perfectly right,” I replied, indulgently, “those stories
are pure nonsense.”
“Oh! no, sir. You must be mistaken.”
“How can I be mistaken?” I answered, “I have just spent a morning with
them and I found them not only normal in every way, but particularly
intelligent.”
“That cannot be,” was the reply, “because it is said that they are
defective.”
I began to grow indignant and finally I gave up the controversy. After I
had gone they asked one another, as I later learned, how much the King
had paid me to say that the Princes were all right! What is one to do
with such people? And this is characteristic of what is met often in
Madrid.
The Prince of Asturias is to-day one of the loveliest of children.
Presently he must submit to the discipline which will make of him a
strong, fearless man fit to lead and rule a nation. If he lives he will
succeed to the throne of Spain as King Alfonso XIV.
There is no better wish that I may express for my readers than that when
they come to this beautiful summer land of Spain, they may have
something of the same privileges I have enjoyed; that they may meet this
manly, courageous, wise King, Alfonso XIII--face to face, clasp his hand
in hearty grasp and sit with him in his study by the hour listening to
his clear-cut, incisive conversation, enjoying his ideas and ideals, all
expressed in most excellent English; or go with him to the beautiful
polo ground and watch him play the fastest sort of game, riding his
beautiful ponies brought over from the Argentine Republic; that they may
meet the beautiful Queen Victoria Eugenie, the English Princess, who is
the true heroine of this romance and perhaps hear from her own lips the
story of the beautiful prophesy of her father, now long dead, that one
day she should come to Spain and be very, very happy. Perchance, indeed,
some favoured ones may be shown the Spanish fan he sent her from Seville
and which is to-day her most treasured possession. Above all, I would
wish that all might spend a morning such as I spent in the Casa de Campo
with the little Princes, playing in the sand, splashing water and eating
strawberries plucked by these dear, little, Royal hands and carry away a
pure white rose, selected and plucked by him who will one day, God
willing, be King Alfonso XIV of Spain.
PART II
EMPRESS ALEXANDRA FEODOROVNA OF RUSSIA
CHAPTER I
“SUNNY”
“The most beautiful Queen on any throne,” she was called when first she
became Empress of all the Russias. She still is tall and stately, her
hair is luxuriant and rich in colour. Eyes that some call blue and some
call grey look out through long, dark lashes, and in them lies a great
sadness, an appealing wistfulness touched with regret, a silent
melancholy betraying soul tragedy. Yet as a child she was known as
“Sunny.”
The life story of “Sunny” has never before been comprehensively told in
English. This is curious, because there probably is not a person in the
whole world who would not like to hear the wonderful romance of how a
poor little German Princess became a great Sovereign, the co-ruler of
one of the vastest empires on earth, the mistress of a fabulously rich
and bewilderingly extravagant court, and with opportunity for becoming
the most powerful woman in Europe. “Sunny” was the childhood nickname
of this little Princess, and after the hardships and vicissitudes of a
quiet girlhood, where there was a constant struggle to maintain
appearances, she was courted by a wayward gallant who was heir to a
mighty crown. “Sunny” lost her heart to the Royal wooer, and he, putting
aside the less noble loves of his reckless, youthful days, pledged
himself to her--persistently courted her against wide opposition--turned
a deaf ear to the councils of Emperors and Queens who tried to
discourage the match, and after years of battling with diplomatic
intrigue and personal restraint he carried his purpose, married the
German Princess who was truly the bride of his heart, and in marrying
her raised her from the obscurity and poverty of her own simple home to
the exalted rank of Empress. This is the true story of Princess Alix of
Hesse whom Nicholas II made Tsaritsa of Russia!
There is something tremendously dramatic about this little German
Princess stepping out of the quiet of her Darmstadt home into the arena
of world affairs, and taking her position as Empress over one hundred
and forty millions of people. Yet, of her life, almost nothing is known
by the world at large.
No woman of modern times has had such marvellous opportunities for the
exercise of personal influence and power. Yet who knows her? I had seen
her in St. Petersburg, I knew men and women of the Court who had told me
things about her from time to time. But I felt less acquainted with her
life than that of any sovereign in Europe. I turned to the magazine and
newspaper files of the last fifteen years and I was amazed at the
meagreness of information concerning her. I made diligent inquiry among
people who frequently are veritable mines of gossip and stories
concerning Royal personages, but scarcely a thing could I gather
concerning the Tsaritsa who in many ways occupies the most unique
position of any woman in the world. When I set forth in all seriousness
to learn of her from her childhood to the present time, to gather the
details of her charming romance and the story how she became the wife of
an Emperor, I found I must go far afield--overseas, to Germany, to
Russia; I must seek my information from her courtiers, her
ladies-in-waiting, her friends, princes and princesses of the realm,
tutors of her children, servants in her palaces, officials of the
Imperial Household. So I went. I talked with all these people and many
more besides, and the story I set down here is the story of her life, as
I have heard it piecemeal from the lips of those who have been closest
to her during the years that she has occupied a position of world
eminence.
The Tsaritsa is now thirty-nine years old. She was born at
Darmstadt, Germany, June 6, 1872, and christened Princess
Alix-Victoria-Helene-Louise-Beatrix. She was the youngest daughter of
the Grand Duke and Duchess of Hesse and the Rhine. Her mother was
Princess Alice of England, daughter of Queen Victoria.
Her sister, Princess Victoria, became the wife of Louis of Battenberg;
her sister Elizabeth became the wife of the Grand Duke Sergius of
Russia, uncle of the present Tsar; while a third sister became Princess
Henry of Prussia. Prince Henry is the brother of Emperor William of
Germany, and he is the official head of the German Navy. The only living
brother of these remarkable sisters eventually came into the title of
Grand Duke of Hesse and the Rhine, which he holds to-day. Besides all
these close connections with important Royalties, she was a niece of
King Edward of England and cousin to innumerable lesser Royalties. After
her marriage she became connected with the courts of Denmark and Greece.
The Dukes of Hesse were made Grand Dukes during the time of the
Napoleonic wars and Grand Dukes they have remained to this day.
Thus Princess Alix has always had grand connections, but the duchy of
Hesse and the Rhine was poor and as the Grand Duke, her father, was not
even ruler of the Duchy, and possessed of only small financial
resources, the family household was forced to accept a comparatively
frugal régime. There are hundreds of girls in America to-day who have
never felt the press of poverty as did Princess Alix through the early
years of her life. The little Princess was taught to sew and to assist
in home duties, not only because this was all part of the proper
training of a princess, but because of necessity.
The simplicity of this home was like the simplicity of an ordinary
German or English middle class home of to-day. In her letters to Queen
Victoria, the mother of Princess Alix was wont to speak very freely of
the straitened circumstances of the family. Some of the items and
incidents mentioned in these letters can hardly be credited. For
instance, in one letter the death of a cow is lamented--“because it will
be so difficult to get another.” In another she sends thanks for some
furniture. In another the summer holiday is discussed and frank
acknowledgment made that they cannot afford to go to Sheveningen, the
charming and fashionable Dutch watering resort a few miles from The
Hague, because it is too costly, but they must be content with
Blankenberghe which is treeless, dull and uninteresting, but more
reasonable of price.
Princess Alix’s allowance of pocket money was twenty-five cents a week
up to the time of her confirmation, when she received double that
amount. Alix was the youngest born of the Grand Duke and Duchess and was
called “Alix” because Queen Victoria had always been annoyed at the way
Germans pronounced Alice. And so at her suggestion Alice was changed to
Alix to simplify it for the people of her own country. “Alicky” she was
frequently called by her mother, but the neighbours and friends of the
family early came to call her the “Little Princess Sonnenschein,” and
from this came the name of endearment which she carried for so
long--“Sunny.”
“Baby is a sweet, merry little person, like Ella (her sister), but her
features are smaller,” her mother once wrote to Queen Victoria, “and her
eyes are darker, and she has very long lashes and auburn hair. She is
always laughing, and with a deep dimple in one cheek just like Ernie.”
(Ernie was her brother who is now Grand Duke of Hesse and the Rhine.) On
another occasion her mother wrote: “She is indeed the personification of
her nickname ‘Sunny.’” During all this time Empress dreams were far off,
and the big world with its infinite possibilities, its large joys and
burden of days, but visions of twilight hours. When she was only six
years old her mother died. This was the first deep shadow of her life,
and from that time on she carried little responsibilities that tended to
weigh upon her, to drive her more and more into herself, and perhaps to
plant the seeds of moroseness which some say is now a quality of her
character. At twelve the True Romance of her life came to her.
Princess Elizabeth, the older sister of Alix, had been courted by Grand
Duke Sergius, of Russia, an uncle of the present Tsar and brother of the
then reigning Emperor. In 1884 Sergius came to Darmstadt for his bride,
and young Nicholas was of the Royal party. Nicholas here met Princess
Alix for the first time and in her saw his future bride--the future
Empress of his country. Nicholas, though nearly four years older than
she, was only sixteen, but sometimes hearts can choose their own at
sixteen as surely as in later years, and if love has since been the
dominant element in the family life of this royal couple, it entered in,
there in Darmstadt at this early time.
CHAPTER II
COURTSHIP AND A JOURNEY TO THE NORTHLAND
From the hour of their first meeting, Princess Alix never doubted the
love of her young Russian scion, whose still boyish heart she knew she
had reached. Child as she was, Princess Alix already felt germinating
within her beginnings of woman love, and from that time through all the
following girlhood days, through her period of lovely maidenhood, she
held in close memory the picture of her first wooer. That her young
lover was less faithful was not so much a matter of surprise, because
first of all being a man, and especially a Russian man, not to include a
Prince besides, Nicholas naturally went the way of all the rest, the way
of so many men, of most Russians, and of all Princes, and under the
tutelage of his relatives, the Grand Dukes, and other unavoidable
corrupt associates of the Court, he sowed his wild oats as part of the
day’s work, and as a matter of course, sowed them furiously and very,
very wildly. Nicholas’ mother, spouse of the Emperor Alexander III,
herself early suggested that a mistress for the young Nicholas might be
well as a choice of evils, the lesser one. Thereupon, Nicholas was taken
to the Imperial Ballet, there to make his choice of a temporary love.
The woman whom he chose at that time lives to-day in St. Petersburg, in
a grand palace, given her by the little man who now rules the mighty
Empire of Russia, built by money exacted from thousands of starving
peasants throughout the length and breadth of the vast empire.
Perhaps--for a time--Nicholas forgot the little German girl, but she
never forgot her Prince! Perhaps Nicholas was lacking in that blessed
quality we call “loyalty.” Or it may be that he was only weak of
character as most of his friends of the time would have us believe. At
all events, he was not even true to his Polish dancer, and when he
became infatuated with a Jewess, his Imperial father cried “Enough!” and
sent his son on a tour around the world. Nicholas was accompanied on
this trip by another _bon vivant_, his cousin Prince George of Greece.
Prince George, however, was also an athlete and a man of ready wit, and
when in Japan a fanatic rushed upon the Tsarevitch to kill him, Prince
George raised his arm and succeeded in so diverting the stroke that
Nicholas received only a glancing blow on the forehead. Thus was he
spared to return to Darmstadt and renew his suit with his love of
earlier days.
Royal marriages are so rarely love matches, that the world watches the
few that are with admiration and hope. Too often diplomatic objections
prevent the coming together of royal lovers. And so in the case with
Nicholas, his father desired the union of his son with a Montenegrin
princess.
