eresting sketches to his superiors in Whitehall, Vischnegradsky, the
'wizard of finance', who raised the value of the rouble 30 per cent.,
became one of his intimate friends. When that ambiguous figure, Witte,
his rival and successor, tried to discredit him, Morier vindicated with
warmth the honesty and patriotism of his friend. Baron Jomini of the
Foreign Office was of a different kind, witty, volatile, audaciously
outspoken, more like a character in Thackeray's novels. Pobedonostsev,
the Procurator of the Holy Synod, remained 'somewhat of an enigma'--as
we can easily believe when we hear that this bigoted Churchman, the
terror of the Jews, had been a friend of Dean Stanley, and was still
fond of English literature and English theology.

Still more amusing are the stories which he tells of foreign visitors of
high station--of the Duke of Orleans playing truant without the
knowledge of his parents and being snubbed by his Grand Ducal
relatives; of Dal[=i]p Singh touring the provinces with a disreputable
entourage and trying to make trouble for the British at Moscow; of the
Prince of Montenegro and his beautiful daughters, whom Morier heartily
admires--'tall and massive, strong-limbed and comely, the true type of
the mothers of heroes in the Homeric sense'.

With the Court his relations were excellent. His intimacy with members
of our own royal family helped him, and his geniality and
unconventional, natural manner won favour with the Romanoffs, who
retained in their high station a great deal of simplicity. More than
once Morier seized an opportunity for an act of special courtesy to the
Tsar; and Alexander appreciated this from a man whose character was too
well known for him to be suspected of obsequiousness.

But the life in St. Petersburg was not all pleasure, even when
diplomatic waters were quiet. The work was hard, the climate was very
exacting with its extremes of temperature, and epidemics were rife. In
November 1889 he reports the appearance of 'Siberian Catarrh, more
usually described under the general name of Influenza', which was
working havoc in girls' schools and guardsmen's barracks, and had laid
low simultaneously Emperor, Empress, and half the imperial family.
Morier himself became increasingly liable to attacks of ill-health, and
found difficulty in discharging his duties regularly. It required a keen
sense of duty for him to stay at his post; and when in December 1891 he
was appointed to the Embassy