children, and without waiting for my reply, he disappeared and returned soon after, holding a small india-rubber monkey by a long string. He thrust this little horror into my hand whispering, “That’s for your baby.” As it appeared Mr. O., who had married soon after me, had neither any babies of his own, and thus this nasty little monkey was of no good to either of us. In September the Grand Duke Nicholas came to witness the grand manœuvres and stopped at Petrovski Palace. We lived in one of the wings of the palace, and wanting to see the Grand Duke’s arrival, I had to mount a narrow cork-screw staircase, with shattered steps leading up one of the turrets. The walls were mouldy and hung with cobwebs which tumbled down upon my head. The view of Moscow and its surroundings, on reaching the top of the turret, was a thorough compensation for my disagreeable climb. The next day I was invited to a dancing-party given in honour of the Grand Duke at the military summer club on the Khodinka Field. The Grand Duke was very affable towards me and contrived to put me at my ease at once. His Highness asked me to take tea with him. He seemed in capital spirits and talked in the most friendly way. He told me that he remembered me when I was quite a little thing and wore socks and pinafore, and said that passing through the town of Kharkoff he came to visit my parents and made me jump upon his knee. We sat round the tea-table for a long time. In bidding good-bye the Grand Duke proposed to me to come on the manœuvre-ground the following morning. Getting up at break of day I hurried to our rendezvous and saw the Grand Duke in the distance standing upon a hillock amongst a group of generals and officers surveying the sham-fight with a field glass at his eye. On perceiving me the Grand Duke nodded and waved his hand, and when I approached His Highness, he inquired after the state of my health, fearing I had taken a cold in remaining out in the club-garden so long the night before. A few days later a sham-alarm was raised in the camp. I was out before five o’clock in the morning and directed my steps towards the camp half asleep and yawning widely. There was still moonlight outside, and the breeze that ran before daybreak was making me shiver a little. Suddenly cannon-shots were heard and in less than two minutes the whole camp was astir. The soldiers rushed out of their tents and arranged themselves in battle-columns, whilst trumpet signals rent the air.