The historians of those days record that his memory was so remarkable that he could call all the officers of his army by name, and could even remember the name of every prisoner he had taken, numbering many thousands.  In those days of dim enlightenment, when the masses were little elevated above the animal, the popular mind was more easily impressed by material than intellectual grandeur.  It was then deemed necessary, among the unenlightened nations of Europe, to overawe the multitude by the splendor of the throne—­by scepters, robes and diadems glittering with priceless jewels and with gold.  The crown regalia of Russia were inestimably rich.  The robe of the monarch was of purple, embroidered with precious stones, and even his shoes sparkled with diamonds of dazzling luster.

When he sat upon his throne to receive foreign embassadors, or the members of his own court, he held in his right hand a globe, the emblem of universal monarchy, enriched with all the jeweled splendor which art could entwine around it.  In his left hand he held a scepter, which also dazzled the eye by its superb embellishments.  His fingers were laden with the most precious gems the Indies could afford.  Whenever he appeared in public, the arms of the empire, finely embroidered upon a spread eagle, and magnificently adorned, were borne as a banner before him; and the masses of the people bowed before their monarch, thus arrayed, as though he were a god.

Ivan IV. left two sons, Feodor and Dmitri.  Feodor, who succeeded his father, was twenty years of age, weak, characterless, though quite amiable.  In his early youth his chief pleasure seemed to consist in ringing the bells of Moscow, which led his father, at one time, to say that he was fitter to be the son of a sexton than of a prince.  Dmitri was an infant.  He was placed, by his father’s will, under the tutelage of an energetic, ambitious noble, by the name of Bogdan Bielski.  This aspiring nobleman, conscious of the incapacity of Feodor to govern, laid his plans to obtain the throne for himself.

Feodor was crowned immediately after the death of his father, and proceeded at once to carry out the provisions of his will by liberating the prisoners, abolishing the taxes and restoring confiscated estates.  He also abolished the body guard of the tzar, which had become peculiarly obnoxious to the nation.  These measures rendered him, for a time, very popular.  This popularity thwarted Bielski in the plan of organizing the people and the nobles in a conspiracy against the young monarch, and the nobles even became so much alarmed by the proceedings of the haughty minister, who was so evidently aiming at the usurpation of the throne, that they besieged him in his castle.  The fortress was strong, and the powerful feudal lord, rallying his vassals around him, made a valiant and a protracted defense.  At length, finding that he would be compelled to surrender, he attempted to escape in disguise.  Being taken a captive, he was offered his choice, death, or the renunciation of all political influence and departure into exile.  He chose the latter, and retired beyond the Volga to one of the most remote provinces of Kezan.