(It seemed to Napoleon that the chief import of what was taking place lay in the personal struggle between himself and Alexander.) "From the height of the Kremlin- yes, there is the Kremlin, yes- I will give them just laws; I will teach them the meaning of true civilization, I will make generations of boyars remember their conqueror with love.
'Boyars,' I will say to them, 'I do not desire war, I desire the peace and welfare of all my subjects.' However, I know their presence will inspire me, and I shall speak to them as I always do: clearly, impressively, and majestically.
A general with a brilliant suite galloped off at once to fetch the boyars.
His speech to the boyars had already taken definite shape in his imagination.
They were not alarmed by the fact that Moscow had been abandoned by its inhabitants (grave as that fact seemed), but by the question how to tell the Emperor- without putting him in the terrible position of appearing ridiculous- that he had been awaiting the boyars so long in vain: that there were drunken mobs left in Moscow but no one else.
No, in seeking to blame the President's indifference to the plight of the poor on his insulating advisers, my interviewee was succumbing to the Bad
Boyar theory of politics: If only the czar knew!