The power of Mathilde Kschessinska

 On April 15th I appeared in the other ballet I had inherited from Legnani, La Camargo, a work in three acts and five tableaux in Louis XV style, by Saint-Georges and Petipa.  It was responsible for another clash between Prince Volkhonsky, Director of the Imperial Theatres, and myself.  Legnani had performed the Russian dance in a Louis XV style costume, whose billowing skirts, supported by hoop petticoats, hindered her movements and robbed the dance of all its charm.  Legnani was certainly an excellent dancer, but she paid far less attention to costume than I did.  I knew perfectly well that in these clothes I would look ugly, on account of my small size, and that I would also find it quite impossible to execute the Russian dance in the way I wished to do it.  It consists of imperceptibly subtle touches, which contribute its value.  I had therefore given my reasons to the wardrobe-keeper, adding that I would naturally put on the presribed costume, but without the tiresome hoops, whose absence would anyway not be noticed under the billowing skirts.  My remarks, wholly justified as they were, were doubtless misrepresented to the Director to appear a mere whim.  In any case, my observations were disregarded and I was again told that I must put on the hoops without fail.  I then received the impression that someone was trying to pick a quarrel with me on a trifling excuse.

Just before the performance began Baron Koussov, Theatre Manager in the Imperial Theatres, entered my dressing-room and insisted once more in the Director's name that I should put on the hoops.  The disagreement had now gone on for some time, and the public, who knew all about it, was impatiently waiting the outcome of  "the affair".  The outcome was that I categorically refused to put on the hoops and danced without them!  If it had not been for the publicity given to the quarrel, nobody could ever have known if I was wearing the hoops or not.

The next day when I arrived at the theatre for rehearsal I read on the Administration's notice board: "The Director of the Imperial Theatres fines the ballerina Kschessinska [so many rubles] for an unauthorised change in the costume prescribed by regulation for the ballet La Camargo".  Bearing in mind my salary and position, the fine was so small that it was clearly meant to provoke and not to punish me.  I could not submit to such an insult without taking steps to put it right.  I had no other resource but to apply once more to the Tsar, begging him to have the fine remitted through the same channel.  And now a notice went up on the board:  "The Director of the Imperial Theatres hereby orders a remission of the fine imposed on the ballerina Kschessinska for an unauthorised change in the costume prescribed by regulation in the ballet La Camargo."  Following this incident, Prince Volkhonsky felt that he should not remain at his post and handed in his resignation  However, his prestige and independence did not suffer as a result..  He left in July 1901 and was succeeded by V. A. Teliakovsky.

Dancing in Petersburg: the Memoirs of Mathilde Kschessinska. 2005. Pages 81-2.