Once an eruption of Bolshevik sailors at six in
the morning occurred; they ventured to disturb
the Empress-Mother in her bed. Rough men had
walked without ceremony into the villa and into
her room, ordered her to rise, and refused to retire
or to wait tiU she could slip on even her dressing-
gown. Perforce she must obey instantly in their
presence, and then must watch them fumbling
about among her clothes, papers, and all her small
possessions, while she stood in night-dress and slip-
pers, shivering. In spite of the disorder they created
they had shortly to admit they could find nothing
compromising in her baggage. Finally they laid a
paper on her desk and ordered her to sign it, sajdng
it stated she was found not to be mixed in any
coimter-revolutionary plot. She signed *' Marie.**

"That is not yotu* proper name. Sign 'Marie
Romanoff,"* came a stem rebuke, ''or you will be
made to pay dearly.**

At the end of her patience finally, her Majesty,
quietly looking the tough spokesman in the eye,
replied: "I know how to sign my name; and on
that subject I take no instructions from you. For
fifty years I have signed in this same way, and I do
not mean to change. If you choose, you can kill
me, of course; but you cannot alter the fact that I
had my reign out and have not abdicated, so I am



THE CRIMEA S EFFORT 159

the Empress-Mother still, and that is my signatiire.
Take it or leave it, as you please."

The men grumbUng took the paper and went out,
leaving the Empress-Mother chilled with exposure
in her unusually Hght costume, but quite undaunted
and triumphant in the possession of her room.
