And his eye beaming with anger, his lips contracted, his hand raised, he threw himself on the military courier and tore off his epaulettes.
"Go! You are now only a soldier."
The unhappy colonel, pale with shame, smothering his rage and the tears that rose to his eyes, went out, his soul in despair. But hardly had he reached the staircase, when he heard the voice of the emperor begging his return. He retraced his steps, and Nicholas, running to meet him, embraced him ardently, begged pardon for his brutality, and offered for his acceptance the post of aide-de-camp.
"May your majesty hold me excused," replied the poor officer; "for, in taking off" my epaulettes, you have deprived me of my honor. I leave them in your hands with my dismissal."
"You are right," replied Nicholas. "It is not in my power to repair the offence of my hasty action. Ah! we are both unhappy, and I am vanquished. Yes, completely vanquished!"
And, walking up and down with an agitated step, the subdued lion in his cage, his heart bleeding with the wound given his pride:
"Go, leave my empire," continued he, turning to Colonel A——, "and pardon me. We must not meet again. Both of us would suffer too much in each other's presence."
The mortification attending the first reverses of his army before Sebastopol was a mortal blow to his health; yet, had not his stubborn pride brought about these reverses? Self-deceived thoroughly as to the real condition of his empire, the disastrous news of the Alma came upon him like a thunder-bolt. Some honest men, sent to the different stations, signalized the imperfect state of the fortifications of Sebastopol, the disorganization of the army, the deplorable condition of the roads. They informed the emperor that the soldiers, in their march toward the south, were dying by thousands for want of sufficient nourishment and necessary clothing. Thanks to the bad quality of the grass and hay, whole regiments were in a few days entirely dismounted. And now the alarming news spread with rapidity. Each day brought fresh tidings of new embarrassments, new checks, and new misfortunes. Nicholas at last opened his eyes. He saw the colossus, with its feet of clay, tremble to its base; he felt his power crumble in his hands, his prestige fade and disappear. From the windows of Peterhoff, his loved summer residence, he could follow with his telescope the evolutions of the allied fleet. Turkey itself, hitherto so despicable in his eyes, was transformed into a redoubtable enemy. Now he began to think of the ravages that continued theft had made in his empire, the disorders in the finances, the corruption of public morals, and every one was doomed to punishments. By his order, judgments, condemnations, banishment to Caucasia and Siberia, were daily multiplied. It was too late; the gangrene had reached the wound.
Tears of grief and rage flowed with the consciousness of his impotence. He opened his eyes to the fall of Russia with each victorious flash of the allied cannons; and the edifice of terror that had taken him twenty years to build, he saw crumbling, stone by stone, and felt that the military quackery with which he had intimidated Europe had frightened no one. With the mocking pride of Titan, he bled at every pore. Repeated blows of this kind ended by undermining his constitution, till now so vigorous. Little by little he sank, bent his haughty head, and tottered, with slow and saddened step, to the grave.
It was February. Under a gray and cold sky, a penetrating, driving snow enveloped St. Petersburg in a whitened dust. The streets, the houses, the beards and furred great-coats of the passers-by, all were white. The great city resembled a giant asleep under the snow. An inexpressible sadness took possession of you, weighed down your whole being, and froze your very heart. You seemed to be at the pole itself.