I can only explain the terror that Paul inspired me with from the fact that it was universal, since I must admit that toward myself he was never anything but civil and considerate. When I saw him for the first time at St. Petersburg he was amiable enough to remember that I had been presented to him in Paris on the occasion of his visit there. I was very young then, and so many years had since gone by that I had forgotten the incident; but princes as a rule are gifted with a memory for faces and names. Among the various queer ordinances of his reign, one, to which obedience was very troublesome, compelled both men and women to alight from their carriages whenever the Emperor drove by. Now, I must add that Paul was to be met with very frequently in the streets of St. Petersburg, as he travelled them perpetually, sometimes on horseback with but slim attendance, and sometimes in a sledge without an escort, without any sign by which he might have been recognised. You were nevertheless obliged to obey his command, under pain of incurring his severest displeasure, and it will be agreed that it was cruel to have to jump out into the snow and stand there, however extreme the cold. One day when I was out driving, my coachman not having observed his approach, I scarcely had time to exclaim: "Stop! it is the Emperor!" But, as my door was opened and I was about to get out, the Emperor himself descended from his sledge and hastened to stop me, saying in the most gracious manner that his order did not concern foreign ladies, especially Mme. Lebrun.