I need not say that I expressed my gratitude for the royal condescension; nor that, in leaving Russia, I brought, from the example of its sovereign, a greater desire to be useful to mankind than I had known before. Pattern and Teacher of kings, if each country in each century had produced one such ruler as you, either all mankind would _now_ be contented with despotism or all mankind would be _free_! Oh! when kings have only to be good, to be kept forever in our hearts and souls as the gods and benefactors of the earth, by what monstrous fatality have they been so blind to their fame? When we remember the millions, the generations, they can degrade, destroy, elevate, or save, we might almost think (even if the other riddles of the present existence did not require a future existence to solve them), we might almost think a hereafter _necessary_, were it but for the sole purpose of requiting the virtues of princes,--or their SINS!* * Upon his death-bed Peter is reported to have said, “God, I dare trust, will look mercifully upon my faults in consideration of the good I have done my country.” These are worthy to be the last words of a king! Rarely has there been a monarch who more required the forgiveness of the Creator; yet seldom perhaps has there been a human being who more deserved it.--ED. CHAPTER V. RETURN TO PARIS.--INTERVIEW WITH BOLINGBROKE.--A GALLANT ADVENTURE.--AFFAIR WITH DUBOIS.--PUBLIC LIFE IS A DRAMA, IN WHICH PRIVATE VICES GENERALLY PLAY THE PART OF THE SCENE-SHIFTERS. IT is a strange feeling we experience on entering a great city by night,--a strange mixture of social and solitary impressions. I say by night, because at that time we are most inclined to feel; and the mind, less distracted than in the day by external objects, dwells the more intensely upon its own hopes and thoughts, remembrances and associations, and sheds over them, from that one feeling which it cherishes the most, a blending and a mellowing hue.