The tragedy that elevated Alexander to the throne, restored to the devoted wife the wandering affections of her husband. His profound grief made her sympathy necessary to him, and the young empress, almost a stranger to Paul, wept for him like a true daughter. The secret tears of Alexander were shed at night on the bosom of his consort, whose tender concern for him consoled him for the restraint he imposed upon his feelings during the day. The regretful remembrance of Alexander for his father, outlasted the reviving affection he had during that dolorous period felt for his wife. The empress, still a young woman, was an old spouse, and the emperor had inherited the passionate and inconstant temperament of Catharine. But, gracious and smiling as he always was with the ladies, or polite and friendly to the gentlemen, there crossed his brow from time to time a gloomy shadow, the mute but terrible memorial of that dreadful night, when he heard the death struggle of his father, and was conscious of his agony without the power to save him. His perpetual smile was the mask beneath which he disguised the anguish of his mind, and as he advanced in life, this profound melancholy threatened to deepen into malady. He did not yield, however, without maintaining a warfare with his remorse. He combated memory with action. His reforms, his long and laborious journeys, had but one aim. In the course of his reign, he is supposed to have traversed fifty thousand leagues. But, however rapidly he performed these journeys, he never deviated from the time he fixed for his setting off or return, even by an hour, and he undertook them without guards and without an escort. He, of course, met with many strange adventures, and was amused with rendering his personal assistance whenever he met with accidents or encountered difficulties by the wayside. In his journey to Finland in company with Prince Pierre Volkouski, the imperial carriage in traversing a sandy mountain rolled back, notwithstanding the efforts of the coachman, upon which the emperor jumped out, and literally lent his shoulder to the wheel, leaving his companion asleep. The rough motion of the carriage disturbed the slumbers of the prince, who found himself at the bottom of the carriage and alone. He looked about him with astonishment, when he perceived the emperor, with his brow bedewed with perspiration, from the effects of his toil in assisting to drag him and the vehicle to the top of the mountain, the precise point at which he had awakened from his sleep.