presumed,” he says, “it would not be agreeable to the Emperor for me to follow on.” In a few days he had an interview with Prince Gortchakoff, who “asked after Pickens” (whether Pickens is something, or some place, or somebody, does not appear), “my family, and other things in a familiar way, when I was dismissed by again shaking hands.” Soon after we learn that he and “his suite, Green Clay, William C. Goodloe, and T. Williams,” set out for Peterhoff, where the Emperor received them, and addressed Mr Clay in a set speech, which was delivered in Russian, though, says he, “the Emperor spoke American mostly.” We are at liberty, therefore, to suppose that his Majesty, during great part of the interview, spoke through his nose; and, no doubt, Prince Gortchakoff, who spoke only English, beheld with wonder, not unmixed with envy, this exhibition of his Imperial master’s accomplishments as a linguist. Mr Clay then addressed to the Emperor an essay on the moral government of Russia, which, from internal evidence, we pronounce to have been learnt by heart from a prize paper by Seward. “The Emperor,” he says, “seemed much gratified and really moved by this last remark,” possibly because it was the last; and, besides speaking Russian and American, Alexander was so ostentatious as to conclude the interview by speaking English, perhaps deeming it appropriate to the subject-matter. “He wanted to know if I thought England would interfere. I told him we did not care what she did; that her interference would tend to unite us the more; that we fought the South with reluctance; we were much intermarried and of a common history; but that the course of England had aroused our sensibilities towards her in no very pleasant manner. The Emperor seemed to like my defiance of old John Bull very much. He wanted to know if I was a relative of Henry Clay, and what was my military rank. I told him I was only a distant relation of Clay, and that I wore the uniform of an American colonel” (borrowed, perhaps, from another relation, Pipe Clay), “which rank I filled in my own country.” His Majesty then shook hands twice with the Ambassador, and dismissed him. Before concluding the despatch from which we learn the foregoing interesting particulars, it seems to have occurred to Mr Clay that it would be judicious to show Mr Seward that moralising on the war was a game which two could play at; and he wound up in the following style:—