RUMANIA: Romanov Relic

As though doing homage to the imperial dead, French correspondents in Bucharest last week hovered around a greying count whom they called "The last Ambassador of the Tsar."

He had suddenly lost his job as a result of Rumania's belated recognition of the Soviet Union (TIME, June 18). Last week King Carol's Government told Count

Koziel Pokolovsky that he must get out of Imperial Russia's big house near the Royal Palace.

"If you only knew how sumptuous all this was!" cried an aged Russian servitor. "The broken windows are stuffed with paper now, but 16 years is a long time! With no more money coming from St. Petersburg what was His Excellency to do but sell first the priceless carpets from Turkestan, then the gold service, the tapestries and at last even the chairs."

His Excellency, dazed with grief, was not at home to reporters last week, but month ago he was interviewed. At a long table sat a moth-eaten Grand Duke and a threadbare general of the Imperial Army holding in place a pair of trousers which His Excellency was pressing.

''My situation is perhaps paradoxical," said Count Pokolovsky, going on with his pressing, "but His Majesty the Emperor of All the Russias having signed my credentials, I remain at my post. I attend all the functions of the Rumanian Court. Every Russian New Year I receive thousands of letters from His Majesty's loyal subjects in all parts of the world."

"What will you do if one day Rumania recognizes the Bolsheviks?"

The Grand Duke, the general and His Excellency stiffened. "We shall do what we do now. Somewhere in a little street of Paris or New York we shall press trousers!"