Queen Victoria never really opposed the match, but she feared for the
safety of her grand-daughter. The Russian throne is supposed to offer
unparalleled peril to its occupants, and the health of the Princess Alix
had never been rugged. Queen Victoria feared that under the great stress
and strain of St. Petersburg Princess Alix would not have the strength
to bear up. The Empress Frederick of Germany, an aunt of Princess Alix,
was also doubtful of the wisdom of the match. Her reasons, however, were
somewhat different. Empress Frederick had had many opportunities to
watch the development of her sister’s daughter and she had noticed,
perchance with pain, certain qualities of temperament which may have
been the result of her trying circumstances in early years, together
with the fact that she had been left so much alone through the early
death of her mother. She was reserved and shy, therefore seeming cold of
nature, and haughty of manner. Having seen far less of the great world
than most royal princesses she shrank from the social whirl. The
loneliness of her childhood had taught her to find resource within
herself, thus habits of reading, study, and contemplation had become
part of her nature. These characteristics all make for the development
of a splendid, substantial woman, but they fail to bring out the
qualities essential to a woman who is to preside over a brilliant court,
where the sway of personality, of grace, charm and wit--all of the
surface virtues--count for as much, if not more, than the deeper
qualities of sound character and a disciplined mind.
Appreciating all this Empress Frederick did not encourage, even if she
refrained from actively opposing the marriage.
The Polish Princess, Catherine Radziwill, chanced to be passing through
Germany about this time and lingered for a few days, the guest of the
Empress Frederick. One afternoon, Princess Radziwill referred to the
betrothal and remarked on the happy fate which had led Nicholas to
select a bride who had been imbued with the ideas of Germany and
England. To her surprise the Empress gravely shook her head and remarked
that it was not always safe to trust what was said by people ignorant of
the true character of those they praised or blamed, according to the
exigencies of the moment. When Princess Radziwill pressed the Empress
further she added that “Princess Alix had a haughty disposition, and
would be inclined to take more seriously than might be supposed, her
position of absolute sovereign.”
She went so far as to refer to the despotic temperament of her niece,
and her self-opinioned tendencies. “She is far too much convinced of her
own perfection,” said the Empress, “and she will never listen to other
people’s advice, besides, she has no tact, and perhaps, without knowing
it, will manage to wound the feelings of the persons she ought to try
and conciliate.”
Princess Radziwill remarked that it was passing strange a daughter of
Princess Alice, and a grand-daughter of Queen Victoria could have such a
disposition. Whereupon the Empress returned sadly: “Oh! but when do you
see daughters taking after their mothers?” Then, after a short pause she
continued: “It would not be possible for anyone to be like my sister.”
But Alix loved Nicholas and she would be daunted by neither the perils
of a restless empire, nor the fear of physical weakness or suffering,
nor the discouragements of her royal relatives. And Nicholas, with that
stubbornness that has ever characterised him, set about to win over all
opponents to their marriage. First he appealed to his uncle, Grand Duke
Serge, who had married Alix’s sister, Elizabeth. Then he went to London
and pleaded with Queen Victoria. Finally, he gained the consent of his
own father, who was the last to yield. Then Nicholas went himself to
Darmstadt to carry the news in person to his Princess who had now waited
for this message for nine long years.
There still remained one important obstacle. And that this was a
difficulty to the German Princess, is to her everlasting credit.
According to the laws of Russia, the throne may never be occupied or
shared by anyone not of the Greek Catholic faith. Now Princess Alix,
being born in Germany and brought up in Germany, was a Protestant. From
earliest childhood, she had been devoted to the Church and to her
religion, and the tenets of the Greek Church were totally unfamiliar to
her.
[Illustration: THE TSARITSA IS HONORARY COLONEL OF THE UHLANS OF THE
GUARD.]
When they were presented to her there were many things that seemed so
strange that for a long time she could not acknowledge her acceptance of
them.
In most royal marriages, the brides change their faith as lightly as
they change their gowns, and learn the priest-taught formulas that their
tutors prescribe, and subscribe to the doctrines of their adopted church
without fear or question. Alix demanded intimate knowledge of all the
doctrines she must accept, so learned theologians and doctrinaires were
dispatched to Darmstadt to give her instruction. Many are the stories
told of her long arguments with these learned men over points that were
not clear to her, and of her deep prying questions into the reasons for
certain regulations and laws. At one time it seemed as if she could not
accept certain things that these holy men were endeavouring to press
upon her and more than one rumour went abroad that the royal marriage
would never take place simply because of these religious difficulties.
There seemed some ground for these reports, for the priest who had been
her especial instructor, one Yanisheff, at one time became so despairing
of his “heretical” charge, that he left Darmstadt altogether and
returned to Russia.
A long letter from the Princess was received by Nicholas, and he,
instead of being hurt by the way she held out on these matters,
expressed himself as highly pleased. A vigorous correspondence then
passed quickly between them. And in the end, it was her love that
conquered. I do not think that Princess Alix has ever been what the
world calls an “ambitious woman.” No one believes that the Greek priests
“converted” her. But she loved Nicholas with a love that transcended all
creeds and dogmas and finally, after long hesitation, her love rose to
the highest point and for his sake she “accepted” the state church of
the land that was to be her future home.
At the time the betrothal was definitely announced, it was anticipated
that Alexander would probably continue to reign for some years, and that
in the meantime the bride of the Heir Apparent would have ample time to
accustom herself to Russia, and to school herself for the difficult rôle
of Empress, which she would one day have to assume.
The Russian press was flooded with stories and anecdotes of the beauty,
the cleverness, and the varied accomplishments of the German Princess
whom Nicholas was bringing to Russia. This was to popularise her among
the people. It was said that she was a rare musician, a great scholar,
and even that she had taken the degree of doctor of philosophy at some
university! Flaming lithographs of her were circulated by the thousand
among the peasants, and in the space of a few months her name had become
a household word across the Empire and the Russian people were prepared
to accept her as a worthy consort to the Heir Apparent.
The betrothal was announced in April. In September of the same year,
Tsar Alexander’s health began to fail rapidly and he was removed from
the cold of the northern capital to the Royal estate of Livadia in the
Crimea.
I have seen royal palaces and parks in every part of the world, but I
have never seen a more beautiful place than Livadia. It is on the slope
of the Crimean Alps, some of whose peaks tower more than three thousand
feet above the glorious blue waters of the Black Sea that here lap the
shores of Livadia. Yalta, lovely Yalta, a winter jewel daintily set in a
wondrous setting of sea and hills, is removed from Livadia by only a
spur of mountains easily and quickly crossed. And here, when all the
rest of Russia lies frozen beneath semi-Arctic snows, roses and
oleanders bloom, and ripe fruit hangs luscious for the pickers. Here
winter suns are warm and winter evenings balmy.
I think the fairest nights I have ever seen have been in Yalta and on
the road to Livadia when a December moon shone brightly over the
restless water and aslant the lovely hills as in dream nights of June.
To this most beauteous spot in all Russia, Alexander III was taken. It
was the monarch’s last journey. When it became evident that the end was
near Nicholas sent for his bride-to-be. Probably no woman or man in
modern times has had so warm a welcome prepared. The press of Europe was
echoing and re-echoing the praise of the young Princess, in happy attune
with the inspired press of Russia. The Emperor William himself went to
meet the Princess at the Berlin railroad station and bid her
Godspeed--she who was to wear an Imperial crown.
Warsaw was the first Russian city where Princess Alix paused on her
journey to Livadia whither she was hastening in the expectancy of
marrying prior to the death of Alexander III. At Warsaw she was met by
her sister, the Grand Duchess Elizabeth, and farther along in the
journey by the Heir Apparent. Her progress across the Empire was like a
triumphal march despite the sadness that hovered over a nation whose
ruler lay dying. Great arches of welcome were raised to her, and the
populace turned out all along the way to do her honour.
We can well imagine the mingled feelings of surprise and awe which must
have overwhelmed the retiring and somewhat austere German Princess, as
she came in contact now for the first time with the great world, and
with the homage of a vast people which from that day was to be her’s for
all the rest of the days of her life. Princes and potentates, like
peasants from the isolated villages of the Steppes, bent their knees in
humble obeisance, while soldiers stood at salute as she passed. She knew
full well that she was leaving behind her forever the simple life she
had always known up until now. She knew that she was going to a
death-bed scene, between ranks of gold and silver. Though her path was
scattered with flowers and the plaudits of the people continuously rang
in her ears, she knew what the end of the journey must be, and she must
have known too, in a dim, tragic way, all that lay beyond the endraped
gold, toward which she was speeding in the Crimea.
CHAPTER III
ASSUMING THE BURDEN
Upon arriving at Livadia Princess Alix hastened to the bedside of the
moribund Emperor. The following day, in the royal chapel of Livadia she
was received into the Greek Orthodox Church under the name of Alexandra
Feodorovna. Her own preference was for the name Catherine, but yielding
to the wishes of Nicholas, she accepted the name of his choosing. The
wedding day was fixed for the following Wednesday, but the nearing end
of Alexander necessitated a brief postponement--only till the end had
come, and all that remained of him had been transported to St.
Petersburg and laid to rest beside the remains of his father, and his
father’s fathers for many generations, in the golden-spired Chapel of
the grim fortress of Saints Peter and Paul on the banks of the swift
flowing River Neva.
Some there are, believers in omens, who attribute many of the
difficulties of her life as Tsaritsa to the name she took when she was
received into the Russian Church,--Alexandra Feodorovna, after the
grandmother of the Tsar, her husband. For Alexandra has long been an
ill-fated name in the unhappy land of Princess Alix’s adoption.
A daughter of the Emperor Paul who was called Alexandra had a very
tragic end. When she was but seventeen years of age her grandmother,
Catherine II, arranged that she should marry the King of Sweden. The
preparations for this royal wedding were all elaborately made and on the
day set all was well, so far as the world knew. The tables were laid for
the marriage banquet and the bride, all robed and ready, awaited her
royal bridegroom. The guests were assembled and the priests stood by in
their gorgeous mantles of gold. Suddenly His Majesty the King announced
that he would not go on with the wedding! His courtiers and suite
pleaded and implored him not to offer so terrible an insult to the
daughter of an Emperor and to the whole Russian nation. But in vain. The
King was obdurate.
The news was tardily announced to Catherine, whose wrath knew no bounds.
The guests withdrew and the Swedish party quit the Winter Palace and
returned to Stockholm. The humiliated Alexandra was given no further
choice even after this terrible ordeal, but was speedily married willy
nilly to an Austrian Grand Duke. But she really did not survive the
shock of the failure of her marriage with the King of Sweden, and she
died of humiliation and a broken heart--only nineteen years of age.
A daughter of Nicholas I was named Alexandra. She was early married to a
step-son of Napoleon Bonaparte. But a fatal disease carried her off
before she was twenty, again emphasising the traditional tragedy
associated with his name.
Alexander II had a daughter Alexandra, a lovely, golden-haired child,
but she succumbed to an illness in childhood.
No wonder then, that the superstitious feared for the future of Princess
Alix, when she took for herself the name that has so often been borne by
daughters of sorrow in Russia. But Alexandra was the name Nicholas chose
for her, and that sufficed. The mourning family returned to St.
Petersburg after the death of Alexander III and as soon as preparations
could be made, the wedding took place--the entire Court laying aside its
mourning weeds for one day. Thus edged in black, the official ceremonial
life of the Tsaritsa began.
At the wedding ceremony, she did not show to advantage. She was reserved
in her manner to the point of severity, and a trait was noticed on that
day that has militated against her ever since. Despite her natural
physical grace she does not know how to dress! Her simple German
training had not taught her how to wear beautiful clothes. Possibly the
wearing of lovely gowns well is an instinct born in some women. At all
events on her wedding day, the Empress-bride failed to please the court.
