The youthful despotic propensities of Alexander may be seen from an account given by another of his admiring biographers, Mr. J. G. Hesekiel. This writer enthusiastically swings the censer before Nicholas as the "Iron Knight of Legitimacy" and the "Invincible Champion of Government by the Grace of God." (I may mention in passing that Mr. Hesekiel has done the life of Prince Bismarck into similar adulatory prose). At the age of fourteen--he relates--the boy-prince, Alexander, in going through a state room of the Palace, was respectfully greeted by the assembled high dignitaries of the Empire, senators, generals, and so forth. They all rose and bowed before the Heir-Apparent. The boy's vanity being flattered, he purposely came back several times, expecting the grey-beards on each occasion to rise and salaam before him. When he found that they thought they had done their duty by the first salutation, he angrily complained against them to his father. Nicholas, however, blamed the son for his unreasonable exaction. This vicious arrogance of the boy ripened afterwards into the haughtiness of the despot, being but slightly mitigated by a naturally melancholy disposition, which sometimes gave the appearance of comparative softness. Of Constantine, the second son of Nicholas, there is a further characteristic anecdote on record. It is to be found even in publications otherwise marked by servile feelings towards the Court. We all know at what a supernaturally early age the purple-born are appointed to high titular positions in the State Administration or in the army. In Russia, where the "right divine of kings to govern wrong" is pushed to its most logical or illogical consequences, this royal custom flourishes to excess. At the mature age of eight, Alexander was appointed Chancellor of the University of Finland. His brother Constantine was nominated in early youth High Admiral of the Fleet. One day, Constantine, between whom and his elder brother there was little love lost, had Alexander arrested because he had come on board ship without special authorization. Something of the sentiment of Franz Moor, in Schiller's _Robbers_, seems to have animated Constantine in his youth. He was often heard to utter a malediction against the law of heredity. He declared that, being born when his father (Nicholas) was already on the throne, he (Constantine) had a better right of succession than Alexander, who had been born when Nicholas was only a Grand Duke. He further said that, after the death of Nicholas, he would contend against Alexander with the object of partitioning the Empire.