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Till the Tsar reached it, each regiment in its silence and

immobility seemed like a lifeless body, but as soon as he came up

it became alive, its thunder joining the roar of the whole line

along which he had already passed. Through the terrible and

deafening roar of those voices, amid the square masses of troops

standing motionless as if turned to stone, hundreds of riders

composing the suites moved carelessly but symmetrically and above

all freely, and in front of them two men-the Emperors. Upon them

the undivided, tensely passionate attention of that whole mass of

men was concentrated.

The handsome young Emperor Alexander, in the uniform of the Horse

Guards, wearing a cocked hat with its peaks front and back, with

his pleasant face and resonant though not loud voice, attracted

everyone's attention.