Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - XXII. Evil omens in Petrograd
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
t9i6] THE TSAR AT HEADQUARTERS 421
greater; sometimes the Emperor was summoned to her,
sometimes she herself went to Mohilev, occasionally
accompanied by the four young Grand-Duchesses.
At Mohilev Nicolas II. continued to lead his usual
life side by side with the strenuous life of G.H.Q.
The Chief of the General Staff of the Russian armies,
General Alexieff, assumed as a matter of fact the whole
direction of the war; the Army heads and the heads
of departments had to deal with him alone, and he gave
daily reports to the Emperor who, plunged in the study
of the matter supplied to him by the General Staff and
of the voluminous papers which his Ministers brought
to Mohilev, hardly found time to make occasional trips to
visit the troops of such and such an army, in order to
display during ordinary reviews the same
imperturb-ably benevolent face and to utter the same few and
carefully chosen words. There was no intimacy with
the generals who lived at or came to G.H.Q. ; always
the same surroundings as at Tsarskoe; meals were
taken with the same uninteresting set of people and
with the little Tsarevitch, whom the Emperor had
brought with him and whom he kept with him until
December, 1916.
Among the people who passed through Stockholm
during the year 1916, I saw, with the sincerest pleasure,
the worthy M. Odier, Minister of the Swiss
Confederation to Petrograd, where his high qualities had gained
him many friendships. During our conversation, I
asked M. Odier whether he knew the tutor—a young
Swiss—just engaged for the Tsarevitch, who up till then
had only had an old sailor to look after him, as his
august parents undertook all the details of his education
themselves. M. Odier replied that he knew the tutor in
question very well, that he was a cultivated, conscientious
and distinguished man, and that he had already succeeded
in gaining the affection of his pupil; they were together
at Mohilev and both shared the simple, well-regulated
and studious existence of the Emperor, who found time
to give his son lessons in Russian and history and who
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
