the Turks,
who were the great foe Christianity had most to dread, proposed that
the King of Poland, a renowned warrior, should be entrusted with the
supreme command of the Christian armies, and adroitly suggested to
Vassili, that Constantinople was the legitimate heritage of a Russian
monarch, who was the descendant of a Grecian princess; that it was
sound policy for him to turn his attention to Turkey; for Poland,
being a weaker power, and combined of two discordant elements, the
original Poland and Lithuania, would of necessity be gradually
absorbed by the growth of Russia.

Vassili hated the pope, because he had ordered _Te Deums_ in Rome, in
celebration of a victory which the Poles had obtained over the
Russians, and had called the Russians _heretics_. But still the bait
the pope presented was too alluring not to be caught at. In the
labyrinthine mazes of politics, however, there were obstacles to the
development of this policy which years only could remove.

Upon the death of Maximilian, Charles V. of Spain ascended the throne
of the German empire, and established a power, the most formidable
that had been known in Europe for seven hundred years, that is, since
the age of Charlemagne. Vassili was in the midst of these plans of
aggrandizement when death came with its unexpected summons. He was in
the fifty-fourth year of his age, with mental and physical vigor
unimpaired. A small pimple appeared on his left thigh, not larger than
the head of a pin, but from its commencement attended with
excruciating pain. It soon resolved itself into a malignant ulcer,
which rapidly exhausted all the vital energies. The dying king was
exceedingly anxious to prepare himself to stand before the judgment
seat of God. He spent days and nights in prayer, gave most
affectionate exhortations to all around him to live for heaven,
assumed monastic robes, resolving that, should he recover, he would
devote himself exclusively to the service of God. It was midnight the
3d of December, 1533. The king had just partaken of the sacrament of
the Lord's Supper. Suddenly his tongue was paralyzed, his eyes fixed,
his hands dropped by his side, and the metropolitan bishop, who had
been administering the last rites of religion, exclaimed, "It is all
over. The king is dead."

CHAPTER XII.

IVAN IV.--HIS MINORITY.

From 1533 to 1546.

Vassili At the Chase.--Attention To Distinguished Foreigners.--The
Autocracy.--Splendor of the Edifices.--S