In the night of the 22nd a telegram was received dismissing General Alexeiev and appointing General Brussilov by order of the Provisional Government. The Quartermaster-General Josephovitch woke up Alexeiev and handed him the telegram. The Supreme Commander-in-Chief was deeply moved, and tears came down his cheeks. May the members of the Provisional Government who are still alive forgive the vulgarity of the language: in a subsequent conversation with me the Supreme Commander-in-Chief inadvertently uttered the following words: "The cads! They have dismissed me like a servant without notice."
A great statesman and military leader had thus left the stage, whose virtue--one of many--was his implicit loyalty (or was it a defect?) to the Provisional Government.
On the next day Kerensky was asked--at a meeting of the Soviet--what steps he had taken in view of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief's speech at the officers' Conference (see Chapter XXIII). He replied that Alexeiev had been dismissed, and that he, Kerensky, believed that a late French politician was right in saying that "discipline of duty" should be introduced from the top. The Bolshevik Rosenfeldt (Kamenev) expressed satisfaction, because this decision fully coincided with the repeated demands of the Soviet. On the same day the Government published an official communiqué to the effect that: "In spite of the fact that General Alexeiev was naturally very tired and needed rest from his arduous labours, it was considered impossible to lose the services of this exceptionally experienced and talented leader, and General Alexeiev was therefore to remain at the disposal of the Provisional Government." The Supreme Commander-in-Chief issued the following Order of the Day as a farewell to the Armies.
"For nearly three years I have walked with you along the thorny path of the Russian Army. Your glorious deeds have filled me with joyful elation, and I was filled with sorrow in the days of our reverses. But I continued with implicit hope in Providence, in the mission of the Russian people, and in the prowess of the Russian soldier. Now that the foundations of our military power are shattered, I still preserve the same faith, as life would not be worth living without it. I reverently salute you, my comrades in arms, all those who have done their duty faithfully, all those whose hearts beat with the love of their country, all those who in the days of the popular turmoil were determined not to allow the Mother Country to be disrupted. I, the old soldier, and your late Supreme Commander-in-Chief, once more reverently salute you. Pray think kindly of me."