A few days later when the young Tsar was receiving deputations from
different parts of the Empire, there occurred a rupture between him and
some deputies from the Province of Tver, which he has never been able to
outlive, and for some unexplained reason the sentiments that he then
expressed in heat, were accepted as the sentiments of the Empress as
well. The Chairman of the deputation humbly offered the congratulations
of the people of Tver, and ventured to add that it was their hope that
the new Emperor might be pleased, in the course of his reign, to grant
certain liberties to his people, perhaps even a Constitution. This hope
was partly based on their faith in the young Empress, whom they expected
would have liberal sympathies as a result of her life in Germany and her
affiliations with England. But the Tsar burst forth into a terrible
tirade against such notions, told them “to be done with these idle
dreams,” and even threatened the whole deputation with banishment.
The whole country was astounded at this uncalled for outburst, and a
lurking suspicion sprang up that the Tsaritsa might not be so liberal as
they had hoped. And this indeed seems to have proved true, for whatever
influence the Tsaritsa has exerted in Russia from that day to this, has
been in the direction of Reaction and severe administration. She has
always accepted the point of view of her husband. Nicholas II believes
himself a God-ordained Autocrat, and the great ambition of his life is,
not to hand on to his successor a happy and peaceful nation living under
a constitutional monarchy, but an absolute autocracy, and Alexandra
Feodorovna has supported and worked for the realisation of this
ambition.
When one remembers the glorious, golden romance of this girl, one’s
imagination is fired to highest heat, and one rejoices when the child
who was called “Sunny,” who early battled bravely with life, was at last
coming unto her own. But alas! At the very moment when it would seem
that Providence had filled her cup to the full, the dark clouds began to
gather, and the little German Princess, when she ceased to be Princess
Alix, also ceased to be “Sunny.” Instead of entering upon a period of
life rich in blessings, showered with happiness, she faced graver
responsibilities, greater hardships and harder battles than she yet had
known. The crudest blows of fate were yet to fall upon her.
The wedding of the Tsar and Tsaritsa was almost the only bright day of
the winter of 1894 in St. Petersburg society. Mourning was resumed
before even the usual wedding ceremonials were ended and few court
functions were held until after the coronation, which took place the
following spring. This event was looked forward to by the entire court
and the most elaborate arrangements were made to make it the most
magnificent and dazzling spectacle of the kind that a traditionally
magnificent court had yet known, an historic occasion, notable from
every point of view.
During the festivities celebrating this event, the young Empress might
have been expected to have won all hearts. Instead, the popularity of
the Dowager was enhanced, and the suspicions against Alexandra, which
had been aroused during the wedding celebration, were deepened.
Russia, always poor, was in especially straitened circumstances the year
of the coronation. Crops had failed--the winter had been severe--and
peasants were starving in different parts of the Empire. Yet the
coronation show cost the Government many millions of dollars. The
harness worn by the horses that drew the carriage of the Empress alone
cost more than one million dollars!
The German Princess, born amid frugal surroundings, simply reared, early
taught to value pennies, and never affluent, on this occasion found
herself in a strange setting, indeed. Her coach followed the carriage of
the Dowager Empress. Eight snow-white horses adorned with red morocco
trappings trimmed with exquisitely engraved gold, champed their teeth on
bits of solid gold, and above their heads waved snow-white ostrich
plumes; in her shining chariot sat the Empress in a silver and satin
gown with an ermine cloak over her shoulders, ropes of diamonds hanging
from her shoulders, and a crest of diamonds above her head. How
wonderful a change from the life she had always known! Too great a
change, perhaps. For even now her manner did not please the populace.
The Dowager was hailed with acclamations and unprecedented enthusiasm.
The Empress was received in dead silence. The situation was an
impossible one. She tried to smile upon the throng, but her smiles were
stony and cold, and people remarked to one another that she only “stared
in disdain.” After the long and tedious coronation service, as the
Emperor was painfully making his way to the Church of the Ascension,
staggering under the weight of his royal robes and crown, he stumbled
and fell in a long swoon--just as he has fallen ever since under the
weight of responsibilities and cares he has never been strong enough to
carry.
The following day the coronation festivities were interrupted by a
terrible catastrophe. Some five thousand peasants were crushed or
trampled to death in a stampede and panic preceding the distribution of
certain simple meals, which were to have been in honour of the great
event of the coronation. The calamity has never been satisfactorily
explained, but there seems to have been a general lack of efficiency
among those who had the distribution in charge. No sooner was word
received of the disaster, than the Dowager Empress hurried to the
overcrowded hospitals, administering personal comfort, and relief, and
cheer to the surviving wounded. Her great activity and sympathetic
devotion endeared her yet more to the people, and as long as she lives,
thousands will revere her for her expressions of grief and solicitude on
this occasion.
Nicholas, however, made himself conspicuous by doing nothing. On nearly
every occasion during the course of his reign when he has had a signal
opportunity for doing the right thing, he has acted precisely as he
acted on this occasion--he has turned his back and gone off. And
Alexandra Feodorovna has acted in concert with her husband. They both
attended the ball at the French Embassy that same night, thus horrifying
not only Russia but the civilised world.
I do not believe that the Tsaritsa is lacking in heart warmth or human
sympathies, but her life is dominated by one man. Before she was an
Empress she was a woman, and as a woman she loved, and as a woman she
gave all to that love, and to the end of the chapter one must look for
the real life of the Tsaritsa in those spheres where her personal love
for this one man holds sway.
From the coronation day the Tsaritsa never regained a place in the
affections of the Russian people, and having recognised this fact, and
having realised the futility of usurping the place of the Dowager
Empress, she simply ceased trying. The Russian people don’t dislike her,
they merely do not know her.
When travelling through the interior of Russia, I constantly heard the
Tsar spoken of by the peasants. Sometimes reverently, of late more often
disdainfully, occasionally in the terms of the old Russian proverb: “God
is in heaven and the Tsar is far off.” But I do not recall of ever
hearing a peasant speak of the Empress. When I have asked about her the
_moujiks_ have invariably shrugged their shoulders in silence. They
often have a bright coloured lithograph of her on the walls of their
houses, and they all think the picture very beautiful. More than that,
they know nor care not at all.
Once in an interior village I heard a group of peasants discussing the
Tsar with a trace of old-time superstitious reverence and I asked, “What
of the Empress?”
A shaggy old _moujik_ shook his towsled head stolidly as he replied:
“She is the Little Father’s woman--but what can we know of her?”
The Tsaritsa entered upon a life of unusual difficulty from the moment
she crossed the Russian frontier. She realised even at the time of her
wedding, and more than ever at her coronation that she was not liked at
court, so she did what any sensitive soul would have done under similar
circumstances--she turned from the people who criticised her, who failed
to appreciate her trying, turned to those whom she loved, who loved her.
How many women in our own country have been through just such
experiences! Not called upon to serve as queens or empresses, but
summoned to positions they never were fitted or trained to occupy. With
the realisation of failure comes a terrible disappointment and sorrow,
sometimes heartbreak. Good women then turn to the fruits of love and in
their children seek the salvation necessary to counteract the first
failure.
The Dowager Empress had never approved of the marriage of Nicholas to
Princess Alix. She herself had always been exceedingly popular with the
Russian people. In her affliction and bereavement the sympathy and
affection of the nation went out to her. At the coronation of her son
and his spouse, her warm personality so completely outshone that of her
younger successor as Empress of the people, that a circle of the court
immediately gathered about her. From that day to the present time the
influence of the Dowager Empress and her “court party” has been more
potent than that of the Tsaritsa. At times this influence has been
directed openly against her rival and always to the embarrassment of the
younger woman. For several years they were not even on speaking terms
and to-day they rarely meet save on formal occasions when court
etiquette demands the presence of them both at some particular function.
The attitude of the Dowager Empress has been a source of continual pain
to the Tsaritsa and besides actively militating against her, it has been
one more strong influence driving her away from the usual interests and
activities and more into her family life.
This estrangement between the two first women of the court has also
tended more than anything else to isolate Nicholas. It has resulted in
periodic ruptures between the Tsar and his mother, and it has strained
his relations with his numerous relatives and important personages of
the court, who have remained loyal to her.
These are some of the reasons why the life which ought to have been
bright and happy has been utterly miserable, and now there are
indications that a complete nervous breakdown may crown the burden of
her years.
CHAPTER IV
MOTHERHOOD AND QUEENSHIP
Alexandra Feodorovna, as the wife of the Emperor, was expected to be the
mother of an heir to the throne of Russia. And even here long years of
enduring pain and travail were before her, for four girls were born
before a son came to them. When the first child was born, in November,
1895, there was disappointment throughout the Empire. But the Tsar said
a splendid thing at that time: “I am glad,” said the Royal father, “that
our child is a girl. Had it been a boy he would have belonged to the
people, being a girl she belongs to us.”
One year and a half after the birth of the Grand Duchess Olga the second
daughter was born, and she was named Tatiana. Marie followed in another
two years, and Anastasie exactly two years later. More than three years
then elapsed before Alexis, the son and heir, made his appearance.
During these three years the aid of all kinds of soothsayers and
charlatans was invoked to influence the sex of the child. An old priest
of the interior who had been dead seventy years was canonised in the
hope that the miracle of a boy might be worked! This is a story by
itself, however, and it would be premature to tell it now.
It is wellnigh impossible for people in America to understand the
disappointment and vexation of the court when girl after girl was
born--four of them--before the long wanted son. The Tsaritsa fell more
and more into disfavour, and the aristocracy--especially those who were
the friends and followers of the Dowager--took advantage of the simple,
superstitious peasants to point out to them that the Empress was not
beloved in heaven or she would have borne a son.
When finally a son was born many people loudly asserted that the boy was
a substitution and not the Tsaritsa’s child at all. This was a very
malicious thing to say and was, of course, entirely untrue. The rumour
persisted, however, and received certain credence until it was pointed
out that the Dowager Empress was far too watchful, and too much at
enmity with the Empress to allow any such imposition to be perpetrated.
Until the birth of the son the Tsaritsa took little part in public
activity. Indeed, it was not until the war year of 1904 (which was also
the year of the birth of a son) that she undertook to participate to any
extent in work for the nation.
At the breaking out of the war between Russia and Japan the Tsaritsa
undertook to assist the work of the Red Cross Society. I have seen
several of the rooms in the Winter Palace which were turned over to the
work of preparing bandages and warm clothing for the wounded soldiers in
the hospitals at the front. In connection with this work the Tsaritsa
was conspicuous before the people for the first time since her
coronation as Empress in an undertaking properly belonging to the
nation. She gathered together hundreds of young ladies of the court,
organised working parties, and before long among the women of
aristocratic circles it was distinctly the thing to do to belong to one
of the Empress’s working groups, to prepare warm caps, and mufflers, and
stockings and bandages for the army. The Empress herself worked
indefatigably. And so did the two older Grand Duchesses, Olga and
Tatiana. They both sewed and knit till their little fingers were stiff
and sore.
The earnest spirit of patriotic pride and sacrifice exhibited by the
Empress at this time was inspiration to thousands of young women in St.
Petersburg and Moscow, and on the big estates of rich noblemen
throughout the Empire. One group of fashionable St. Petersburg girls
presented themselves in a body to the Empress with the request that they
be sent to the front to serve as volunteer nurses. But the Empress
replied: “You are not experienced enough for that work, nor strong
enough to endure the hardships of life in Manchuria. What you may do is
to serve in the hospitals of St. Petersburg, thus enabling the regular
trained nurses to go to the front.” Almost without exception these young
ladies acted upon this suggestion, and many of them did most excellent
service, eventually becoming as useful as nurses who
[Illustration: THE FIVE CHILDREN OF THE TSARITSA.]
had undergone the usual training in preparation for such work.
