Besides the Grand Duke Cyril, she has one daughter, the Grand Duchess Hélène, married to Prince Nicholas of Greece, who only visits Russia occasionally, and two other sons. The youngest, the Grand Duke Andrew, is unfortunately very delicate and suspected of the possession of weak lungs, which oblige him to winter in Switzerland. The second son, the Grand Duke Boris, has given cause for a good deal to be said about him. At one time it is said that his conduct was the cause of such scandal that one wondered the Emperor did nothing to put an end to it.
Of the two sisters of the Emperor the elder one, the Grand Duchess Xenia, married her cousin, the Grand Duke Alexander Michaelovitch. They had a very numerous family, and after the accession of the present Emperor enjoyed great influence. The Grand Duke, clever, like all his mother’s children, but of an intriguing disposition, managed to acquire a considerable amount of the confidence of his brother-in-law, Nicholas II.
Unfortunately, he did not know how to use it, and succumbed to intrigues directed against his person. These found food in the disorder in which everything belonging to the Navy, in which he served, was discovered to be during the Japanese War. The Grand Duke took offence at certain remarks directed against him, and, under the pretext that the bad state of his health obliged him to winter abroad, he left Russia with his family and settled in Biarritz, where he has almost continually resided since. There he became acquainted with a certain set, in which the American element predominated, and report says that both the Grand Duke and his wife live in circumstances unfettered by the exigencies of etiquette, which, although giving rise to no open scandal, nevertheless afford much food for gossip. Neither one nor the other, it is said, takes any trouble to hide his or her likes or dislikes, and they live more the life of a fashionable couple than that of members of an Imperial House.
The younger sister of the Emperor, the Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna, is the most popular member of his family. She is not pretty by any means, but pleasant, clever, amiable, good-natured, and very much in love with gaiety in any shape or form. She was married when quite young to Prince Peter of Oldenburg, a distant cousin. This was partly by the wish of the Dowager Empress, who wanted to keep her daughter in Russia, and partly was influenced by her long-standing friendship for the Princess Eugénie, the mother of Prince Peter.