Greek cross over them.

ARCHBISHOP.
The kiss of peace I bring you in the name
Of Father, Son, and of the Holy Ghost,
Proceeding from the Father!

OLGA.
Sir, we kiss
In humblest reverence thy paternal hand!
Command thy daughters!

ARCHBISHOP.
My mission is addressed to Sister Marfa.

OLGA.
See, here she stands, and waits to know thy will.

[All the NUNS withdraw.

ARCHBISHOP.
It is the mighty prince who sends me here;
Upon his distant throne he thinks of thee;
For as the sun, with his great eye of flame,
Sheds light and plenty all abroad the world,
So sweeps the sovereign's eye on every side;
Even to the farthest limits of his realm
His care is wakeful and his glance is keen.

MARFA.
How far his arm can strike I know too well.

ARCHBISHOP.
He knows the lofty spirit fills thy soul,
And therefore feels indignantly the wrong
A bold-faced villain dares to offer thee.
Learn, then, in Poland, an audacious churl,
A renegade, who broke his monkish vows,
Laid down his habit, and renounced his God,
Doth use the name and title of thy son,
Whom death snatched from thee in his infancy.
The shameless varlet boasts him of thy blood,
And doth affect to be Czar Ivan's son;
A Waywode breaks the peace; from Poland leads
This spurious monarch, whom himself created,
Across our frontiers, with an armed power:
So he beguiles the Russians' faithful hearts,
And lures them on to treason and revolt.
The Czar,
With pure, paternal feeling, sends me to thee.
Thou hold'st the manes of thy son in honor;
Nor wilt permit a bold adventurer
To steal his name and title from the tomb,
And with audacious hand usurp his rights.
Thou wilt proclaim aloud to all the world
That thou dost own him for no son of thine.
Thou wilt not nurse a bastard's alien blood
Upon thy heart, that beats so nobly; never!
Thou wilt--and this the Czar expects from thee--
Give the vile counterfeit the lie, with all
The righteous indignation it deserves.

MARFA (who has during the last speech subdued the most violent emotion).
What do I hear, archbishop? Can it be?
Oh, tell me, by what signs and marks of proof
This bold-faced trickster doth uphold himself
As Ivan's son, whom we bewailed as dead?

ARCHBISHOP.
By some faint, shadowy like