Some idea of the extent of this work may be gathered from the single
fact that in the year 1904 the depot at Kharbin alone received from the
Winter Palace headquarters, over which the Empress presided in person,
no fewer than eleven million eight hundred articles. In addition to
these things more than a million dollars in money was collected and
forwarded for the purchase of surgical instruments and such other things
as were sorely needed by the badly equipped Russian forces. Some seventy
ambulance trains were organised, and a number of chapels and libraries.
In thanking the corps of women who had assisted her in this work the
Empress said: “I am happy to know that through the efforts of the
workers in my depot my most ardent desire to give relief to our dear
troops has been satisfied.” And in a telegram to one of the generals
commanding at the front she said: “Inform the troops in the Far East
that I rejoice that it has been given me to lighten even to a slight
extent the lot of the unhappy victims of a cruel war, who have so
self-sacrificingly shed their blood for the honour of the Throne of
Russia. United in prayer with you all I lift up to the Highest my ardent
petition that He may comfort all who have suffered on the field of
battle and continue to keep alive in the hearts of the valiant and
heroic Russian warriors, the feeling of devotion to their duty, their
oath and their love to the Fatherland.”
The Empress also organised the famous “Dog Detachment,” by which, with
the help of dogs especially trained in Germany, the overlooked wounded
were sought out after the tides of battle had swept the Manchurian
plains and hills. Unfortunately this detachment was never given proper
opportunity for activity, as the fields of battle almost invariably
remained in the hands of the enemy.
Besides the Red Cross work, the most important public undertaking of the
Tsaritsa has been the establishment of Labour Aid Institutions. This is
really an incipient charity enterprise and is being gradually extended
to different parts of the Empire.
Viewed as the charity organisation of a great nation the whole scheme is
a ridiculous farce, but viewed as the work of an individual its
proportions seem substantial. A complete list of these institutions
practically means a complete list of the charities of the Empire, and
includes temporary nurseries for babies, homes and asylums for children,
lodging-houses for workless men, old people’s homes, lying-in hospitals,
institutions for the insane, libraries and reading-rooms and various
depots where simple work is provided for those who are able.
I visited a number of these institutions and satisfied myself that,
however satisfactory a catalogue of this work might be, that the work
itself had small value. It is the crudest and most careless organisation
of charity I have seen anywhere in the world, and carried on on such a
trifling scale as to be practically valueless. If the time ever comes
when the Russian Government can take up the work thus begun it will be
given a value--the value that ultimately accrues to all pioneer work.
There are more starving peasants in Russia every year than in any
country of the western world. The numbers annually mount up into the
millions--in 1906 there were twenty-seven millions in the famine belt.
The beggars and workless, the maimed and the crippled victims of the war
fill the streets of all the large cities. A lodging-house for fifty or a
hundred men in a city where fifty thousand are in want is the merest
drop in the bucket. The schools for girls are better equipped and better
endowed than any of the other institutions embraced in this work, and
this is owing to the personal interest of the Empress in girls.
This interest of the Tsaritsa’s in girls is doubtless owing to the fact
that she has so many daughters of her own. Many of the schools which she
has helped to start and to support have been named after her own little
girls. The “Olga Children’s Homes” in St. Petersburg and Moscow were
first inaugurated in 1898 and now are on a firm foundation.
In Russia, the Labour Aid Institutions are treated lightly. Even friends
of the Empress speak of them as trivial. Judged by their present
capacities they _are_ trivial. They are badly managed. They offer rich
opportunities for what is variously called “protection,” “patronage”
and “graft”--opportunities which are fully taken advantage of, as I saw
for myself in several of the places which I visited. There were
elaborate offices, luxuriously fitted with selected furnishings, and
small regiments of young aristocrats and noblemen (like all public
servants of rank in Russia, called “chinovniks”) serving as clerks and
directors. Positions of absolute sinecure carrying rich emoluments. Not
one of these institutions--outside of the orphanages--would stand the
test of scientific charity or philanthropy. For all this I am inclined
to give the work a higher value than do the Russian people for, after
all, Russia will one day be a modern nation in forms and institutions,
and then all of this work will needs be developed. It will then be good
to have this little experiment scattered about the country. It may prove
the foundation for a work of worthy proportions. And I am glad that the
Empress may claim credit for most of what has been done. There are
schools and institutions of one sort or another named after each of the
children, as well as after the Empress herself, and to all of these the
Empress contributes annually from her private purse.
In no sense can any, or all of these enterprises be considered a great
work, but they are all characteristic of the Tsaritsa. It is indicative
of simple, human sympathies, it is quiet and unostentatious--almost
timidly so--but the idea underlying it all is real.
The court of Nicholas II does not entertain nearly so frequently nor so
lavishly as the preceding Courts of the last hundred years. This is
partly owing to the temperament of the present Tsar, and the retiring
characteristic of the Tsaritsa, and also because of the troubled and
distraught condition of the Empire during the last several years.
Several court balls each winter are required, however, and on these
occasions the Tsaritsa is always a conspicuous figure. Her own enjoyment
at these Royal functions may well be questioned. In the first place,
there are certain aged ministers, ambassadors and potentates with whom
she must dance. Doubtless these eminent worthies are frequently endowed
with great dignity, but statesmanship and imposing presence do not make
up for grace and ease in tripping figures to light music. And if,
perchance, the Tsaritsa would waltz with a brilliant young officer, or
charming courtier, all the other dancers must at once stop and clear the
floor for the Empress and her favoured partner. To be thus the observed
of all observers cannot be otherwise than trying to one of so modest and
retiring a nature.
Years before, when the Tsaritsa was still only Princess Alix of Hesse,
she had visited St. Petersburg as the guest of her sister Elizabeth, who
had married the Grand Duke Sergius. During one of the dances at a
certain ball given during this visit, Princess Alix slipped on the
polished floor and fell. Her partner, as well as a number of young
officers, sprang toward her to assist her to her feet, but the Grand
Duke chanced to be near and he, too, sprang to her assistance. Instantly
the embarrassed partner and other officers stepped back. The privilege
of assisting the confused and blushing Princess was the prerogative of
the Grand Duke because of his exalted position!
When the Tsaritsa does participate in a public function she does it with
a stateliness and grace that commands respect, whatever of coldness her
manner may suggest.
I had the privilege of being near to her on one of these occasions. It
was the 10th day of May, 1906, in the Throne Room of the Winter Palace
in St. Petersburg.
The Emperor had called together the First Duma and the members of this
extraordinary body, together with the council of Empire and the entire
Court, were assembled to hear the speech from the Throne. It was the
first time in sixteen months that the Royal Family had visited the
capital. These sixteen months had been characterised by almost
continuous revolutionary activity, successive mutinies in the army and
navy, general strikes and disturbances of every description. There was
wide speculation as to the probable outcome of this meeting between the
Tsar and the representatives of the people. “To us,” remarked one of the
Ladies of Honour attached to the Empress, “to us, it is like letting the
Revolution into the Palace”--this reception of the elected deputies of
the people! Members of the court were fearful lest the Tsar would never
return from the Throne Room. Many, if not most of the nobles present,
went in fear and trembling, and went because they had been commanded by
the Emperor and for no other reason.
I met one well known Prince the morning of that day and he immediately
bade me congratulate him, as he had been excused from appearing at the
function.
When the music of the National Anthem was heard, announcing the approach
of the Royal party the atmosphere of the Throne Room became so tense
that it was painful. Not one person in the room dared think what the
next minute might bring forth! When the Tsar and the Grand Dukes and the
Empress and the Dowager Empress and the Grand Duchesses were all
assembled before the richly attired Metropolitans and high priests for
the interminable preliminary blessings, the slightest sound echoed
throughout the room, so still and strained was every human being in the
room. The nervousness of the Tsar was apparent to all. The agitation of
the Grand Dukes was laughable, especially the manifestations of their
fear in their repeated and excited crossing of themselves. Even
correspondents, schooled and trained to recklessness in all kinds of
danger and calm to the point of being blase in the face of any
situation, breathed hard and showed the terrible strain and tension of
the minutes.
The Empresses alone appeared in full command of every nerve and muscle.
I looked upon the Tsaritsa in silent admiration. The picture of her
strong, immovable figure is imaged forever upon my memory. The
fluttering of a glove or a handkerchief from the balcony to the floor
would surely have upset the entire assemblage in spite of its
magnificent show of military symbols, buttons, medals and gold and
silver trappings. The thought came to me there, and I have recalled it
many times since, had such an untoward incident occurred the Tsaritsa
alone, or at least, the Empresses alone, would have stood stolid. The
exquisite poise and complete possession of the Tsaritsa commanded
absolute admiration. Cold and indifferent she may be toward the people
of her court, but on an occasion like this she certainly acquits herself
with rare credit. At all times a magnificent woman to look upon, tall,
statuesque, imposing, imperial, she never appeared to better advantage
than on this occasion.
With her, somewhat back in the procession were the four older children
of the Tsar and Tsaritsa--Olga, Tatiana, Marie and Anastasie. These
little girls bear the title of Grand Duchess, and in them has the life
of the Tsaritsa long been centred. Presently I shall have a number of
stories to tell of their nursery days. As we go on we shall learn how
completely the life and time of the Tsaritsa have been taken up with her
children and their home and family life.
Easter is one of the greatest fêtes of the year in Russia. The long
Lenten fast is usually kept rigorously by all classes over whom the
church maintains dominion, and even by many who have ceased to reverence
Orthodoxy, but in whom the instinct of traditional observance remains.
On Easter Eve there is a tremendously solemn service in all of the
churches in the land. At the stroke of midnight priests and choir burst
forth in loud hallelujahs and all the people shout “Christ is Risen!”
“Christ is Risen!” and greet one another with a holy kiss. Everybody
kisses everybody else in sight regardless of previous acquaintance. I
remember standing bolt upright in a fearful press in St. Isaac’s
Cathedral one Easter Eve for two mortal hours in the middle of the
night, the atmosphere hot and fetid till even men swooned and all
wearied unspeakably.
On Easter morning presents are exchanged and masters and mistresses
greet all the servants of their households with the holy kiss. The Tsar
and Tsaritsa observe this custom as religiously as the humblest of their
subjects, and every palace maid and stable boy is greeted in this way.
Long before the hour when the Emperor and Empress are to receive the
household, there is great excitement below stairs where all the servants
busily scrub their honest faces with soap and water till they shine like
great apples in preparation for the kiss of their imperial master and
mistress. The Tsar kisses every man in the palace, even to the soldiers
on duty, and the Empress every maid servant. On one occasion the
Tsaritsa remarked that she “sometimes thought the Emperor had rather the
better of it because of the new leather that the soldiers wear on that
day, and which smells so nice!”
In view of the fact that court observance would naturally expect the
Tsaritsa to play the rôle of Empress, rather than of mother and wife as
her life work, it is the more extraordinary that this mighty Queen (in
point of power and opportunity) has chosen the quieter life of the home.
In addition to the private fortune of the Tsar, an immense income
accrues from the gold and precious stone mines of Siberia which are
worked by convicts for the private purse of the Emperor and from the
vast timber holdings that he controls; besides all this, the Government
officially grants him a “salary” of nearly five million dollars a year,
which is paid to him in monthly instalments of four hundred thousand
dollars each.
The Tsaritsa, as head of the Royal Household, is mistress of nearly
thirty thousand servants, scattered in many palaces and residences
throughout the Empire. It is not likely that this vast retinue is any
particular care to her, for the army of servants, just like the army of
soldiers, is divided into groups and officered by various functionaries.
In fact, it is likely that the two armies are not dissimilar in the
minds of the Tsar and Tsaritsa. Every wish of the Tsar’s is a command to
the army and has only to be uttered to an aide to be executed. So the
word of the Tsaritsa spoken to a lady-in-waiting is all sufficient to be
carried out by any or all of her servant host.
