The Giants of Russian Literature: The Greatest Russian Novels, Stories, Plays, Folk Tales & Legends. Максим Горький
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and ransacked the houses of boyarins and merchants. Outside, the Moskvitchi, swarming like burnt-out bees, were reinforced by drafts of Liapounov’s Riazan levies. The arrival of the chief Zaroutzkie with a following of Don Kozaks was a source of weakness rather than strength, and the quarrels of the ill-disciplined children of the steppes with the Riazan troops served to inflame the jealousy existing between their respective leaders. While the wardens of Polish occupation were being hemmed within the walls of the Russian citadel, Sigismund was steadily discharging his cannon against the battered bulwarks of Smolensk. On the 3rd of June a breach was effected and the city won. The voevoda Shein defended himself with a small body of men in a tower, and only surrendered on a promise of the King’s mercy. The mercy of Sigismund Vasa might be likened to the “gentle dew from Heaven” only in the sense of a tendency to rapid evaporation, and neither his sense of honour nor a regard for brave constancy came to the rescue; the man who had held his forces so long at bay was put to the torture and afterwards dispatched in fetters to a Lit’uanian prison. This besmirched victory was celebrated by a triumphant entry into Warszawa, graced by the presence, in the King’s train, of the befrocked and discrowned Tzar, Vasili Shouyskie. According to the Russian historians, who see the trail of Jesuit intrigue throughout the duration of the Troubles, this success of the Poles had the significance of a Papal triumph. “The success of Poland over Russia brought joy to all the Catholic world. In Rome festival succeeded festival.”197 Rome was thankful for small mercies in those days. The King found it easier to celebrate his victory than to follow it up by any vigorous action against the Russians who were in armed opposition to his son’s pretensions to the throne. The gosoudarstvo at this moment was in a state of bewildering chaos, and nowhere could be seen the elements of re-organisation. Around the Pole-held inner city of Moskva was quartered an army of some 100,000 men, strielitz, dieti-boyarins and their followings, and Don Kozaks, the whole under the separate leadership of three voevodas, Prokope Liapounov, Dimitri Troubetzkoi, and Zaroutzkie. Besides the personal jealousy which existed between the leaders, it was impossible to say what common cause, except the negative one of opposition to Vladislav, brought and held their forces together. There was not even a phantom to set against the claim of the Polish prince. It almost seems as if, like the Germans who nursed the legend that their Red King still slept in his Untersberg and would come forth with all his knights in the hour of his country’s greatest need, the Moskovites persistently hoped that the real Dimitri would at last emerge from his obscurity and give Russia once more an Orthodox sovereign. Beyond the immediate neighbourhood of the capital, confusion and uncertainty were naturally intensified; no town knew whom to acknowledge and could at most only defend itself against the attacks of the plundering bands which swarmed everywhere. The inhabitants of Velikie-Novgorod, in the midst of their indecision, were suddenly startled by the arrival before their gates of a Swedish army under de la Gardie, who demanded their allegiance to Karl, his king. 1611The old spirit of the Novgorodskie answered defiance to their old enemies, and the Swedes were held awhile in check; on the night of the 16th July, however, de la Gardie was admitted by treachery into the town, and effected his entrance so stealthily that the citizens first learned of the unexpected stroke by seeing the Swedish guards patrolling the walls. After a faint attempt at resistance the city submitted with as good grace as was possible to the Swedish occupation, and swore fealty to Karl-Filip, the King’s second son, as their sovereign. Meanwhile the army around Moskva showed serious signs of breaking up in confusion. A forged letter, supposed to have been concocted by the Poles, calling upon the Moskovites to destroy the Kozaks and signed with the name of Liapounov, was found in Zaroutzkie’s camp. Despite his denial of the authorship, the enraged Kozaks hewed the voevoda down with their sabres, a deed which increased the ill-feeling and distrust with which the country people and citizens regarded them.
In this deplorable condition did the waning of the year find the Russian land; the capital in the hands of the Polish enemy, its outskirts and slobodas infested with scarcely more welcome Kozaks; Smolensk and the towns of the Sieverski country held by Poles; bands of Poles and Dniepr Kozaks ravaging and slaying in the western villages; Great Novgorod, Ladoga, and the cities of the Finnish Gulf in Swedish thrall; freebooters and robber gangs everywhere. To crown all, there descended on the stricken inhabitants a winter of frightful severity, and many of the homeless outcasts died of cold and hunger in the roads and fields.
S. Solov’ev; Kostomarov; Iz Istorie Moskvui; Pierling.
183 Kto bull pervie Ljhedimitrie? S. Petersburg, 1864.
184 A. Karzinkina, O medalyakh Tzarya Dimitriya Ioannovitcha (Ljhedimitriya I.) Moskva, 1889.
185 S. Solov’ev, Karamzin.
186 Le père Pierling, Rome et Demetrius.
187 S. Solov’ev; Kostomarov; Le père Pierling; V. N., Iz Istorie Moskvui.
188 Karamzin.
189 Kostomarov.
190 S. Solov’ev.
191 Kostomarov.
192 S. Solov’ev.
193 Istoritcheskoe Opisanie sviatotroitzkiya Sergievui Lavrui.
194 Kostomarov.
195 S. Solov’ev.
196 Iz Istorie Moskvui.
197 Kostomarov.
CHAPTER XI
“THIS SIDE THE HILL”
In the midst of Russia’s direst despondency, when the throne of Monomachus was empty and the lawful Patriarch starving in prison, and when the tombs and temples of Moskva’s sacred past were profaned by the unhallowed presence of strangers and heretics, within the scarred walls of the Troitza the lamp of Orthodoxy and national independence was kept steadily burning. The hegumen Dionosie, as bitter a foe of Catholicism as any of the Reformers who were convulsing Western Europe in their struggle with Rome, ceased not to call to his fellow-Russians to unite against the foreign enemy, and save alike the true religion and the empire. Like the cry of the figurative pelican re-echoing through the wilderness, the warlike summons from the Troitza passed along the wasted land; and met at length with response. The city of Nijhnie-Novgorod, advantageously situated at the confluence of the Volga with the Oka, had, since the reduction of Kazan and the decline of the Tartar power, advanced greatly in prosperity and importance. At a moment when Moskva, Velikie-Novgorod, and Novgorod-Sieverski were in alien hands the eastern city stood forth with enhanced prominence as the rallying-point of Russian freedom, and it was here that the exhortations and entreaties of the Troitza hegumen were most effective. As was usual in times of popular commotion, visions and portents were not wanting, and the religious enthusiasm of the people was wrought up to a high pitch. The anger of heaven,