nor a negative influence
upon the character of the exceedingly passionate, restless and
headstrong boy. The only person who really took him in hand was Cesar La
Harpe, who was tutor-in-chief from 1783 to May 1795 and educated both
the empress's grandsons.

Like Alexander, Constantine was married by Catherine when not yet
seventeen years of age, a raw and immature boy, and he made his wife,
Juliana of Coburg, intensely miserable. After a first separation in the
year 1799, she went back permanently to her German home in 1801, the
victim of a frivolous intrigue, in the guilt of which she was herself
involved. An attempt made by Constantine in 1814 to win her back to his
hearth and home broke down on her firm opposition. During the time of
this tragic marriage Constantine's first campaign took place under the
leadership of the great Suvorov. The battle of Bassignano was lost by
Constantine's fault, but at Novi he distinguished himself by such
personal bravery that the emperor Paul bestowed on him the title of
cesarevich, which according to the fundamental law of the constitution
belonged only to the heir to the throne. Though it cannot be proved that
this action of the tsar denoted any far-reaching plan, it yet shows that
Paul already distrusted the grand-duke Alexander. However that may be,
it is certain that Constantine never tried to secure the throne. After
his father's death he led a wild and disorderly bachelor life. He
abstained from politics, but remained faithful to his military
inclinations, though, indeed, without manifesting anything more than a
preference for the externalities of the service.

In command of the guards during the campaign of 1805 Constantine had a
share of the responsibility for the unfortunate turn which events took
at the battle of Austerlitz; while in 1807 neither his skill nor his
fortune in war showed any improvement. However, after the peace of
Tilsit he became an ardent admirer of the great Corsican and an upholder
of the Russo-French alliance. It was on this account that in political
questions he did not enjoy the confidence of his imperial brother. To
the latter the French alliance had always been merely a means to an end,
and after he had satisfied himself at Erfurt, and later during the
Franco-Austrian War of 1809, that Napoleon likewise regarded his
relation to Russia only from the point of view of political advantage,
he became convinced that the alliance must transform itself int