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Anna Pavlovna's "At Home" was like the former one, only the

novelty she offered her guests this time was not Mortemart, but a

diplomatist fresh from Berlin with the very latest details of the

Emperor Alexander's visit to Potsdam, and of how the two august

friends had pledged themselves in an indissoluble alliance to

uphold the cause of justice against the enemy of the human race.

Anna Pavlovna received Pierre with a shade of melancholy,

evidently relating to the young man's recent loss by the death of

Count Bezukhov (everyone constantly considered it a duty to

assure Pierre that he was greatly afflicted by the death of the

father he had hardly known), and her melancholy was just like the

august melancholy she showed at the mention of her most august

Majesty the Empress Marya Fedorovna. Pierre felt flattered by

this. Anna Pavlovna arranged the different groups in her drawing

room with her habitual skill.