"So long as your method of selecting ministers was known to a limited
circle only affairs went on somehow, but from the moment your system became
generally known it is stupid to govern Russia in that way. Repeatedly you
have told me that you could trust no one, that you were being deceived.
If that is true then the same influences are at work on your wife, dearly
beloved by you, who is led astray by [--].

[Footnote: the evil circle that surrounds her. You trust Alexandra
Fedorovna--that is easy to understand. But that which comes out of her
mouth is the result of clever fabrication and not the truth. If you are
not strong enough to remove these influences from her, at least put
yourself on guard against this steady and systematic interference of those
who act through your beloved. If your persuasion is ineffective, and I am
certain that you have more than once fought against this influence, try
some other means so as to end with this system once for all. Your first
impulses and decisions are always unusually true and to the point, but as
soon as another influence comes in you begin to hesitate and end up by
doing something different from what you originally decided. If you should
succeed in removing this continuous invasion of the dark forces there
would take place at once the birth of a new Russia, and there would return
to you the confidence of the greater number of your subjects. All other
matters would soon settle themselves. You would find people who under
different conditions would be willing to work under your personal
leadership. At the proper time, and that is not far distant, you can of
your own free will organize a ministry which should be responsible to you
and to constitutional institutions. This can be done very simply, without
any force from outside as was the case with the act of October 17, 1905. I
hesitated a long time before venturing to tell you this truth, and I
finally consented when your mother and sister urged me to do so. You are
at the beginning of a new era of disturbances, I will go farther, at the