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him on the frontier of his dominions for the purpose of giving him his advice in this dilemma. But as this request met with a distinct refusal on the part of Sigismund, Trepca is said to have exclaimed to him, with tears in his eyes, "Never again, O king, shalt thou see thy nephew, nor receive another message from him"; which prophecy, in fact, came to pass; for as King Sigismund subsequently left the confines of Hungary, on a religious pretext, for Dantzic in Prussia, his nephew died, together with this same Trepca, in that most disastrous slaughter, which is named, from the place, "the slaughter of Mohacz". But now I return to the Russians.

While Vasiley Ivanovich was deliberating about his marriage, it struck him that it would be better that he should marry the daughter of one of his subjects than a foreigner, by which means he would not only spare himself very great expense, but also avoid having a wife accustomed to foreign habits and of a different religion. The suggestor of this idea was one George, surnamed the Little, the prince's treasurer and chief councillor, who thought it likely that the prince would marry his own daughter; but at length it happened that when at the public suggestion fifteen hundred daughters of the boyars were brought together into one place, that the prince might make his selection from their number, he chose for his wife, contrary to George's anticipation, Salomea, daughter of the boyar Ivan Sapur; but as after one-and-twenty years he had no children by her, chagrined at her barrenness, he thrust her into a convent in the principality of Susdal, in the same year that I came to Moscow, namely, 1526. When the metropolitan, upon her arrival at the convent weeping and sobbing, cut off her hair and then offered to put on the hood, she was so indignant at its being placed upon her, that she took it and hurling it to the ground, stamped upon it with her feet. One of the chief councillors irritated at the sight of this indignity,

not only reviled her bitterly, but beat her with a scourge, and asked her, "darest thou resist the will of my lord? and delayest thou to obey his commands?" When Salomea in return asked him by what authority he beat her, he replied, "by the will of his lord"; upon which she, broken-hearted, protested in the presence of all, that she took the hood unwillingly and under compulsion, and invoked the vengeance of God on her behalf for so great an injury. After Salomea was thus cast into the convent, the prince married Helen, daughter of the blind Duke Vasiley Lintzki (now dead)-I mean the brother of the Duke Michael Lintzki, who was then in prison; but this had no sooner taken place than a report became current that Salomea was pregnant and near the time of her delivery. This report was confirmed by two matrons, the wives of the chief councillors, George the Little, the treasurer, and Jacob Mazur, chamberlain,-which ladies said that they had heard from the mouth of Salomea herself that she was pregnant, and near the time of her delivery. The prince when he heard this was much disturbed, and drove both of them from his presence; he even punished one of them, the wife of George, with stripes, for not having earlier informed him of the fact; he then sent the councillor Theoderic Rack, and one Potal, a secretary, to the convent in which Salomea was confined, and desired them to inquire diligently into the truth of the case. While I was at Moscow, some persons declared solemnly that Salomea had brought forth a son, named George, but that she would not show the infant to any one; she is said, however, to have replied to some persons who were sent to her for the purpose of ascertaining the truth of the matter, that they were unworthy to set eyes upon the infant, who, when he came of age to be king, would revenge the injury done to his mother. Some, however, constantly denied that she had had a child. Thus the reports about this business are doubtful.

