I

FROM SPLENDOR TO GLOOM


The ice was breaking up along the river Neva, in 1917. At the Winter
Palace, the ladies were rejoicing over the good news. The Czar in the
field was reorganizing his dismembered armies. America was severing
diplomatic relations with the Central Powers. The Asquith Ministry had
dissolved and Lloyd-George was hurling his dynamic personality into
organizing Victory for the Allied forces in the field. Kut-el-Amara
had fallen to the British--Bagdad had been taken--the Crescent was
fleeing before the Cross of Russia--the Grand Duke was driving the
Turk from Trebizond. Even Hindenburg was retiring along the Western
Front--France with unexampled gallantry was holding back the
Juggernaut--America was getting mad and rolling up its sleeves.

The women at the palace did not disguise their happiness over the
cheerful events that heralded the approach of Victory. The evening
star that poured down its steel-blue rays upon the crosses of St.
Isaac's presaged to their encouraged fancies the early dawn of peace.
Yet the chilly wind that whistled round their dull-red household was
laden with a frosty air that blew from official regions and "froze
the genial current of their souls." The icy glances of ambitious
princelings, reflecting back the sinister sullenness of designing
ministers, fell like a spectral gloom upon their happy hearts. A
hollow roar rolled down the Nevskii Prospekt--a guard burst into the