The state of health of the little Cesarewitsch also was not the real reason why the latter’s mother would not allow Raspoutine to leave [Illustration: THE CESAREWITSCH] her. She believed in the efficacy of his prayers for her son, but this belief alone would not have been sufficient to make her so entirely submissive to his will and to reduce her to the state of slavery into which she had been entranced. No, the secret of Raspoutine’s influence lay in the simple fact that, thanks to the hypnotic faculties which he undoubtedly possessed, he had contrived to acquire an absolute dominion over her mind, and to persuade her that every time she prayed with him she was put into direct communication with her dead lover; that this lover had been allowed by the Almighty to come to her help in the troubles and perplexities of her life, to guide her in her conduct as a woman and a mother and in her duties as a Sovereign. During the hours of agony which followed upon the news of the murder of that man whom she had considered as a holy creature and a real Prophet of God, Alexandra Feodorowna blurted out something of what lay on her mind to her devoted friend and companion, Anna Wyrubewa. The latter had removed from her own house to the Palace of Tsarskoye Selo, so as to be able to remain in constant attendance on the miserable Empress. Seeing her so forlorn and desolate, she bethought herself of rousing her faculties, and tried to persuade her that, though she had lost her advisers and counselors, she had yet a duty to perform, which consisted in going on with the work they had suggested to her to start. Peace was more than ever necessary to Russia, as well as to the dynasty, against which such fierce attacks were being launched. The sacred principles of autocracy that were being everywhere challenged ought to be maintained, and how could this be done when the army which was the only force on which the Czar could rely was being kept at the frontier and uselessly butchered in battles it could not by any possibility win? There were other mothers besides herself in Russia who were crying over their dead sons and appealing to her to spare those who were still left to them. This war was a monstrous crime against humanity, as well as against the whole of the Russian nation. It must be stopped because otherwise worse calamities even than those that had already fallen on the country would occur. The performance of a duty was sometimes painful, but this ought not to prevent any right-minded person from trying to accomplish it. It was quite evident that the duty of the Empress required her to work toward the conclusion of peace with Germany, and this had been already suggested to her not only by the devoted friends she still had in the world, but by the spirit of the dead ones who had loved and honored her while they had been alive on earth.