It was dark before the ceremony was over. On our return the Czar, having heard from General Ivanoff that there was a casualty station quite near, decided to visit it at once. We entered a dark forest and soon perceived a small building feebly lit by the red flames of torches. The Czar and Alexis Nicolaïevitch entered the house, and the Czar went up to all the wounded and questioned them in a kindly way. His unexpected arrival at so late an hour at a spot so close to the front was the cause of the general astonishment which could be read on every face. One private soldier, who had just been bandaged and put back in bed, gazed fixedly at the Czar, and when the latter bent over him he raised his only sound hand to touch his sovereign’s clothes and satisfy himself that it was really the Czar who stood before him and not a ghost. Close behind his father stood Alexis Nicolaïevitch, who was deeply moved by the groaning he heard and the suffering he felt all around him. We rejoined our train and immediately left for the south. When we woke next morning we were in Galicia. During the night we had crossed the former Austrian frontier. The Czar was anxious to congratulate the troops, whose prodigies of valour had enabled them to remain on hostile soil notwithstanding the dearth of arms and ammunition. We left the railway at Bogdanovka and gradually mounted the plateau on which units from all the regiments of General Tcherbatcheff’s army had been assembled. When the review was over the Czar disregarded the objections of his suite and visited the Perchersky Regiment, three miles from the front lines, at a place which enemy artillery fire could have reached. We then returned to our cars, which we had left in a forest, and went to General Lechitzsky’s army, which was some thirty miles away. We were overtaken by darkness on our way back. A thick mist covered the countryside; we lost our way and twice had to go back. But after many wanderings we at length struck the railway again, though we were sixteen miles from the place where we had left our train! Two hours later we left for G.H.Q. The Czar brought away a most encouraging impression from his tour of inspection. It was the first time that he had been in really close contact with the troops, and he was glad that he had been able to see with his own eyes, practically in the firing-line, the fine condition of the regiments and the splendid spirit with which they were inspired. We returned to Mohileff in the evening of October 27th, and the next morning Her Majesty and the Grand-Duchesses also arrived at G.H.Q. During their journey the Czarina and her daughters had stopped at several towns in the Governments of Tver, Pskoff, and Mohileff, in order to visit the military hospitals. They stayed three days with us at Mohileff and then the whole family left for Tsarskoïe-Selo, where the Czar was to spend several days.