Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1874-12-17

! IN the dungeons of the fortress. His
share OF amusement, and they wandered
from street to street during the day,
! Furnishing with their hatchets such dis
! loyal people as they encountered. They
were moderate in their indulgences, how
ever, in imitation of their sovereign,
doubtless, and it is recorded to their
credit that at this time they rarely ever
killed more than twenty people in one
day, while sometimes the number was
| low as FIVE.
But quiet life of this kind could not
always content the Car. Naturally, he
grew tired of individual killings, and be-
gan to long for some more exciting sport.
When one day quarrel arose between
some of his guards and few of the peo-
pie of Torjek, Ivan saw at glance that
all the inhabitants of Trojek were mutt
nous rebels, and of course it became his
duty to put them all to death, which he
straightway did.
Up to this time the genius of Ivan
seems to have been cautiously feeling its
way, and so the part of his history al
ready sketched may be regarded as a
mere preliminary to his real career. His
| extraordinary capacity for ruling an
empire on the principles taught him by
the Prince Gluisky was now about to
show itself in all its greatness. A Grim
inal of Norgorod, feeling himself ag-
grieved by the authorities of that city,
who had incarcerated him for a time,
wrote letter offering to place
the city under Polish protection.
This letter he signed, not with
his own name, but with that of the
Archbishop, and instead of sending it to
the King of Poland, to whom it was ad-
dressed, he secreted it in the Church of
st. Sophia. Then going to Alexandrovs-
ky he told Ivan that treason was con
templated by the Novgorodians and that
the reasonable letter would be found
behind the statue of the Virgin in the
church. Ivan sent messenger to find
the letter and upon his return the Gar
Happening to pass through the town of
Khur on his way to Novgorod he put all
its inhabitants to death, with the purpose
doubtless of training his troops in the
art of wholesale massacre before requir
ing them to practice it upon the people
of Novgorod. Finding this system of
drill an agreeable pastime he repeated it
upon his arrival at the city of Twer, and
then, in order that the other towns along
his route might have no reason to com
plain of Partially, he bestowed upon all
of them a like manifestation of his i'm
perial regard.
1t is not my purpose to describe in de-
tail the elaborate and ingenious cruelty
practiced in the massacre Of the Novgo-
rodians. The story is sickening. Ivan
first heard mass and then began the
butchery, which lasted for many days,
was conducted with the utmost delibera-
ton and most ingenious cruelty, and
ended in the slaughter of 10000 people
Ivan had selected certain prominent cit
liens, to the number of several hundred
whom he reserved for public and partic-
ularly cruel execution at Moscow. Sum-
moning the small and wretched remnant
of the population to his presence he be-
sought their prayers for the continuance
and prosperity of his reign, and with
gracious words of farewell took his de-
parture from the murdered city.
The execution in Moscow of the re-
served victims was a scene too horrible
to be described in these pages. Indeed,
the half of VANS enormities may not be
told here at ALL and even the historians
content themselves with the barest
outlines of many parts of his ca
reer. He thought himself in some
sense a deity, and blasphemous-
ly asserted that his throne was sur
rounded by archangels precisely as
Gods is. Identifying himself with the
Almighty, he claimed exemption from
the observance of Gods laws, and in de-
fiance of the fundamental principles of
the Greek Church, of which he was the
head, he married seven wives. Believing
that he might with equal impunity insult
the moral sense of other nations, he
actually sought to add England's Queen,
Elizabeth, to the list Of his spouses.
And he was so far right in his estimate
of his power to do as he pleased that the
Virgin Queen, head of the English
| Church, while she would not herself be-
come one of his wives, consented to as
sist him, and selected for his eighth
cOnsort Mary Hastings, the daughter Of
the Earl of Huntington. She came near
bringing about marriage between the
two in face of the fact that the two
churches of which Ivan and she were
respectively head were agreed in con-
demning polygamy as heinous crime.
For one only of all his crimes Ivan
| showed regret, if not remorse. His old
| est and favorite son, when the city OF
Pskof was besieged by the Poles, asked
| that he might be intrusted with the COM
mand of body with which to assist the
beleaguered place. Ivan was so great a
| coward that he dared not trust the affeC-
ton and loyalty of even his own favorite
child, and in fit Of mingled fear and
rage he beat the young man to death
]