There are fifty thousand head of cattle in the Royal pastures, and five
thousand horses in the Royal stables. Over all these the Tsaritsa is
supreme--as the wife and consort of the Tsar,--and one hundred and forty
million subjects besides!
The point of her whole life as Empress is that when Princess Alix
married Nicholas she gave herself and all of her activity to
Nicholas--not to the Russian nation.
Every act of hers has been one of personal devotion. If Princess Alix
had been ambitious as many women in court circles are, or if she had
never loved so intensely and so blindly, the world looking back upon her
career as it does to-day, might have deemed her a better Empress. As it
happened, circumstances throughout her life have all driven her back
from the public role and more into the circle of the family. Thus it
comes about that the chronicler of her life must pass lightly over her
life as Empress and dwell at length upon those sides of her character
which the words wife and mother indicate. In other words, her entire
life has been one long romance. A life of devotion to her husband and to
her children, and this at the expense of her duties as Empress.
As the years have passed the disposition of the child once called
“Sunny” has altered and changed, and the lines of wistful pathos which
have settled round her still lovely face are doubtless indications of
the drops of gall that have tainted her cup of life’s happiness. For all
these mellowing lines the Tsaritsa wears an expression that in many
lights is of that unusual other-worldly beauty, so seldom seen in the
great world of to-day, but common to so many of the women whose
portraits have been left us by the world artists of the Middle Ages. It
is an expression that appears and ripens only under soul development,
and as we see it in the Tsaritsa we do not find it difficult to
understand and trace, for a considerable part of her life has been given
over to religious thought and contemplation, and not to the study of
theological doctrines and controversies only, but to the deeper truths
of spiritualism and mysticism, truths whose elusiveness holds them for
ever remote to all save the few, and whose realities are measured only
by the standards of the eternal verities. This brings us to one of the
most extraordinary, and at the same time one of the fascinating sides of
the life of the Tsaritsa.
CHAPTER V
SPIRIT WHISPERINGS
An interesting trait of the forebears of Princess Alix was their belief
in ghosts. Presently we shall see that Princess Alix, even after she
became Tsaritsa, gave much of her time to the study of the mystics and
has always had spiritualistic tendencies and beliefs in the
supernatural. Most of the Dukes of Hesse are credited with similar
superstitions.
Duke George II, who lived in the seventeenth century, is said to have
seen the ghost of his dead brother Wilhelm on one occasion. Before the
death of Wilhelm there had been a quarrel between the two brothers. The
ghost chastened and severely reproached Duke George for his bitterness
and hatred. The incident made such an impression upon him that as long
as he lived, he could not shake off the spell of the weird experience.
Another Duke of Hesse, a William, had a life-long terror of ghosts and
always slept in a brilliantly lighted room. A story is on record of this
man that he once returned to one of his hunting lodges at night, when
suddenly all of the lights went out, a great wind magically arose, doors
slammed, windows shook--and presto!--the lights as suddenly reappeared,
but all of the soldiers of the guard had mysteriously vanished and the
entire lodge was dismantled. Long before this the lodge was reputed
“haunted,” so that when the Duke was there the soldiers of the guard
were changed every thirty minutes and the whole establishment kept well
lighted.
Just prior to the birth of the fifth child to the Empress, a phase of
temperament developed, which attracted the attention and comment of the
world. From early girlhood, the Princess Alix had manifested an interest
in things philosophical and theological. Back in her old home at
Darmstadt, the Royal betrothal had once nearly been broken owing to the
religious scruples of the bride-to-be. Princess Alix could not convince
herself or be convinced that she was right in renouncing the Protestant
faith of her mother and adopting that of the Greek Catholic Church.
Finally, her love for Nicholas overcame her scruples of conscience and
she forced herself to accept the doctrines of the State Church of
Russia. Priests who had been assigned to tutor her, to this day relate
their experiences and difficulties in meeting the arguments and
answering the questions brought up by the Princess: the familiarity
which she exhibited with German theological writings and philosophical
theories confused them. In Russia, as Empress, she continued to
encourage her interest in religious doctrines and theories. The friends
of her own choosing were generally men and women with whom she could
discuss vital religious problems. Surrounded as she was by an atmosphere
perennially surcharged with the sense of impending tragedy, she not
unnaturally, developed pronounced morbid tendencies. From time to time,
she believed that she caught the glint of certain gleams of spiritual
truths in the distance and these she pursued with that fatal persistence
which so often leads people, especially women of temperamental or
melancholy tendencies to ultimately accept various “isms.” The Tsaritsa
became more and more markedly spiritualistic. By nature and by training,
she was retiring and preferred the splendid isolation of the court in
her home circle to the more brilliant opportunities offered her by her
supreme social position. These tendencies toward retirement, encouraged
as they were by the Court which did not take kindly to her nor exhibit
at any time the cordiality and friendliness generally accorded Queens,
she came to live more and more in the realms of the spiritual. She
carried her intellectual interests far beyond the things we know and
over into the borderland of Faith and Belief. To those who knew her
well, it was not a matter of special surprise when, after the birth of
three children and no heir to the throne, the Tsaritsa turned an open
ear to various men who claimed supernatural control over things
physical.
Prior to the birth of Anastasie, the aid of eminent medical and
scientific men was sought to influence, if possible, the sex of the next
child, but all to no avail. (What pangs of bitterness must sometimes
have come to her mother heart when she remembered the two boys whose
father was also the father of her daughters,--two sons who could never
be recognised by their own father and who were destined forever to be
exiled to a foreign land because of the blot on their ’scutcheon! What
piercing irony of fate for the father who must sometimes have remembered
his outcast sons upon whom he had bestowed the bastard mark while the
birth of a legitimate son and heir was so long deferred!)
When science failed, religion and spiritualism were appealed to. Rumours
were rife of various charlatans imported from one place or another to
practise their magic. Of these, the one who came to be the most widely
known was called Philippe. Philippe first joined the royal entourage at
Livadia. Later, he was brought to Moscow and St. Petersburg, and for
several years, he is said to have exercised great influence not only
over the Empress but over the Tsar as well. The Tsar has ever been an
impressionable man and though he has displayed all the stubbornness of a
weak nature, he has frequently been under the domination of others. Just
as he was willing to lend a ready ear to Pobiedonostzeff and to his
uncle, the Grand Duke Sergius, so also was he willing to listen to
charlatans who came to him well recommended. It was under the
Reactionary Grand-ducal party that Philippe was brought to Russia. In
course of time, this man came to be known as “the Tsar’s magician.” An
atmosphere of profound mystery always surrounded Philippe, although of
the extent of his domination, there never was any question. From all
that I can gather, this man’s name was Philippe Landard. Landard is
supposed to have been the son of a shepherd and that he was born in a
small village situated high among the French Alps. When quite a boy, his
father would regularly take him to the local abattoir, and on one of
these visits, he made the acquaintance of a butcher who took the boy
into his employ. Landard possessed imagination even as a child, as is
evinced by the fact that his contract with the slaughter-house prompted
him with the desire to become a surgeon. With this hope in view, he
attended evening classes and night lectures in the medical school at
Lyons. Handicapped, however, by lack of money and presumably not endowed
with keenest intelligence, he never succeeded in passing the
examinations necessary to admit him to practice. What he did succeed in
doing, however, was to discover and develop certain magnetic powers
which he undoubtedly had,--powers of personality which he cultivated
remarkably. He turned this power especially in the direction of healing.
He practised auto-suggestion and by the judicious use of massage,
frequently succeeded in convincing people that his healing powers were
literally real. Ultimately, he was able to establish himself as a
thaumaturgist or practising healer in the Rue Tape d’Or at Lyons where
he acquired considerable local notoriety which presently spread all
over France among people who believed in his art. At least twice, he is
said to have been arrested and charged by the police as an illegal
practitioner. This led him to be more discreet in his methods and he
refrained from ever writing a prescription or committing himself in
writing on any point. The leader of the French School of Occultism
became interested in him and through him, he met Dr. George von
Langsdorff of Freyburg. Dr. von Langsdorff had been brought to Russia by
the Grand Duke Constantine Nicholevitch and presented to the Emperor
Alexander II who had actually commissioned him to sense out and unravel
Nihilist conspiracies. Dr. von Langsdorff, whether through the
connivance of the political police or not we do not know, succeeded in
foretelling certain plots which actually materialised. He attained
considerable notoriety in connection with the blowing up of the
dining-room of the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg in 1880. Dr. von
Langsdorff evinced considerable interest in Landard but unlike von
Langsdorff and other members of the French School of Occultism, Landard
ascribed his supernatural powers, both in matters of healing and
prophesy, to divine influence, that is to say, whereas the French
practitioners were avowedly irreligious and proclaimed themselves
Freethinkers, Landard cultivated the spiritual element and professed
himself a religious man.
Through von Langsdorff, Landard was brought into contact with certain
members of the Russian colony of royalties who annually visit the
Riviera. It was upon their invitation that Philippe visited Nice and
while there was fortunate enough to win the favour of the Grand Duke
Alexis. This was accomplished through curing the Grand Duke of a painful
attack of rheumatism of the knee by his “laying on of the hands” method
and magnetism. The Grand Duke Alexis passed Philippe on to the Grand
Duchess Vladimir, who in turn brought him to Russia and was instrumental
in having him put in touch with Tsar Nicholas II. From all accounts,
Philippe was a man of courage, personality, of winning and sympathetic
manner. The Tsar frankly liked him and before long, Philippe was
established as a more or less permanent member of the Royal Household.
The Emperor consulted Philippe on all kinds of personal questions and
later sought his counsel in regard to the weightiest questions of state.
It has even been said that during the winter of 1902-3, the influence of
Philippe had grown so supreme, that a determined protest was submitted
to the Tsar by the members of his council and ministers, including Conte
Witte. Philippe was retired for a time from practice, but was still
retained as a member of the Royal household and, privately, Nicholas
continued to listen to the spiritualistic haverings of this man. From
time to time, Landard also appeared to effect cures upon various members
of the Royal household and of the court. These things naturally tended
to strengthen his position and to enhance his prestige. The result of
these manifestations of power upon Emperor Nicholas was to confirm his
confidence in Philippe’s supernatural connections. In him, Nicholas
thought he had found another, if not the actual reincarnation of Joan of
Arc. Nicholas seems to have had little difficulty in persuading the
Empress to trust in the potency of Philippe’s power in regard to
influencing the sex of their next child. At all events, the next child
proved to be a son. Philippe claimed much of the credit for this, but it
is evident that the entire credit was not accorded him by the Royal
Family inasmuch as a certain parish priest in the Province of Tambov was
later given credit for exerting a like influence. The priest had been
dead many years, but his tomb had been made a kind of shrine by the
_moujiks_ and it had been annually visited by barren women who claimed
to have found in the shrine the secret of fruitfulness and also the
spirit of influencing the sex of unborn children.
The effect of Philippe’s ministrations upon the Tsaritsa let her still
deeper within the portals of the Spirit World. To conclude the story of
Philippe, it is said that he became intoxicated with the power and
confidence bestowed in him by the Royal Family and that he overshot
himself at the time of the Russo-Japanese war. He is supposed to have
been largely instrumental in persuading Nicholas to take the attitude
that he did which brought about the war and throughout the long,
disastrous campaign was continually prophesying a turn in the tide which
never came. Landard is said to have represented to the Emperor that he
had been selected by Divine Inspiration to assure the Emperor that the
war in Manchuria would inaugurate a new and great era of Russian glory
that would forever overshadow the Yellow Peril which at that time was
popularly feared to be menacing Europe. When disaster followed disaster,
members of the Court and Royal Household lost faith in Philippe and
finally the Tsar himself ordered him to leave Russia within forty-eight
hours. This banishment proved a great blow to Landard, who, heart broken
and covered with disgrace, returned to his own native villa of St.
