Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-11-13
FRIENDS OF THE CAR.
Reasons WHY Two Persons Share His Best
Confidence-They Are the Only Ones
Who Are Treated by the Russian Ruler

|
Reasons Why Two Persons Share His Best
Confidence-They Are the Only Ones
Who Are Treated by the Russian Ruler
as Relatives.
OF all the members of the Imperial Court
OF Russia, says St. Petersburg correspond
ent OF the New York Times, the Count and
Countess Scheremetiew are the only two
who are treated by the Gear and Czarina as
personal friends and relatives. They are
the sole persons having access to the
monarch and his consort who are permitted
to say what they please and to talk to
| Alexander and the Empress in perfectly
! Tree and unconstrained fashion. Indeed,
| they may be regarded as the sole means of
| communication that exists between the
autocrat and the masses of the population.
| Inc Other dignitaries of the court though
honest and devoted to their imperial master
and mistress, endeavor to keep the latter
from knowing anything disagreeable.
Or course their object is to spare the En-
peror and Empress from trouble and annoy
ance, but the result is that the latter are
kept in ignorance of many things that it
| would be far better that they should know,
| especially in so far as public opinion and the
| sentiments of their subjects are concerned.
Count Scheremetiew and his wife are indebt-
ed for their exceptional position to the fact
that the Countess is daughter of the EN-
peror's aunt, the Grand Duchess Marie, and
of her second husband, Count Stroganon.
Moreover, the Count himself is the son of a
natural daughter of Car Alexander l., and,
besides holding the post OF Grand Huntsman
of the Empire he is one of the wealthiest
mobiles in Russia. This wealth has been fur
ther increased in the last few days by the
death at Odessa of old Count Stroganoff, the
father of the nobleman by that name who
married the Grand Duchess Marie, and the
grandfather, therefore, of Countess Schere-
metiew.
The Terror of the Russian Press.
The terror with which the press avoids
the possibility of giving any offense to the
imperial family is strikingly demonstrated
by the fact that in the obituary notices of
the old Count not single paper mentioned
that he had been father-in-law to daughter
of Gar Nicholas. Count Alexander Stroga-
noff was at the time of his death over 81
years old and without exception the best
known and most popular figure at odessa,
where he had resided uninterruDtedly Tor so
years. He was the Dean of the Order of st.
Andrew and of all other Russian orders, an
Adjutant General of the Emperor, and
half a century he abstained from exercising
any OF the functions connected with these
offices and dignities. At the time of his
self-imposed exile he o,oa was Minister l,teh
Emperor Nicholas on the ground
of his sons relations to the Cars
daughter. The Grand Duchess was at the
time married to the Duke of Leuchtenberg,
who was grandson of Empress Josephine
of France and of the latter's first husbsnd,
NJ. de Beauharnais. The Grand Duchess,
after a few years of marriage, declined to
live with the Duke any longer, and had
given her heart instead to Count Gregory
Stroganoff, whose principal title to fame was
that Of being the most gigantic and most
RI fnl mo int aDfi GGIo n arm
Immediately on the death of the Duke OF
Leuchtenberg the Grand Duchess contracted
morganatic marriage with the Count,
greatly to the morttfication and disgust OF
her father and brothers, who insisted that
thenceforth she should reside as much as
possible abroad. The Grand Duchess and
her husband spent most of their time in the
French Riviera, and it was there that the
Count became implicated in a disagreeable
scandal, which would have resulted in his
trial for murder had it not been for the per-
sonal Intervention of Napoleon Ill. at that
time President of the Fr1nch Republic.
The Hairdresser Was Too Familiar.
1t appears that one day the Count, enter
ing his wifes dressing room, found the
coiffeur arranging her hair with far too
much empressement and familiarity. Al
though not ordinarily jealous-for Jealous
disposition would be out of place in the
husband of a Russian Grand Duchess-the
spectacle presented proved too much for his
feelings, and, seizing the unfortunate figaro
hurled him bodily through the window into
the garden, two stories below. The man
died few hours later from his I'M uries, and
It was only by the personal intervention on OF
for the purpose of invoking the assistance of
Napoleon and of his sister, Princess Mathilde,
that criminal proceedings against the Count
were averted A heavy indemnity, however,
had to be paid by the Count to the family Of
his victim.
From the time of his dispute with Emperor
ipho foil fhnr
visited either st. Petersburg or Moscow. He
lived in a beautiful house looking out on the
sea at Odessa His household was on a
princely SCALE as befitted a man of his rank
and immense fortune. Exceedingly courtly
and generous, age and experience had
rendered him much Of a cynic, and he pro-
His friends wepe few in number, and strange
though it may appear, his most intimate
and confidential companion was an aged
Hebrew, almost as old as himself. About Is
years ago the Hebrew lost his entire fortune
through no fault of his own. The Count,
within "a hours of receiving the news of his
friends loss, appeared at his house and laid
on the table a paokase containing bank
notes to the amount of money which the
Hebrew had lost.
81 am your Oldest FRIEND" said he. "Pov-
erty at your ageis hard to bear. From me
you can have no compunction about taking
the money after out years of close friendship
and intimacy" ''Do not be offended nv
dear Alexa Gregorovitch. if 1 refuse your
have been close friends for ,many years. 1
do not know if either of us will live much
longer, but l would not for the world that
anyone should be able to say, during the re-
lnaing years that we have to live, that my
friendship has been of an interested charac-
ter"
First on the List of Citizens.
The Count appreciated the delicacy of his
friend, and after excusing himself with
drew. A few days later, however, the He
brew was, through his influence, appointed
to an almost sinecure Government post
which placed him beyond want for the re-
mainder of his days.
The old Count was almost as tall as his son
and maintained his erect carriage to the
last. There was not a man, woman or child
in Odessa who did not know and venerate
the grand looking old man, with his long, |
snow-white beard and superb air. His |
name figured first on the list of the citizens
of Odessa, and so proud was he of the fact |
that he omitted all mention of his Adjutans |
Generalship and of his various dignities on |
his visiting cards, upon which he invaria- |
bly, described himself as the first citizen of |
Odessa. |
The fortune which he left amounts to ten |
or fifteen million rubles in money, besides |
immense estates. Nor is this wealth of re- |
cent origin for the StroganOffS have ALWAYS |