Watching Mother carefully, when she looked troubled, I sprang a new joke or some lighthearted remark to cheer her up again. In this self-appointed task I had a helper. I found a book of funny stories, which I kept in one of the drawers in the round table in the music room, and in privacy I delved through it. It contained many jokes which I did not understand, but, believing they must be funny, I put my own interpretation upon these and tried them out on the family in the evening. On Father’s last trip to the capital, his appearance before the Duma was a great success. In his speech he urged unity and warned that only unity would bring victory--the victory he reminded them was so near. Hearing his inspiring message, everyone was optimistic. There was country-wide rejoicing, especially when shortly afterward the news came that Erzerum, which had been stubbornly held by the Turks for so long, had fallen. Father said that he was willing to grant liberal concessions but he feared that this was not the time for great, radical changes. They would have too damaging an effect during wartime. Sir John Hanbury-Williams was in Petrograd for several days and saw Olga and Tatiana at this presentation of Father’s at the Tauride Palace (Duma). He afterwards said to Olga: “Knowing your Imperial Father the way I do, I am most sorry for His Majesty; so is all the High Command, for there is not one single word of truth in all the propaganda circulating. He assuredly does not deserve such malicious criticism.” Hanbury-Williams thought that Father’s address was most enthusiastically accepted and would bring good results. However, it created apprehension among the enemy who seemed to be losing hope of winning the war. Nevertheless, it provoked more damaging propaganda. Father repeated that he would not yield to Germany. More than ever, Wilhelm made Father his target. He aimed at him with traitors who spread their lies insidiously underground like the roots of a tree. There were attacks on Father from all directions--a whispering campaign spread to injure his reputation before his people. Of course Mother already had come in for her share of this terrible barrage of falsehood; in her case the slander centered around Anna and Rasputin. But that only made Mother stubborn, and she closed her ears and no longer would believe anyone around her. She had felt for a long time that she was doomed to death from the day she set her foot on Russian soil. X MOGILEV The year 1916, the date May 6th. It was Father’s forty-eighth birthday. The day before, we went to G.H.Q. at Mogilev to be with him. As usual we stayed on our train. On this occasion the Russian and all the Allied High Command, as well as some of our relatives, came to extend to Father their congratulations.