Julian d’Arbresle where he died the following year from a complication
of internal disorders.
Despite the downfall of Philippe, the faith of the Empress was not
shaken in the least in things mystic and spiritual and there is ample
evidence that this inherent characteristic has in reality become a
veritable second nature.
Miss Margaret Eager, an Irish lady of good education, was called to
Russia in the year 1899 to serve in the capacity of Nursery Governess to
the Royal Family. Miss Eager is very much of a Celt. She has a profound
belief in the philosophy of mysticism and indeed she herself seems to be
possessed of certain supernatural powers, second sight, visions and
dreams that come true. Miss Eager related to me various occurrences in
the Royal Family concerning strange and seemingly mystical
manifestations. Miss Eager herself, believes firmly in the reality of
the spiritualistic sense of the Empress.
When the Grand Duchess Olga was three years old, she was taken ill with
a gastric attack from which she did not fully recover for two or three
weeks, the attack itself, in its severe form, keeping the Royal child in
bed three or four days. The first time Miss Eager left the bedside of
the sick child for a breath of fresh air, she went for a walk along the
quays of the Neva. Upon her return, as she entered the room, little Olga
looked up and said, “An old lady was here!” “What old lady?” she asked.
“An old lady who wears a blue dress,” the child replied. Miss Eager was
frankly puzzled because the Court was in mourning at that time and there
was no one wearing a blue dress. “Surely, you mean blue. What kind of
blue?” questioned Miss Eager. “It was not like Mamma’s,” and the child
paused. Miss Eager thought perhaps one of the maids had had a visitor
and so they were all questioned, but nobody knew of any visitor during
Miss Eager’s absence, and so the matter for the moment was dropped and
dismissed by Miss Eager as a possible vagary of the child’s imagination.
A few days later, Miss Eager was sitting on the floor with the Royal
children in a certain room in the Royal Palace playing at building
castles of cards. Suddenly, Olga looked up and exclaimed, “There is the
old lady in blue!” “Where? Where?” said Miss Eager and the other
children. “There! she came through the bedroom door; she is standing at
the door now!” Miss Eager quickly caught up the child and ran through
the bedroom into the room beyond and into yet another room, but she
could find no one nor could she hear any footsteps. “Well,” said Olga to
Miss Eager, “you must be very stupid because the old lady was there.”
Two days later, the Empress directed Miss Eager to take the child to the
Chapel in the Winter Palace and there, in the hall on the way to the
chapel, are two life-sized portraits of the Emperor Alexander II and his
wife. Looking at the picture of Alexander II’s wife, Olga said, “Why,
that is the lady I saw in the blue dress and see, her dress is not the
dress Mamma wears.” The identification was made by the Grand Duchess
with the utmost assurance.
Now, this incident by itself would have no significance, but Miss Eager
relates in connection with it other incidents which give it interesting
if fantastic value. Miss Eager, during her long stay in the Royal
Household, always slept with the nursery. One night, she maintains, she
distinctly heard a voice coming from directly beneath her bed. The voice
was far off and weird and was as of one weeping bitterly and making
terrible complaints and the language used was French. The story she was
relating was one of extreme intimacy. Miss Eager says that she sat up in
bed to try to locate from whence the sounds were coming, but no sooner
had she raised herself upright than the voice ceased. Upon laying her
head on the pillow again, the voice resumed and the complaints were of
her husband’s unfaithfulness. While Miss Eager was still meditating the
extraordinary experience, the Empress as was her wont, entered the room
and Miss Eager asked her what room was directly beneath the room they
were then in. The Empress replied, “Merely storerooms.” Miss Eager then
said to the Empress, “But there is some poor woman there and suffering
from the most terrible affliction.” The Empress replied, “What are you
saying?” Whereupon, Miss Eager related what she had just experienced.
The Empress then asked if the words were spoken in English. “No,”
replied Miss Eager, “It is French; at first I thought it might be the
cook, but that is impossible because the French spoken was very pure and
elegant.” The Empress then said that if Miss Eager thought there was any
one below, she had better get out of bed and listen at the floor, which
she did, but could hear nothing. The Empress then told her to get back
into bed and go to sleep. Immediately her head touched the pillow, the
voice was again audible to her. Suddenly the Empress said, “Tell me,
does it remind you of anything you have ever heard before? Do you know
anything of the story of this room before it was done up for my little
ones?” Miss Eager replied that she knew that the wife of Alexander II
slept in this room and then she recalled having heard that this woman
was very unhappy because of her husband’s numerous peccadilloes with
other women. She recalled, also, that the Princess Dolgoruki was
Alexander II’s mistress. His wife, who used this room over a long period
of time, used nightly to bury her face in her pillow and cry aloud.
After she recalled these things, the Empress said, “Yes, but before she
died, she went to the Dolgoruki and told her of her unhappiness, using
the very selfsame words that you have just repeated to me as having
heard while on your pillow.” The Empress thereupon told Miss Eager that
she was sleeping on the very bed which Alexander II’s wife had used and
upon which she died. The next day, the Empress herself, insisted that
the entire furnishings of the room be changed and that a new bed be
installed. It is said that Alexander II, after the death of his wife,
wanted to marry the Princess Dolgoruki, which indeed, he may have done
morganatically. Miss Eager was deeply impressed by this experience and
in the mind of the Empress there was no question or shadow of doubt
whatever.
Another incident related by Miss Eager in connection with the Empress
occurred in the Palace at Peterhof. One night, according to her custom,
the Empress entered Miss Eager’s room. Miss Eager relates that she awoke
to find herself being shaken by Her Majesty who was crying, “Awake!
awake! come back!” and when Miss Eager came to her senses, she realised
that she was crying bitterly. “What is it? What is it?” exclaimed the
Empress. “I have been here five minutes shaking you and you would not
wake up; what is the matter?” Miss Eager replied that she must have had
a nightmare. The Empress insisted upon knowing what Miss Eager had seen
in her unhappy dream, whereupon, the nursery governess related that in
her dream, she appeared to be in a town of some far distant country--a
southern land. The streets were badly lighted; many of them were narrow
and the people round about her who filled the streets, were dark and
swarthy. Traversing these streets, she presently came to a great
building before which a crowd had collected. As she stood and wondered
what interest held the people, an open carriage drove up. The thought
flashed through her mind, “Royalty must be expected; who can it be?”
Just then, out of the building came an elderly gentleman whom Miss Eager
did not recognise, but he was followed closely by a man in uniform.
After the man got into the carriage, there was the glint of flashing
steel and immediately the oldish man dropped back apparently lifeless.
At once, all was turned into a mad dream and Miss Eager found herself
trying to crush the Empress and the Royal Princesses under the seat of
the carriage. Whereupon, the Empress laughed and said, “You can see for
yourself, that it was only a dream, for you could not shove me under the
seat of the carriage even if you could succeed in putting the children
there.” When the Empress had gone Miss Eager once more drifted off into
sleep. In the morning when she awoke, she was tired and nervous as if
after some long journey. When Mary, the nurse, came in, she said, “Why,
Miss Eager, what is the matter with you this morning?” and Miss Eager
told her that in the night she had had a terrible dream in which she had
seen a man in a carriage murdered. At breakfast time, when she saw the
Empress, she said, “Have you had any more nightmares?” and then turning
to the Emperor, who had just entered the room, Her Majesty directed Miss
Eager to relate to him the hideous dream of the night before. Whereupon,
Miss Eager related the unhappy scenes of her nightmare. The Tsar
listened with the utmost attention and when Miss Eager had finished
speaking, he said, “Miss Eager, I hope that you won’t be very much
frightened because what you saw in your dream last night was an incident
which occurred in a town of Northern Italy where His Majesty, King
Humbert, was assassinated at precisely the hour that the Empress entered
your room and in that manner that you describe in your dream.” Miss
Eager, like a flash, remembered the picture she had seen of the late
King of Italy and it was the man whom she had seen enter the carriage
followed by the officer in uniform! As the Tsar told her this, he held
in his hand a telegram which had just been received detailing the news
of this assassination.
On one occasion, the Empress told Miss Eager that all her life she had
been much interested in the spiritual world, but that she had come to
the conclusion that it was wrong to meddle with such things because if
there was anything in it, it must come from the devil.
Early one evening, the Empress entered the nursery and told the children
that she was going to dinner and would probably be very late,
consequently would not come in to see them on her return, as was her
wont. There was going to be a séance after the dinner. The next day,
Miss Eager took occasion to ask Her Majesty if she had enjoyed the
séance. The Tsaritsa proceeded to tell her all about a clairvoyant
called Philippe but with a note of bitterness in her recital, for she
said that Philippe had mesmerised her husband and made him do exactly
what he told him. The Empress steadfastly refused to see Philippe after
that. Just what occurred at this séance, the Empress never did say, at
least to Miss Eager, but it was quite clear to her that Her Majesty had
been unfavourably impressed and that she would have nothing more to do
with the mysterious Frenchman. Considerable pressure was brought to bear
upon the Empress by various ladies of the Court to persuade her to go
once more to Philippe, but she never would do it.
These incidents indicating this phase of the Tsaritsa’s character are,
of course, sympathetically interpreted by Miss Eager because she,
herself, believes so absolutely in the spirit world, in dreams and
intuitions.
For example, before Port Arthur was beseiged, Miss Eager in a dream saw
its fall and told the Empress about it. The Empress afterwards reminded
her of this dream and deeply regretted that the Tsar had not taken
counsel from Miss Eager’s vision rather than from Philippe.
On another occasion, Miss Eager told Mary, the nurse, to go and tell a
certain lift-man in the Palace that he was not to work that day as, in a
dream, she had seen him terribly crushed and mangled, but Mary laughed
and refused to convey the message. Miss Eager thought it seemed rather
foolish and so did not insist upon sending the message to the man. That
afternoon, when she returned from the daily drive with the Grand
Duchesses, the Empress sent for her and said, “Miss Eager, this morning,
you told Mary to warn the lift-man not to work to-day and Mary refused
to carry your message.” Miss Eager said, “Yes, that is true.” “Well,”
said the Empress, “I sent for you because I wanted to tell you myself
that while you were out with the children, the lift-man was killed.”
Another curious incident which is hard to explain occurred at the time
of the death of Princess Ella, a daughter of the Grand Duke of Hesse, a
charming child of seven years, who succumbed to an illness of only 36
hours’ duration,--apparently ptomaine poisoning. The child was staying
at the time with her Royal uncle and aunt, the Tsar and Tsaritsa at the
Palace in Poland. While the child was ill, and just before her life
spark was extinguished, two of the Russian Grand Duchesses, Olga and
Tatiana, who were sleeping together in a neighbouring room, suddenly
began to scream frantically. The Empress, the physicians in attendance
upon Princess Ella and Miss Eager rushed into the room where the
children were and saw them standing in their beds and shrieking in
terror. It was long before they could be pacified and then they told how
they had seen a strange man with flowing robes and great wings, walk
through their room. While they were still telling of the fearful
apparition, the eyes of both the children suddenly became dilated with
terror and both of them simultaneously pointing in the same direction,
cried, “Look! Look! There he is again. Don’t you see him? He is going
into Ella’s room. Poor Ella! Poor Ella!” Of course, none of the adults
could see anything and the physicians assured the Empress that it was
but an attack of childish hysteria which had suddenly and strangely come
upon both children. Only a few moments later, the Empress and the
physicians were hurriedly summoned to the bedside of the dying child
who, lapsing into a state of coma, died in the Tsaritsa’s arms. To this
day, the Empress, as well as the Emperor and Miss Eager, are convinced
that the children actually saw this Angel of Death passing into the room
of the dying Princess. At least, it is true that there are many similar
inexplicable cases on record of children and sometimes of animals, as
well as of dying persons, having supernatural vision at moments of
death. Horses, for example, have been known to become terror-stricken
when passing the scene of a murder, while the well-known death-rap is of
such common occurrence that there can be no doubt of its existence.
