“The Prince likes to find me at every free moment he has, and so I am always at home. He must never notice that I am at work. When he calls or I hear his footsteps, pen and paint brush are thrown away till he does not want me any more. For as he has much work to do, and sees many people, we must make use of and prize the quarters of an hour which belong to us alone. If I were to hesitate for a moment the time would be gone and could not be reclaimed. Also I think that I am first a wife, then the mother of my country, and then a poetess. But, thank God, the genius of poetry goes secretly with me to the audiences, to the forests, and to the schools, to dinners too, &c. Anything and everything gives occasion to endless studies, and I gather treasures in my memory which has ever been a trusty companion to me.” “In politics the Prince is my oracle, and I avoid discussing them with any one else. He gives me lectures on political economy, finances, railways, and the army--everything in fact which concerns him. He has a very decided turn for organisation. All his talents are exactly the contrary of mine. Demeter Stourdza said lately that he had never seen two people so complete in one another, and yet we could not be more different, said I. ‘Yes,’ he answered, ‘the ways differ, but the idea is ever the same.’” (From letters of the Queen in May and June 1884.) But the quiet life of the royal pair was soon interrupted by the beginning of a devastating war. The development of the fatal Eastern Question was to introduce a new epoch, which not only converted Roumania into a theatre of war, but also induced her to take an active part in it herself. This decision was crowned with many and brilliant successes. [Illustration] X. The War and its Results. Threatening clouds had arisen on the political horizon. The condition of the Christian inhabitants of the tributary Turkish provinces had become untenable. Servia and Montenegro had declared war with Turkey. The rebellion had broken out in Bosnia, in Herzegovina, and in Bulgaria. Russia had taken up the case in a warlike spirit which drove her irresistibly forward. To free the Slavonic brothers from the yoke of Turkey was the long desired object of Panslavistic thought. The Emperor Alexander II. held it to be his sacred duty to go to the help of the oppressed Christians who were one with him in name and in faith. The decision of Russia to settle the Eastern Question by force of arms decided the point. On the 13th of November 1876 the Emperor commanded that six army corps in the south of Russia should be put in motion, and he placed them under the command of his brother, the Grand Duke Nicholas. On the 24th of April 1877 the Russian troops had crossed the Pruth and were marching through Roumania.