Mercy now entered his cell, but it was too late even for that angel visitant to bring a gleam of joy.  His friends were all dead.  His name was forgotten on earth.  He knew nothing of the world or of its ways.  His mind was enfeebled, and even the slender stock of knowledge which he had possessed as a child, had vanished away.  They broke off his chains and removed him from his dungeon to a comfortable chamber.  The poor old man, dazzled by the light and bewildered by the change, lingered joylessly and without a smile for a few weeks and died.  Immortality alone offers a solution for these mysteries.  “After death cometh the judgment.”

The Christian bishop, Joseph, and Ivan Belsky, the regent, in cordial cooeperation, endeavored in all things to promote prosperity and happiness.  Again there was a coalition of the Tartars for the invasion of Russia.  The three hordes, in Kezan, in the Tauride and at the mouth of the Volga, united, and in an army one hundred thousand strong, with numerous cavalry and powerful artillery, commenced their march.  The Russian troops were hastily collected upon the banks of the Oka, there to take their stand and dispute the passage of the stream.  By order of the clergy, prayers were offered incessantly in the churches by day and by night, that God would avert this terrible invasion.  The young prince, Ivan IV., was now ten years of age.  The citizens of Moscow were moved to tears and to the deepest enthusiasm on hearing their young prince, in the church of the Assumption, offer aloud and fervently the prayer,

“Oh heavenly Father! thou who didst protect our ancestors against the cruel Tamerlane, take us also under thy holy protection—­us in childhood and orphanage.  Our mind and our body are still feeble, and yet the nation looks to us for deliverance.”

Accompanied by the metropolitan Joseph, he entered the council and said,

     “The enemy is approaching.  Decide for me whether it be best that
     I should remain here or go to meet the foe.”

With one voice they exclaimed, “Prince, remain at Moscow.”

They then took a solemn oath to die, if necessary, for their prince.  The citizens came forward in crowds and volunteered for the defense of the walls.  The faubourgs were surrounded with pallisades, and batteries of artillery were placed to sweep, in all directions, the approaches to the city.  The enthusiasm was so astonishing that the Russian annalists ascribe it to a supernatural cause.  On the 30th of July, 1541, the Tartar army appeared upon the southern banks of the Oka, crowning all the heights which bordered the stream.  Immediately they made an attempt to force the passage.  But the Russians, thoroughly prepared for the assault, repelled them with prodigious slaughter.  Night put an end to the contest.  The Russians were elated with their success, and waited eagerly for the morning to renew the strife.  They even hoped to be able to cross the river and to sweep the camp of their foes.  The fires of their bivouacs blazed all the night, reinforcements were continually arriving, and their songs of joy floated across the water, and fell heavily upon the hearts of the dismayed Tartars.