These incidents are related in order to explain much that is otherwise
inexplicable in the character of the Tsaritsa. The mental development
which she has experienced through her entire life has been logical and
in natural sequence. Her early philosophical and theological interests
have simply been developed abnormally in the abnormal environment in
which she has lived. While the Empress has been ever sceptical when
conversing with her friends and reluctant to accept as reality,
manifestations of the spirit world, there can be no doubt that both she
and the Emperor have nevertheless been secretly convinced that they are
both instruments of God as well as possessing the power of holding
converse with the spirit world.
This is proved by the canonisation of Seraphim, the parish priest of
Tambov, whose tomb they visited prior to the birth of the heir, Alexis.
Seraphim had been dead seventy years, but the Tsar, anxious to leave no
stone unturned to procure a son and heir, encouraged by the Tsaritsa,
insisted upon the canonisation of Seraphim. When the remains of the old
priest were unearthed, it was found that the body was badly decomposed,
and to canonise a man whose body yields to the influence of
decomposition is contrary to the traditions and customs of the Church.
Orthodox Bishop Dmitry of Tambov made bold to call attention to this
fact and protest the canonisation of Seraphim. For his temerity, the
Tsar, deeply angered, ordered that Dmitry be deprived of his see and
exiled to Viatka. According to Emperor Nicholas, the preservation of
bones, hair and teeth were sufficient qualification for saintship.
Furthermore His Majesty was upheld in this by various sycophant but
prophetic monks, who, with sublime assurance, allowed that God will one
day work a miracle and restore Seraphim’s body. So Seraphim was
canonised with great pomp and ritualistic solemnity. If anything were
needed to fasten the belief of the Tsar and Tsaritsa in these extreme
forms of religion it was the patent answer to their faith and trust in
Philippe and Seraphim.
The boy was called Alexis and he was born on July 30, 1904, according to
the Russian calendar, and since that time, Tsar and Tsaritsa have been
given more and more to spiritualistic religion.
CHAPTER VI
FAMILY LIFE AT THE RUSSIAN COURT
Of recent years, since the war with Japan and the revolutionary outbreak
in 1905-6, few court functions have been held. In the ordinary daily
routine the Tsaritsa prefers to breakfast alone, to lunch with only one
lady-in-waiting and the Emperor with but one adjutant. The dinners are
likewise simple as often as is possible. The older children are brought
in for meals when there are no guests. The tastes of both Tsar and
Tsaritsa are equally simple as to food and to dress. The Tsar’s
favourite uniform is that of Colonel of one of his regiments, except in
the summer, when he frequently appears in hunting costume--an English
Norfolk jacket, knee trousers and leggings or high boots.
English is the language generally used by the Royal Family when
alone,--English and German. The Tsaritsa speaks Russian quite correctly,
but with a marked German accent. This is not strange in view of the fact
that she did not begin to study the language until after her betrothal.
Like most Germans, she speaks French poorly and consequently French has
never been a popular language with them, although the Tsar speaks it
most excellently well.
Because English is used so much by the Emperor and Empress it is the
popular language in court circles and among officers. Many Russians send
their children to England when they are very young in order that English
may be their first language. I have known many Russians who spoke
English absolutely perfectly; fluently and without the slightest trace
of foreign accent. The children of the Tsar and Tsaritsa use English
most.
The Tsaritsa’s voice is low and deep, not unmusical. Her laugh is light,
usually breaking into a silvery falsetto. She is slightly taller than
the Tsar, being about five feet eight and one-half inches, while he is
barely five feet eight inches. Her face still wears an expression of
soft, wistful beauty, which is enhanced by a small mole near the corner
of her mouth. It is so small that it frequently is not noticed at all,
but if one stands near her it is observed and not unpleasantly.
Miss Eager relates an incident which reveals the curious stolidity not
to say cold-bloodedness of the character of the Empress. The Empress had
gone to the christening of a battleship at St. Petersburg and returned
to the Palace at St. Petersburg in the evening. In the nursery the
Empress told Miss Eager how the officers of the ship had been drawn up
in line for the ceremony when a sudden thunderstorm had descended and a
peculiarly vivid flash of lightning had struck a flagstaff nearby,
shattering as it fell and striking some of the officers. One man rolled
right to the feet of the Empress and her dress had been splashed with
blood. The Dowager Empress had fainted at this sight, but the Empress
herself insisted that the man had died in the service of his country and
that consequently it was not a matter for mourning!
Of late years, the health of the Empress has been decidedly shattered.
During the summer of 1910, the Tsar took her for a long holiday to
Germany. She visited her childhood home of Darmstadt and later took a
cure at a watering-place known for its beneficial effects upon people
suffering from nervous and heart disorders.
During the summer of 1907 when the Imperial Family were holidaying on
the yacht, _Standart_, off the islands of Finland, there was an attempt
to do away with the entire family, the full details of which have never
leaked out into the broad world. It is known, however, that this attempt
was the result of a conspiracy which included some of the officers and
men of the Royal yacht. The shock which the Empress sustained at that
time, she has never recovered from and more or less sensational rumours
are frequently given to the world suggesting the precarious condition of
her mind as well as of her nerves.
From this extraordinarily exclusive family life, which is at present the
rule at Peterhof and Tsarskoe-Selo (the two places where the Imperial
Family spend most of their time) the Tsar has come to be spoken of
among the Grand Dukes and people of the court as “The Little Married
Man.” This phrase is indicative of the supercilious way that family life
is regarded in Russia. Americans are frequently horrified at the
nonchalant way that Russian nobles flaunt their mistresses about the
streets and public restaurants of St. Petersburg.
The Tsar, as a young man, was probably as fast as any of his court, but
after his marriage he settled down wonderfully. Whether he still has his
wayward periods, as gossip sometimes asserts, I do not know. On the
whole he is a good husband and a fond father. He undoubtedly appreciates
the tremendous love the Tsaritsa pours upon him.
The attitude of the Tsaritsa toward the education of the Russian people
will seem somewhat extraordinary to Americans, though after all it is
probably consistent with her life. In this, as in everything else, she
accepts the attitude of her liege and lord, the sovereign of the Russian
people. When a certain Count Tolstoy (not the late Leo Tolstoy) was
Minister of Public Instruction he once appealed to the Empress to aid
him in extending the educational advantages of the Empire to the girls
and young women of the country. (I have Count Tolstoy’s own permission
to relate this incident.)
The Tsaritsa listened to the Minister attentively as he set forth the
needs of Russia in this direction, and when he had concluded she replied
that she thought all young girls should be taught to sew, to care for
their homes, in short, to become helpful wives and good mothers, but as
for granting them the privileges of so-called “higher education,”
knowledge of history, philosophy and the sciences--to this she was
entirely opposed. “Because these studies, when offered to women, only
result in such terrible times as Russia is now passing through.”
This, surely, is a remarkable tribute to the women of Russia, the
Tsaritsa holding them responsible for the movement toward liberty and
freedom, as a result of their contact with education and culture!
On the other hand, the Tsaritsa sometimes generously encourages the
extension of school opportunities to individual girls whose efforts
happen to have been brought to her attention. For example, Miss Eager,
who for six years was governess to the little Grand Duchesses, and who
probably saw as much of the Tsaritsa during those years as anyone
outside of the Royal Family has ever seen, relates this anecdote, which
I repeat with particular gladness, because it is one of the few of the
kind that I have heard concerning Her Majesty.
“This story was told me by the Empress herself,” says Miss Eager. “One
morning there arrived on the train from the Caucasus, a little girl aged
eleven. She approached a station porter and asked to be sent to the
Minister of Education. The porter was greatly astonished and hesitated
as to what he should do. Then the child said with oldish solemnity, ‘I
have come from the Caucasus, a seven days’ journey, to be put to school;
you must please get me a droshky and send me to his house.’ So the
porter called a carriage and directed that she be driven to the Ministry
of Education. Arriving there she had great difficulty in gaining
admission to the Minister, but the doorman finally consented to tell the
Minister that a little girl from the Caucasus desired to see him.
“The Minister was occupied at the moment, with a Secretary of the
Empress, but the latter was interested in the message and the child was
ushered into the office. The little girl bowed to the two dignitaries
and proceeded to relate her case. The Minister appeared greatly amused
and told the child she must return to her home, as he had no vacancy.
But the little girl was persistent and soon showed that she had no idea
of returning so easily to her distant home across the Empire. ‘You are
Minister of Education,’ she exclaimed, ‘and I have come all the way from
the Caucasus to St. Petersburg to be put to school. You _must_ put me
somewhere.’ The Minister, though puzzled, was beginning to be impressed.
At last the Empress’s Secretary begged that the child be cared for until
there was a vacancy in one of the schools patronised by the Tsaritsa.
These schools are few in number and are very exclusive. A note was
thereupon written by the Minister to the Mistress of one of these
schools and the little girl was sent to her under escort of a footman.
The joy of the child was unbounded and she could scarcely express her
gratitude to the Minister.
“The Secretary went that afternoon to Peterhof and related the incident
to the Tsaritsa herself. The Empress asked that an inquiry be made
immediately and the truth of the child’s story substantiated. The
investigation showed that the two older sisters of the child had been
admitted to a local school, but there was no room for her. She took this
greatly to heart and fretted over it until at last she determined to get
a schooling anyway. She appealed to friends, to the local priest and the
doctor, and all of their combined efforts to reconcile her to the ‘Will
of God’ proved futile. At last, to pacify her, they subscribed enough
money for a ticket to the capital, and the child set forth on her long
journey all alone.
“When the Empress heard the story in detail, her heart was touched and
she commanded that place be made for her in one of her own schools. The
child is there to-day, receiving careful instruction, and enjoying the
direct patronage of the Empress.”
The Empress really loves all children, and in spite of the coolness
which exists between her and her court, all children are fond of her. On
the name day of each of her own children, she takes a long drive with
the child whose celebration it is, and this event is much looked forward
to by them all. Whatever leniency may be exercised in correcting the
capricious whims of Alexis, I believe that she is a strict mother with
all of her daughters.
The Empress has few recreations. Owing to the fact that she rides badly
she practically never rides for pleasure. Because of her disposition she
has few, if any, real confidantes and intimate friends among the ladies
of the Court. She has ladies-in-waiting--several hundred of them--but
these are chiefly for formal occasions, and of her own choice she has
but one near her at a time and different ladies are chosen for brief
periods. Evenings she and the Emperor choose to retire to their private
apartments and if she has no guests she reads aloud to him, not
infrequently from English newspapers or an English novel.
The Tsar is fond of cards. The game of wint, a gambling game much played
all over Russia, is a favourite of his, and he usually plays for high
stakes, much enjoying the zest that the gambling element lends to the
game. The Tsaritsa, on the other hand, is fond of the camera, and enjoys
photography immensely. The children have few playmates apart from their
own family and sometimes Royal cousins, children of one or another of
the Grand Dukes, or one of the Royal relatives of their own mother or
father abroad.
The Princess Ella, daughter of the present Grand Duke of Hesse and
brother to the Tsaritsa, was a playmate whom the little Russian Grand
Duchesses adored up to the sad and untimely death of the German
Princess. Being left most of the time to themselves, the children of the
Tsar and Tsaritsa enjoy joining their mother in her pastimes when it is
possible, and photography is one of the things that they all can do
together.
