f Russian grenadiers, and half of Parisian national
guards; Russian coaches and four, answering to the description of Dr
Clarke, the postillions riding on the off-horses, and dressed almost
like beggars; Russian carts drawn by four horses a-breast, and driven by
peasants in the national costume; Polish Jews, with long black beards,
dressed in black robes like the cassocks of English clergymen, with
broad leathern belts--all mingled with the Parisian multitude upon the
Boulevards: and in the midst of this indiscriminate assemblage, all the
business, and all the amusements of Paris, went on with increased
alacrity and fearless confidence. The Palais Royal was crowded, morning,
noon, and night, with Russian and Prussian officers in full uniform,
decorated with orders, whose noisy merriment, cordial manners, and
careless profusion, were strikingly contrasted with the silence and
sullenness of the French officers.

It is fortunately superfluous for us to enlarge on the appearance, or on
the character of the Emperor Alexander. We were struck with the
simplicity of the style in which he lived. He inhabited only one or two
apartments in a wing of the splendid Elysee Bourbon--slept on a leather
mattress, which he had used in the campaign--rose at four in the
morning, to transact business--wore the uniform of a Russian General,
with only the medal of 1812, (the same which is worn by every soldier
who served in that campaign, with the inscription, in Russ, _Non nobis
sed tibi Domine_); had a French guard at his door--went out in a chaise
and pair, with a single servant and no guards, and was very regular in
his attendance at a small chapel, where the service of the Greek church
was performed. We had access to very good information concerning him,
and the account which we received of his character even exceeded our
anticipation. His well-known humanity was described to us as having
undergone no change from the scenes of misery inseparable from extended
warfare, to which his duties, rather than his inclinations, had so long
habituated him. He repeatedly left behind him, in marching with the
army, some of the medical men of his own staff, to dress the wounds of
French soldiers whom he passed on the way; and it was a standing order
of his to his hospital staff, to treat wounded Russians and French
exactly alike.

His conduct at the battle of Fere Champenoise, a few days before the
capture of Paris, of which we had an account from eye