Page:Ivan the Terrible - Kazimierz Waliszewski - tr. Mary Loyd (1904).djvu/183

 Rh added to material distress. 'The men shaved off their beards,' so the chronicler tells us, '… and debauched their younger comrades.' The boïars, sitting in council at Moscow, devised none but the most frivolous expedients; they had the sacred relics carried in procession from the Cathedral of the Annunciation to the Cathedral of the Assumption; they sent water consecrated by these same relics to Sviajsk, together with an edifying instruction drawn up by the new Metropolitan, Macarius. Ivan and his closest counsellors felt something else must be done. The prestige of Moscow, the whole future of the Muscovite policy in the countries affected, were at stake. A blow must be dealt, this time, that would win the day, or else all hope of conquest must be relinquished, and the ancient yoke, maybe, assumed once more. Saïp, once grown bolder, would not yield again. The experience of past years proved the necessity for haste. On June 16, 1552, having made over a sort of regency to the Tsarina Anastasia, ordered the liberation of a great number of prisoners, and performed various other pious acts, in the hope of bringing down the heavenly benediction on his undertaking, Ivan set out with all the available forces remaining to him. Of the importance, composition, and quality of these forces, I shall now endeavour to give some approximate idea.

In this country, where the feudal system was unknown, the military organization of the period was, nevertheless, essentially feudal in all its features. In France, naught of such an organization remained, save the ban et l'arrière-ban—a small matter, some 2,000 or 3,000 men, little or nothing in presence of the regular and permanent forces, the real army of modern times. In Russia, Ivan was only beginning to form this new type of contingent, by giving it a nucleus in the shape of the corps called the Striéltsy, a name which appears for the first time in the course of the decisive campaign of 1552 against Kazan. The Striéltsy were arquebus-men (striélat, to fire), recruited from the free class, on a life engagement. Most of them were married men, and they ultimately formed a separate body in which the profession of arms was hereditary. They were armed and equipped in the European fashion, and each received a rouble to build himself a house, another rouble of yearly pay, uniform, powder, and some measures of flour and kacha. These arrangements having proved insufficient, the Government ended by giving land, and allowing the Striéltsy to pursue divers trades, subject to the performance of their military duties. This led to their being confused with