The Emperor has always done some shooting each year and is really fond
of the sport. One morning a few summers ago he returned to the Palace
quite fatigued, having been out all night after blackcock. Blackcock
shooting is considered right good sport because the birds are so shy
that it is difficult to get near them, and indeed, it is only at certain
times of the year that they can be shot at all. On the morning that I
refer to the Empress greeted the Royal sportsman and turning to a friend
said: “Blackcock can only be shot at the mating season, when the males
are pouring forth their song in deaf and blind rapture.” Could anything
be more cruel than to kill them at such a time?
In the summer the Tsaritsa is fond of sailing in and out among the
Finnish wherries, but this annual outing is for two or three weeks only.
Previous to “Bloody Sunday” in January, 1905, the Winter Palace in St.
Petersburg was occupied, but since that fateful day the two outlying
palaces only have been used. This has been a disappointment to Grand
Duchess Olga, who always loved the Winter Palace and often expresses the
wish to “live there all the time.” The Winter Palace is the largest
building in Europe and is a marvel in appointments. It contains rarest
malachites and jaspers, rich paintings, gifts galore that have been
showered upon other Tsars, priceless jewels, and wonderful carved
furniture. Besides the great rooms of state, salons and banquet rooms,
suites of residence, libraries, offices, and vast halls that are now
used as public museums, are beautiful winter gardens, great
conservatories rich in tropical plants, rare ferns and orchids,
blossoming plants exuding fragrance, and among the forest of greenery
hang many cages of singing birds. In the centre of these winter gardens
are pools of water in which gold fish sport, and at times pretty
fountains play into these pools.
Whenever I have been in this wonderful palace I have felt as if I were
wandering through a dream world. Several times I have been through
portions of this palace and each time I have felt a new thrill of
unreality.
The occasion of my first visit was when the Tsar received the members of
the first Duma, the occasion when I first saw the Tsaritsa, the Dowager
Empress and the little Grand Duchesses. The Tsar had commanded all of
the grand dames of the Court to appear in full court costume, and the
result was a scene of unparalleled splendour, a spectacle imposing
beyond imagination. The Throne Room and halls that were in use that day
suggested scenes from the magnificent days of the Empire of France when
beautiful women and emblazoned, uniformed men arrayed themselves in
costumes of glittering splendour. The old Russian court costumes which
were worn in the Winter Palace that
[Illustration: THE WINTER PALACE, THE SCENE OF “BLOODY SUNDAY.”]
day were quite as splendid as any the French ever conceived even in the
days of greatest pomp and show.
On another occasion I was received at the Winter Palace by a well-known
and powerful nobleman of the Court, who has been close to the Empress
for many years in the dual capacity of high functionary and friend. He
is one to whom my high thanks are due for some of the material contained
in these articles, for he not only told me some of the anecdotes which
are here related, but he verified much of the material that I had
collected from other persons and sources.
Peterhof is the favourite residence of the Tsaritsa and four of her five
children were born there. One of the several buildings of this palace
boasts a charming romantic history. About half a century ago when the
first Nicholas was soon to be Emperor of Russia, he paid a visit to the
German court. During the visit a tournament was held and Nicholas, then
a Grand Duke, acquitted himself with honour. At the close of the
tournament the victors rode past and close under a balcony, where were
seated the ladies of the court and the Royal Family. A young Prussian
Princess tossed a wreath of roses which the Russian Grand Duke caught on
his sword.
The incident proved the beginning of an attachment which culminated in
their marriage. Some years after, when the Grand Duke had become
Emperor, he bought the great park of Peterhof and built a palace for
his Empress. Remembering the incident of the wreath of roses, at the
tournament at the Prussian court, the device of a sword and a wreath of
roses was made the predominant decorative figure of the palace. You may
see it there to-day. Now as then, Peterhof belongs to the ruling
Empress. Tsarskoe-Selo is an Imperial residence belonging to the
government. Both of these palaces are within an hour of St. Petersburg.
Any visitor may stroll through the outer gardens and adjoining parks of
the palaces and at any time one may meet the Tsaritsa or the Grand
Duchesses driving or riding. The Tsar is the only real prisoner of the
family, although Alexis, the four-year-old heir, is jealously guarded.
The Tsaritsa rides badly. Despite the fact that she is commander and
“honorary Colonel” of at least two cavalry regiments she does not sit a
horse well and never rides for pleasure. In this respect she is very
unlike many modern Queens, notably the Empress Elizabeth of Austria, who
was a marvellous horsewoman, possessing that rare hypnotic influence
over the most spirited horses that the animals themselves are quick to
recognise and yield to. It is only on such occasions as a review of one
of her own regiments that the Tsaritsa mounts a horse. Ordinarily she
drives--in summer in an open carriage, and generally unescorted.
The children may from time to time be seen playing about the lawns with
a favourite pony, or driving in little wicker-work carts. They are as
full of frolic as any little girl in America, and in the nursery and the
household apartments of the palaces they are as ingenuous, as
irrepressible and often quite as embarrassing as any children we all
know. Royal manners, at least in the children, are no different from
manners of other people, and the daughters of even an Emperor and
Empress have sometimes to be rebuked quite as severely as any children
the world over.
The Tsaritsa dresses very plainly. Richly often, but in general effect
simple. The Court has never approved her clothes, chiefly, I think,
because of her inability to wear good clothes well. As a child she
dressed in the utmost simplicity and the habit has remained with her. At
certain court functions etiquette prescribes her costume. When she dons
court dress known as Old Russian, she has merely to wear elaborate
clothes that have been described in detail for her generations ago. It
is when she dons costumes for everyday wear that she fails to please a
fastidious court.
The average American girl very naturally thinks of the clothes of the
Tsaritsa of Russia with a combined feeling of awe and interest, with
just a little of envy creeping in. Imagine having all the money you want
to spend on your clothes and being able to wear jewels valued at
millions of dollars. And, of course, the American girl wants to know all
the details of the Tsaritsa’s wardrobe, and how many hats and dresses
she has each season, and how much they cost.
It may be a disappointing fact, but it is nevertheless true, that the
Tsaritsa just hates the thought of clothes, and though her costumes are
of expensive fabrics, they never have any chic individuality of their
own, for the very good reason that she cares so little about them. Of
course, she does her shopping in Paris, but she does it by proxy. One of
the Ladies-in-Waiting is commissioned to buy each season her gowns and
her hats and all the other little details appropriate for a Tsaritsa’s
wardrobe, in Paris, but many times when they reach the Tsaritsa, she
discards them with the expression, “Indeed, that is perfectly lovely and
very Frenchy, but it would never do for me at all.”
The corsetiere in Paris who makes the Tsaritsa’s stays has troubles of
her own, for the Tsaritsa utterly refuses to change her figure to suit
the ever-changing modes. Her waist is growing large of late, according
to the Parisian idea of a fashionable figure, but this doesn’t trouble
the Tsaritsa as much as it would trouble many women in America.
For everyday wear her gowns are all of the plainest, but, of course,
there are occasions when she must wear regal robes. Her court costume is
a magnificent creation of the richest satin elaborately trimmed with
heavy embroidery. Masses of the embroidery are used, while the corsage
is laden with jewelled trimming. The buttons which trim this court
costume are each one of them worth a small fortune. They consist of a
large pearl in a wonderfully artistic setting. The Tsaritsa’s pearls,
which she wears with her court costume are famous the world over.
It is no wonder she has all of these magnificent things, for in addition
to the hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of gifts that she has
herself received from her subjects and from fabulously rich kings,
princes and potentates of the East and Central Asia, she has at her
disposal jewels that belong to the Russian Crown--gifts to other
Empresses, and Emperors, far back, perhaps for several hundred years.
Sometimes she wears drop-earrings of matched pearls, which are
marvellously valuable, and her dog collar and necklace and corsage pin,
also of pearls, have a value of millions of dollars. The Tsaritsa is
always glad when the time comes for her to take off her court costume.
The long, heavy train is a burden to her. She is very partial to
light-in-weight gowns.
Many of her dresses are of the lingerie order, consisting of lace and
fine nainsook.
Yet, on the other hand, she has many house gowns and cloaks of velvet,
trimmed with rare laces. Perhaps, of all her jewels, she cares most for
a long string of wonderful pearls, which she wears very often. The
string is so long that she can wear it twice around her neck, and yet
have the longest loop reach to her knees. The short loop comes to the
waistline, and is finished with one single pear-shaped pearl of enormous
value.
All the children’s clothes are made according to the Tsaritsa’s idea,
and simplicity is their key-note. The children are very apt to wear
white entirely, and the four little girls are dressed exactly alike.
Their hair is arranged in the same way, too, brushed straight back from
their foreheads. Of course, the finest of materials is used in making
their clothes, but the design is always extremely simple. Their
christening costumes were all made alike, even the small boy’s this
time. They were of the sheerest of white mull with exquisitely fine lace
insertions. The little dresses had short sleeves and were cut out round
at the neck, and tied on the shoulders with white ribbon, having long,
silk fringe. The shoulder bows were the dress-up touch, the touch which
is so seldom seen in any of the costumes worn by the Tsaritsa’s
children.
The young man of the family is also usually dressed in white, and though
his little Russian suits come from Paris, they are strictly plain in
design, generally of heavy white linen, and trimmed with bands of
embroidery.
All these little details may be commonplace, but they are perhaps all
important when we are trying to analyse the character of the Tsaritsa
through her tastes.
CHAPTER VII
THE GRAND DUCHESS OLGA
The effect of the war upon the children of the Tsaritsa caused much pain
to their gentle English governess, Miss Eager, who relates the following
experience: “It was very sad to witness the wrathful, vindictive spirit
that the war raised in my little charges. One of the illustrated papers
had a picture of the baby children of the Crown Prince of Japan. Marie
and Anastasie came running across to see the picture, and wanted to know
who those queer little children were. I told them, and with a look of
hatred coming into her sweet face Marie slapped the picture with her
open hand. ‘Horrid little people,’ said she; ‘they came and destroyed
our poor ships and drowned our sailors.’” Miss Eager then explained to
the little Grand Duchess that it was not these children who had done
this terrible thing, because they were only babies and could not
possibly fight. But Marie answered obstinately, “Yes; those little
babies did it. Mamma told me the Japs were all only little people!”
Olga, as usual, was yet more bitter toward the Japanese. One day she
opened up vituperatively: “I hope the Russian soldiers will kill all of
the Japanese; not leave even one alive.” Her teacher tried to explain
that there were many little children and women in Japan, who had nothing
whatever to do with the war and could not fight under any circumstances.
Would it be good, she asked of Olga, for the Russian soldiers to kill
these too? The child was thoughtful for a moment, then asked: “Have they
an Emperor in Japan?” “Yes, certainly,” the teacher answered. Olga then
asked several more questions, and finally remarked: “I did not know that
the Japs were people like ourselves. I thought they were only like
monkeys.”
Olga, like so many children, who are the oldest in a family, has always
been a handful. About Marie, and Anastasie, and Tatiana too, for that
matter, are many pretty little stories of charming childish ways, but
almost every anecdote I heard of Olga was when she had been up to some
mischief, or disobedient, or stubborn, or quick of temper. One or two of
these stories, however, are interesting and show that even the mother
task of an Empress’s life is very much like every mother’s life, and
especially in the case of the Tsaritsa who has ever undertaken so much
more personal care of her children than most Queens--and one may even
say, than many mothers right here in this land.
One day, before the outbreak of the war, when Olga was quite a little
girl, she was taken for a drive with her nurse along the Nevsky
Prospect, the principal street in St. Petersburg. The little Grand
Duchess simply would not behave. She was continually jumping up and
attracting the attention of people along the streets, and as it was that
time in the afternoon when the Nevsky is crowded, this meant pretty much
the attention of all St. Petersburg.