John Abbott - The Empire of Russia - From the Remotest Periods to the Present Time

These were dark and awful days. Horrible as war now is, it was then attended with woes now unknown. Gleb, prince of Minsk, with a ferocious band, attacked the city of Sloutsk; after a terrible scene of carnage, in which most of those capable of bearing arms were slain, the city was burned to ashes, and all the survivors, men, women and children, were driven off as captives to the banks of the Dwina, where they were incorporated with the tribe of their savage conqueror. In revenge, Monomaque sent his son Yaropolk to Droutsk, one of the cities of Gleb. No pen can depict the horrors of the assault. After a few hours of dismay, shriekings and blood, the city was in ashes, and the wretched victims of man's pride and revenge were conducted to the vicinity of Kief, where they reared their huts, and in widowhood, orphanage and penury, commenced life anew. Gleb himself in this foray was taken prisoner, conducted to Kief, and detained there a captive until he died.

Monomaque reigned thirteen years, during which time he was incessantly engaged in wars with the audacious nobles of the provinces who refused to recognize his supremacy, and many of whom were equal to him in power. He died May 19, 1126, in the seventy-third year of his age, renowned, say the ancient annalists, for the splendor of his victories and the purity of his morals. He was fully conscious of the approach of death, and seems to have been sustained, in that trying hour, by the consolations of religion. He lived in an age of darkness and of tumult; but he was a man of prayer, and, according to the light he had, he walked humbly with God. Commending his soul to the Saviour he fell asleep. It is recorded that he was a man of such lively emotions that his voice often trembled, and his eyes were filled with tears as he implored God's blessing upon his distracted country. He wrote, just before his death, a long letter to his children, conceived in the most lovely spirit of piety. We have space but for a few extracts from these Christian counsels of a dying father. The whole letter, written on parchment, is still preserved in the archives of the monarchy.

"The foundation of all virtue," he wrote, "is the fear of God and the love of man. O my dear children, praise God and love your fellow-men. It is not fasting, it is not solitude, it is not a monastic life which will secure for you the divine approval—it is doing good to your fellow-creatures alone. Never forget the poor. Take care of them, and ever remember that your wealth comes from God, and that it is only intrusted to you for a short time. Do not hoard up your riches; that is contrary to the precepts of the Saviour. Be a father to the orphans, the protectors of widows, and never permit the powerful to oppress the weak. Never take the name of God in vain, and never violate your oath. Do not envy the triumph of the wicked, or the success of the impious; but abstain from everything that is wrong. Banish from your hearts all the suggestions of pride, and remember that we are all perishable—to-day full of life, to-morrow in the tomb. Regard with horror, falsehood, intemperance and impurity—vices equally dangerous to the body and to the soul. Treat aged men with the same respect with which you would treat your parents, and love all men as your brothers.

"When you make a journey in your provinces, do not suffer the members of your suite to inflict the least injury upon the inhabitants. Treat with particular respect strangers, of whatever quality, and if you can not confer upon them favors, treat them with a spirit of benevolence, since, upon the manner with which they are treated, depends the evil or good report which they will take back with them to their own land. Salute every one whom you meet. Love your wives, but do not permit them to govern you. When you have learned any thing useful, endeavor to imprint it upon your memory, and be always seeking to acquire information. My father spoke five languages, a fact which excited the admiration of strangers.

"Guard against idleness, which is the mother of all vices. Man ought always to be occupied. When you are traveling on horseback, instead of allowing your mind to wander upon vain thoughts, recite your prayers, or, at least, repeat the shortest and best of them all: ' Oh, Lord, have mercy upon us.' Never retire at night without falling upon your knees before God in prayer, and never let the sun find you in your bed. Always go to church at an early hour in the morning to offer to God the homage of your first and freshest thoughts. This was the custom of my father and of all the pious people who surrounded him. With the first rays of the sun they praised the Lord, and exclaimed, with fervor, 'Condescend, O Lord, with thy divine light to illumine my soul.'"

The faults of Monomaque were those of his age, non vitia hominis, sed vitia sœculi ; but his virtues were truly Christian, and it can hardly be doubted that, as his earthly crown dropped from his brow, he received a brighter crown in heaven. The devastations of the barbarians in that day were so awful, burning cities and churches, and massacring women and children, that they were regarded as enemies of the human race, and were pursued with exterminating vengeance.

Monomaque left several children and a third wife. One of his wives, Gyda, was a daughter of Harold, King of England. His oldest son, Mstislaf, succeeded to the crown. His brothers received, as their inheritance, the government of extensive provinces. The new monarch, inheriting the energies and the virtues of his illustrious sire, had long been renowned. The barbarians, east of the Volga, as soon as they heard of the death of Monomaque, thought that Russia would fall an easy prey to their arms. In immense numbers they crossed the river, spreading far and wide the most awful devastation. But Mstislaf fell upon them with such impetuosity that they were routed with great slaughter and driven back to their wilds. Their chastisement was so severe that, for a long time, they were intimidated from any further incursions. With wonderful energy, Mstislaf attacked many of the tributary nations, who had claimed a sort of independence, and who were ever rising in insurrection. He speedily brought them into subjection to his sway, and placed over them rulers devoted to his interests. In the dead of winter an expedition was marched against the Tchoudes, who inhabited the southern shores of the bay of Finland. The men were put to death, the cities and villages burned; the women and children were brought away as captives and incorporated with the Russian people.

Mstislaf reigned but about four years, when he suddenly died in the sixtieth year of his age. His whole reign was an incessant warfare with insurgent chiefs and barbarian invaders. There is an awful record, at this time, of the scourge of famine added to the miseries of war. All the northern provinces suffered terribly from this frown of God. Immense quantities of snow covered the ground even to the month of May. The snow then melted suddenly with heavy rains, deluging the fields with water, which slowly retired, converting the country into a wide-spread marsh. It was very late before any seed could be sown. The grain had but just begun to sprout when myriads of locusts appeared, devouring every green thing. A heavy frost early in the autumn destroyed the few fields the locusts had spared, and then commenced the horrors of a universal famine. Men, women and children, wasted and haggard, wandered over the fields seeking green leaves and roots, and dropped dead in their wanderings. The fields and the public places were covered with putrefying corpses which the living had not strength to bury. A fetid miasma, ascending from this cause, added pestilence to famine, and woes ensued too awful to be described.

Immediately after the death of Mstislaf, the inhabitants of Kief assembled and invited his brother Vladimirovitch to assume the crown. This prince then resided at Novgorod, which city he at once left for the capital. He proved to be a feeble prince, and the lords of the remote principalities, assuming independence, bade defiance to his authority. There was no longer any central power, and Russia, instead of being a united kingdom, became a conglomeration of antagonistic states; every feudal lord marshaling his serfs in warfare against his neighbor. In the midst of this state of universal anarchy, caused by the weakness of a virtuous prince who had not sufficient energy to reign, Vladimirovitch died in 1139.