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“Je suis chargée de vous annoncer une bonne nouvelle, secrète encore, c’est que le grand duc Constantin est nommé president du grand comité, et qu’à son retour l’Empereur présidera lui-même. Avais-je raison ce matin de croire à une Providence spéciale pour la Russie, et pour nous tous?”

(I have been asked to give you some good news, which is as yet secret, and that is that the Grand Duke Constantine has been appointed President of the Grand Committee, and that after his return here the Emperor will himself preside. Was I not right this morning in thinking that there existed a special Providence for Russia, and for us all?)

Editha Rhaden was a charming person, rather given, perhaps, to exuberant enthusiasm, which prevented her from appreciating the real worth of things as well as of people, but with real intelligence, sound principles, and brilliant conversational powers. She was perhaps slightly poseuse and rather given to exaggerate both her own and her Imperial mistress’s importance. A great stickler for etiquette, she contrived to give a ceremonious appearance to the smallest gathering, and she was famed for the magnificence of her curtseys whenever a crowned head came into a room. She lived only within the atmosphere of a Court, and when absent from it seemed lost and utterly out of her element; but she was thoroughly genuine, incapable of a mean act, and very much liked even by those who smiled at her innocent foibles. After the death of the Grand Duchess Hélène, whom she did not survive very long, she continued to receive those who had been habitués of the Palais Michel, and held a small Court of her own, whose importance she overvalued. When she died she was generally regretted, for she had tried to do all the good she possibly could, and no one could reproach her with a bad action or a bad use of the influence which at one time she unquestionably possessed.