I closed my interview, as in all cases, with the question, "What hope is there for the future?" and received the same answer as in all other cases: "Everything depends upon how this war ends. If God helps us and we lose the war, improvement is possible; for then ruin, above all, the chronic bankruptcy of the nation, can no longer be concealed. If a man should enter my room now--at this hour only respectable persons enter my room--and I should say to him, 'What do you hope and wish in regard to the war?' his answer would be, 'Defeat; the only means to save us.' If we calculate how many men are shot and exiled and how many families are ruined every year by absolutism, the total equals the losses in war--a more terrible one, however, for only a catastrophe can make an end of this war, which has long been destroying us. Therefore, I say again, if God helps us we shall lose the war in the East. Do not allow yourself to be deceived by any official preparations. Every good Russian prays, 'God help us and permit us to be beaten!'" When I left the brilliant lawyer it was, as I have said, long after midnight. It was "butter-week,"[6] and my sleigh had trouble in avoiding the drunken men who staggered across our way, and the shrieking hussies, who, with their companions with or without uniforms, carried on pastimes suitable to the season. FOOTNOTES: [5] Chief of the county council.--TRANSLATOR. [6] "Butter-week" (maslyanitza) is in Russia the week preceding Lent. Meat is forbidden, but milk, butter, and eggs are allowed as food. Like the carnival, it is celebrated with popular amusements.--TRANSLATOR. XX THE IMPERIAL FAMILY AS THE PUBLIC SEES IT