Russia in 1839 -Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia

338CORRESPONDENCE OF IVAN

Karamsin himself adds, " The Russians gloried in the very thing for which they were reproached by foreigners — a blind and unbounded devotion to the will of the monarch, even when, in his most insensate vagaries, he trampled all the laws of justice and humanity under his feet."

I am sorry I must not venture to multiply these curious quotations. I will, however, give one more illustration, in the correspondence of the Czar with one of his creatures.

" The Khan of the Crimea had taken prisoner a favourite of Ivan, Vassili Griaznoï, whom he offered to exchange for Mouzza Divy, a proposal which the Czar would not accept, although he lamented the fate of Griaznoï, and wrote him friendly letters, in which, as was his wont, he ridiculed the services of his unlucky favourite. 'You fancied,' he said, 'that it was as easy to make war with the Tartars as to make jokes at my table. They are very different people from you Russians. They do not go to sleep in the enemy's country; they do not constantly repeat to themselves, It is time to return home! What a droll idea came into your head when you thought you could make yourself pass for a great man ! It is true that, obliged to keep at a distance the perfidious boyards who surround us, we call near to our person slaves of low extraction like yourself, yet you must not forget your father and your grandfather. Do you dare to put yourself on a par with Divy ? Liberty would restore you to a voluptuous life, at the same time that it would put a sword into his hand against the Christians. It must suffice that, willing to protect such of our