“We read Mrs. Eddy’s book, of course, and the complete works of the great American author, Miller.” “Miller?” I interrupted. “What Miller?” “I don’t remember his first name,” said Mme. Virubova. “But you must know who I mean. He wrote many religious and philosophical works. The Empress was very fond of them.” I was obliged to confess that I had never heard of Miller, and Mme. Virubova looked her surprise. “Another reason why the Empress, and of course myself, were unpopular was because the children were with us so much of the time. The Empress simply would not allow them to associate with the sons and daughters of the nobility. She wanted to keep them sweet and clean minded and good, and she knew that very few of the children of high society in Russia were fit companions for them. The daughters of our nobility are mostly frivolous, selfish, empty-headed girls, and as for the sons, they are too often debauched in early boyhood. You can imagine that the Empress’s poor opinion of them and her refusal to allow her children to know them aroused great resentment. People always think their own children perfect, you know.” The former Empress of Russia is one of the enigmas of histories. Mme. Virubova, who knew her better than almost any other living woman, makes her out a religious devotee and something of a puritan. She does not reveal her as an intellectual woman, in spite of her love of books. A really intelligent woman in her position would not have spent so much of her time in the wards of hospitals in the one small town of Tsarskoe Selo. She would have used her brains, her vast wealth and her almost unlimited power to organize the work of the hospitals all over the war area. I have seen some of those hospitals, and while some of them are modern and well equipped, many are of the crudest description. I never saw such a thing as a fly screen in any Russian hospital. Flies seem to be regarded as harmless domestic pets even in contagious disease hospitals in Russia. The Empress may or may not have been a German plotter. I heard it said on high authority that the minutest search of all the palace records, after the revolution, failed to unearth any evidence to that effect. Practically everybody in Russia, however, believes that she was a traitor to her country in the war. Those who are charitably disposed toward her say that she was melancholy, mad, irresponsible, and a weak tool in the hands of Russia’s enemies. But when the days of revolution burst on the palace at Tsarskoe Selo, and the night of perpetual extinction began to descend on the royal house of Romanoff, it was this woman, the Empress of Russia, who alone showed strength of mind and character. She alone of the whole court kept her head and her cool nerve, and kept them to the last.