rom a wise and well reasoned calculation, is to cool in them that
impetuosity from which they derive all their strength. The prospects
of the campaign were therefore the most inauspicious possible, and
the silence which was maintained on that account was still more
alarming. The English give in their public papers the most exact
account, man by man, of the wounded, prisoners and killed in each
action; noble candour of a government which is equally sincere
towards the nation and its monarch, recognizing in both the same
right to have a knowledge of what concerns the nation. I walked
about with deep melancholy in that beautiful city of Petersburg
which might become the prey of the conqueror. When I returned in the
evening from the islands, and saw the gilded point of the citadel
which seemed to spout out in the air like a ray of fire, while the
Neva reflected the marble quays and the palaces which surround it, I
represented to myself all these wonders faded by the arrogance of a
man who would come to say, like Satan on the top of a mountain, "The
kingdoms of the earth are mine." All that was beautiful and good at
Petersburg appeared to me in the presence of approaching
destruction, and I could not enjoy them without having these painful
ideas constantly pursuing me.

I went to see the establishments for education, founded by the
empress, and there, even more than in the palaces, my anxiety was
redoubled; for the breath of Bonaparte's tyranny is sufficient, if
it approach institutions tending to the improvement of the human
race, to alter their purity. The institute of St. Catherine is
formed of two houses, each containing two hundred and fifty young
ladies of the nobility and citizens; they are educated under the
inspection of the empress, with a degree of care that even exceeds
what a rich family would pay to its own children. Order and elegance
are remarkable in the most minute details of this institute, and the
sentiment of the purest religion and morality there presides over
all that the fine arts can develope. The Russian females have so
much natural grace, that on entering the hall where all the young
ladies saluted us, I did not observe one who did not give to this
simple action all the politeness and modesty which it was capable of
expressing. They were invited to exhibit us the different kinds of
talent which distinguished them, and one of them, who knew by heart
pieces of the best French authors, repeated to me