A week afterwards the Grand Duke Michael arrived to be present at the grand manœuvres. I was on the Kodinka Field driving my pair of ponies when the order was given to the cavalry to attack the Petrovski Palace. Fearing to be trampled down by the charge of the cavalry, I jumped out of the pony-chase, leaving the ponies to the care of the groom, and started running home by the shortest cut, jumping over pits and ditches. The next day I drove to the spot where the mock-battle was to take place. The sound of the trumpets resounded from everywhere and the cannons kept up such a continual firing that the ground actually shook under us. The cavalry was prancing round. I soon perceived the Grand Duke and would have turned tail and fled, but I was not permitted to make my escape. I alighted and tried to hide myself behind my ponies, but for the first time I was dissatisfied with the diminutive stature of these little fellows; there was no concealment even for a rabbit. My position was awfully critical; I have never felt such a longing to sink into the earth and disappear from human sight. The Grand Duke, who had discovered me, laughed a great deal—I didn’t! We often spent our evenings at the Hermitage, a large music-hall, the entrance of which was strictly forbidden to collegians and cadets. One of them got in nevertheless, dressed in woman’s clothes, a fair, effeminate youth. With his smooth girlish face he easily passed for what he pretended to be and played his part to perfection. He was soon surrounded by a crowd of admirers. But the poor boy got severely punished for his trick, and had to endure three days of arrest. By the end of September we returned to town. Our new home was ready to welcome us: our house is said to be haunted, and the first thing we did was to order a Te Deum to be sung in our apartments. Now I hope we won’t come across visitants from the other world! We have been very busy settling into our new quarters. When all was arranged, we began to lead a gay life, and went to the best concerts and theatricals of the season. Sarah Bernhardt, an actress of world-wide renown, the greatest tragedian of the age, having conquered New York, achieved her next success in Moscow, which she took by storm. I was deeply interested to see her in _La Dame aux Camelias_, where she is at her best. Sarah, who is already well up in years, is a delicate-looking woman with a waist of painful slenderness. Her acting is simply wonderful. She was a glorious incarnation of _Violetta_, in the death scene, though I am not readily moved to the tears, I wiped from my eyes “_Una furtiva lagrime_” as Donizetti’s song has it. The audience, which packed the house from floor to ceiling, was enthusiastic and applauded her much.