Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

230COURT DANCES.

fete. Elsewhere liberty gives birth to a feeling of gladness which is favourable to illusion; here despotism suggests meditations which make it impossible to deceive one's self.

The kind of dance that is most common at the grand fetes of this country, does not disturb the course of ideas. The company promenade in a solemn step to the sound of music, each gentleman taking his partner by the hand. In the palace, hundreds of couples thus follow in procession, proceeding from one immense hall to another, winding through the galleries crossing the saloons, and traversing the whole building in such order or direction as the caprice of the individual who leads, may dictate. This is called dancing la Polonaise. It is amusing at first, but for those destined to dance it all their lives, balls must, I think, be a species of torture.

The Polonaise at Petersburg recalled to my memory the congress of Vienna, where I had danced it in 1814. No etiquette was observed in the European fetes celebrated on that occasion, every one's place in the dance was regulated by hazard, though in the midst of all the monarchs of the earth. My fate had placed me between the Emperor Alexander and his consort, who was a princess of Baden. All at once, the line of the dancing couples was stopped without our perceiving the reason, as the music continued playing. The emperor, growing impatient, put his head over my shoulder, and, addressing himself to the empress, told her in a very rude tone, to move on. The empress turned, and perceiving behind me the emperor, with a lady as his partner for whom he had for some days past manifested a violent passion,