I have heard that there were two reasons why the

prince should marry the daughter of Vasiley Lintzki, the fugitive from Lithuania, besides the hope which he had of having children by her the first was, that his father-in-law derived his lineage from the family of Petrovitz, which was formerly of great distinction in Hungary, and professed the Greek faith; the second was, that his children would have for their uncle Michael Lintzki, a man of uncommon talent and distinguished valour,— for the prince had two brothers-in-law yet living, George and Andrew, and therefore he thought that if he were to have any children by another wife they would not be safe in the government, while those brothers were alive; but he did not doubt that if Michael were again received into favour. and released from prison, the children whom he might have by Helen would enjoy greater peace by means of the authority of their uncle. His liberation was spoken of in my presence, and after having first had his chains removed, and then being honourably set free on his parole, I at length saw him at full liberty, and enrolled by the prince among the other dukes by patent, and finally appointed tutor to his nephews Ivan and George. But subsequently, after the death of the prince, when Michael saw that his widow was constantly dishonouring the royal bed with a certain boyar named Ovezina, and that she showed implacable enmity against her husband's brothers, who had been thrown into prison, and that she otherwise governed with much cruelty, he, actuated purely by a sense of piety and honour, took occasion sometimes to admonish her to live a more worthy and religious life. She received his admonitions, however, with so much offence and indignation, that it was not long before she took counsel as to the best means of putting him out of the way. She soon found a reason, for they say that Michael was immediately arraigned for the crime of treason. and again thrown into prison, where he died a wretched death. It is also said that the widow not long after was

carried off by poison, and that the adulterous Ovczina was cut to pieces. The eldest son Ivan, who was born in 1528, came to the throne after the death of his mother.

Religion.

As Russia began, so to the present day it continues to observe the Christian faith according to the Greek ritual. The metropolitan formerly resided in Kiev, afterwards in Vladimir, but now in Moscow. It was a custom of the metropolitans to pay a visit every seven years to that part of Russia which was subject to the Lithuanians, and to return after exacting sums of money from them; but Withold fearing that his territories would become exhausted of coin, would no longer permit this. He therefore called a convocation of bishops, and appointed a special metropolitan, who at this day holds his seat at Wilna, the metropolis of Lithuania, a city which though observing the Roman ritual, has more Russian than Roman churches in it. The Russian metropolitans hold their authority from the Patriarch of Constantinople.

The Russians openly boast in their annals, that before the times of Vladimir and Olha, the land of Russia was baptized and blessed by Andrew, the apostle of Christ, who came, as they assert, from Greece to the mouth of the Dnieper, and that he sailed up the river against the stream as far as the mountains where Kiev now stands, and there blessed and baptized all the country; that he planted his cross there, and preached the great grace of God, foretelling that the churches of the Christians would be numerous; that thence he went afterwards to the sources of the Dnieper, to the Great Lake Volok, and descended by the River Lovat to Lake Ilmen, and thence by the River Volchov', which flows

out of the same lake, to Novogorod; thence by the same river to Lake Ladoga, and by the River Neva to the sea, which they call Varetzkoi, but which we call the German Sea [the Baltic], between Finland and Livonia, and so sailed to Rome. Finally, that he was crucified for Christ's sake in the Peloponnesus by Antipater. Such is the account given in their annals.

Metropolitans and bishops were formerly chosen at an assembly of all the archbishops, bishops, abbots, and priors of monasteries; a man remarkable for sanctity was sought for through monasteries and deserts, and was selected. But they say that it is the custom of the present prince to summon certain ecclesiastics to him, and choose one of their number accord ing to his own judgment. When I was the Emperor Maximilian's ambassador at Moscow, Bartholomew, a man of holy life, was the metropolitan; and on one occasion, when the prince had violated an oath made conjointly by him and the metropolitan himself to the Duke of Semeczitz, and had made assertions which appeared to him to be contrary to truth, he went to the prince and said :—Since thou usurpest all authority to thyself, I find it impossible to retain the charge of my office; and tendering the staff which he bore, which was in the form of a cross, he thus resigned his office. The prince without hesitation accepted the staff, together with the resignation of the office, and immediately sent the poor man bound with chains to Bielosero. They say that he was there a long while in chains, but that he was afterwards liberated, and privately passed the rest of his life in a monastery. One Daniel succeeded him as metropolitan, a man of about thirty years of age, of a large and corpulent frame, and with a red face, who, lest he should be thought more given to gluttony than to fastings, vigils, and prayers, used on all occasions when he had to perform any public ceremony, to expose his face to the fumes of sulphur to make himself pale; and when

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