Wilhelm II. in terms of highest praise,
declared that he was under the greatest obligations to him for useful
warnings and advice, said that he believed he had no truer or more
zealous friend.

When I drove to the house of M. Petrovitch that evening I carried,
carefully sewn between the inner and outer folds of my well-starched
shirt-front, where no sound of crackling would excite remark, a sheet
of thin note-paper covered in a very small handwriting with the text
of the Czar's letter to the ruler of Japan.

M. Petrovitch was not alone. Around his hospitable board he had
gathered some of the highest and proudest personages of the Russian
Court, including the Grand Duke Staniolanus, generally believed to be
the heart and soul of the War Party. His imperial highness was
well-known to be a desperate gambler, up to the neck in debts
contracted at the card-table, and bent on recouping himself out of
the wealth of Korea and Manchuria.

I was duly presented to this royal personage (whom I had met once
before under widely different circumstances) in the character of a
Peace Crusader, an emissary of the philanthropists of Great Britain.

At the dinner-table, where I found myself placed on my host's left
hand, while the Grand Duke was on his right, the conversation
continued to be in the same strain. That Petrovitch believed me to be
an English peace fanatic I did not believe any longer, but I could
not tell if any, or how many, of the others were in his confidence.

As soon as the solid part of the feast was disposed of, Petrovitch
rose to his feet, and after a bow to the Grand Duke, launched out
into a formal speech proposing my health.

He commenced with the usual professions in favor of peace, spoke of
the desire felt by all Russians to preserve the friendship of
England, eulogized the work done by my friend the editor, and by
other less disinterested friends of Russia in London, and wound up by
asking all the company to give me a cordial welcome, and to send a
message of congratulation and good-will to the British public.

Knowing as I did, that the man was a consummate rogue, who had
probably invited me to his house in order to keep me under
observation, and possibly to prevent my getting scent of the
intrigues pursued by his friend and ally, Princess Y----, I was still
at a loss to understand the reason for this performance.

I have learned since that an account of the proceedings, with
abstracts from this hypoc