Page:Ivan the Terrible - Kazimierz Waliszewski - tr. Mary Loyd (1904).djvu/351

 Rh from a Moscow prison after a detention lasting seven years, still further contributed to chill the Sovereign Pontiff's ardour. In 1576 a fresh attempt was made. The Pope's Nuncio, Laureo, driven out of Poland by the double election of Batory and Maximilian, conferred on German soil with the two Russian envoys, Sougorski and Artsybachev. The new Legate at the Emperor's Court, Cardinal Morone, had a hand in this negotiation, and, duly authorized by Gregory XIII., chose Rudolph Clenke, a man of learning, gifted with a strong constitution and an adventurous spirit, to bring about the long-wished-for agreement. But Poland was on the watch, and at the very last moment Maximilian objected to the departure of the chosen representative. In 1575, too, during Batory's first campaign, Laureo's successor, Caligari, renewed Portico's attempt, but with no better success.

Now it was the Tsar who took the first step. He deputed Leonti Istoma Chévriguine, known to foreigners as Thomas Severingen, to propose that very league against the Turks on which the Roman calculations, half political, half religious, were all based, and to set forth the preliminary condition he demanded. This condition was that the King of Poland should be advised, and if necessary forced, to make peace. On his way through Prague, where the Emperor gave him a somewhat chilly reception, Chévriguine entered into relations with the Papal Nuncio and the Venetian envoy. Doubt has been expressed as to whether he had any mission to the Republic at all. He certainly was not even acquainted with the Doge's titles, and believed Venice to be part of the Papal States. But on his way to Prague he had taken him two companions—a Livonian German, named Wilhelm Popler, and a Milanese Italian, Francese Pallavicini. These two men were better informed than he, and possessed a lively imagination as well. Attended by these acolytes, he proceeded to Venice, and presented the Doge with a letter from the Tsar, forged by himself, as Father Pierling believes ('Russia and the Holy See,' ii. 14, etc.), to constitute a claim on the liberality of the Signory, or fabricated at Rome, as Monsieur Ouspiénski supposes ('Relations of Rome with Moscow,' Journal of the Min. of Public Instruction, August, 1885), so as to ensure the association of the Republic with the missionary undertaking the Roman authorities were now hoping to initiate.

This improvised Ambassador does not seem to have made any very great effort. diplomatically speaking. He enjoyed the civilities heaped upon him, spoke in a general way of commercial relations which might be established, with a somewhat vague reference to the route by the Caspian and the