Division he was practically in charge of the political police system of the Russian Empire. The letters now published are all that have been preserved, and they are printed without omitting anything but purely family matters which would have no interest for the general public. In translating them I have endeavoured as far as possible to give a literal rendering of Madame de Lieven's style, and by so doing may have retained certain Gallicisms which might have been expressed by English equivalents, but in this way the original forms would have been lost.