Master of the Ceremonies came aboord our Ship to signify to the Ambassador from their Majesties the King and Queen Mother the satisfaction they received at his arrival But before he could deliver his Complement we escaped â—ery narrowly from being cast away For having weighed our anchors in the morning to take advantage of the wind that was something favourable the Pilot doubling a point to gain the greater benefit by it the Vessel on a sudden ran so near the Rocks the Pilot in a great fright was forced to tack immediately with all the dexterity he was able which was not so great but the Ship struck with her Poop as she was turning about But by the Grace of God it was done without any other mischief than a concussion that waked and affrighted too all that were then asleep in the Ship After this our Vessel was managed so well that at length we gained the point that was so near destroying us and came to anchor within a League of Stockholm At this time the Master of the Horse who was arrived the day before came aboord the Man of war â—o give an accompt to the Ambassador of his Voiage and amongst the rest of an accident â—efel one of his Coach-horses at Sea which â—e had ordered to be thrown over board beâ—ng fallen ill beyond any hopes of recovery â—n the mean time my Lord Ambassadors Lady â—eing big with child thought convenient to get a-shore assoon as she could The 8. of September the Ambassador made his Entry where he received all possible expressions of an Amity extraordinary True â—t is there was not that Bravery and Ceremony as at his Entry at Mosco but I dare affirm there was much more Sincerity Frankness and Decorum And whereas in that the Moscovites made demonstration only of their Grandeur and Vanity The Swedes in this made no other expression but of Kindness Civility Their Artillery which is so dreadful in the wars was become here the grateful Proclaimer of Peace and Affection nothing being to be heard about the Town for an hour together but the noise of their Cannon and great Guns For assoon as the Ambassador had left the ship and was entered with his Train into the Boats that were sent him by the King the Fregat gave us a whole round with his Cannon and whilst we were making for the shore they saluted him with many from land so that they made a very strange clattering amongst the Rocks As we past along we had the sight of a Diver that came up out of a place twenty fathoms deep into which they let him down out of a shallop with a Cord to look for the Guns of a Man of War that had been cast away there He was clad all in leather and sate under a certain Engine something like a bell in which he said himself he had space enough to breathe the water comming no higher than his breast After this we came to a Bridg covered over with Carpets of Tapestry at which place his Excellence was complemented from their Majesties by one of the principal Senators And from thence he was conveyed in the Kings Coach to a House set a part for Ambassadors Their Majesties having joyned several of their Gentlemen Pages and Footmen to his Train The Liveries my Lord Ambassador had in this place were new Liveries brought him with several other goods by Mr. Watson to Riga They were like those which they wore at Mosco of Scarlet cloth the King of Englands Colour but trimed up after another fashion according to the Mode at that time and in all points very rich and handsom Of the Ambassadors Residence at Stockholm HIs Excellence having spent but five weeks in this Town I shall not have many â—hings to speak upon occasion of this Embassy â—he principal end whereof was to declare in â—he behalf of the King of great Britain the â—incere desire his Majesty had to enter into a â—ricter correspondence with the King of Swedeâ—and But before we enter upon this subject â—t will not be inproper to premise a word or â—wo concerning this Court. The word Stockholm is properly the name of the Isle in which the City is built which â—sland is called Stockholm which signifies the â—sle of the Tronk or body of a Tree Holme â—ignifying an Iland and Stock the trunck of a Tree For the Capital City being burned of â—ld they which layd the foundation of this did it as they relate it in this manner They â—hrew the Trunck of a tree into the water and â—esolved that at what Island soever the same Trunck first rested in that place they would â—uild their Town and the Trunck resting in â—his place the Town was accordingly built â—here and called Stockholm as the Island also â—s The Town is very compact but even with â—he suburbs is not altogether so big as Roven â—n France The buildings are most of stone yet some also of wood Of the first sort there are several very magnificent and amongst them that of General Wrangel and the Chancellors There are some parts of the Town which being built off from the Island stand like parts of Venice upon piles so that the Sea flows under them The Palace hath nothing in it very remarkeable saving that it stands on the bank of the Sea and has a faire prospect of several Ships that ride hard by and the Kings Men of Warr amongst the rest But that which is most considerable in Stockholm is that in so cragged and unpleasant a place the people should be so courteous and friendly and that amongst so many Rocks and uninhabited Islands which are as so many fortresses to the Town we should find a Court so civil and benigne In Moscovie we had experience of the contrary where in a Country pleasant beautiful we found a people whose manner of living is very rude and austere Whereas here in a place that seems to be the very refuse of nature we found all manner of humanity and politeness Besides the peculiar language of the Country the nobility do with great industry addict themselves to the French and indeed they speak it as freely as if it were their own Their humor and manner of living has great affinity with the French also they are free and open hearted and no less affectors of Gallantry As for their Religion they follow as they do in Denmark the doctrine of Luther His Excellence being arrived at this Court â—e was for three days entertained at the â—harges of the Swedish King and on the third which was a Sunday he had Audience from his Majesty I shall not delay my self so much as to make any discription of their Ceremonies they being the same that are ordinarily used in other Courts of Europe This only 〈◊〉 shall say in relation to the person of the King that at that time he was not fully arrived at the ninth year of his age and yet was at that age indued with all the
arrived at Archangel from London had without question given us fair recommendation by the report they had published at this Town and thorough the whole Road to Mosco of the extraordinary Reception which had been given them by the King of great Britain Here I shall take the liberty of speaking something of the People called Samojedes upon occasion of some of them that we saw at Archangel They are of a Country very barbarous but under the Tzars dominion and of a long time instructed in the Religion of the Greeks Their Habitation is under the frozen Zone near the antient Scythia toward the Ryphean or Hyperborean Mountains which are next neighbours to Petzora which I have mentioned before The word Samojedes denotes what they have formerly been viz. Anthropophagi or such as eat mansflesh for Samojedes is composed of Sam which signifies ones self and Jeda which signifies to eat and indeed they did use to eat the bodies of their dead friends with Venison The Sun that robs them of his presence in their Contry five or six Months every year obligeth them to make provision in summer of whatever is necessary for their livelyhood in so tedious an obscurity against which they have no better remedy than the brightness of their lamps which are fed with a certain oyl drawn out of Fish It is reported that their houses are built half way under ground and that for their mutual conversation in winter they are forced to make trenches in stead of sheets and that in summer time they march out from their imprisonment at their Chimneys Their Common sustenance is Venison honey or a certaine fish dried in the Wind or the Sun without any bread at all They wear a Kind of Vest half way down their legs which they make of Buck skins or the skins of Rein Deer with the Furrs turned outwards These Vests have no other parts open than the bottom by which they get into them and the upper part where they put out their face for they cover the head with it as the Capuchinos do but the cap has the same fashion with the head of a Man At the end of their sleevs they have their Muffs Sown half on that they may have it at their choice to make use of them or let them hang loose as they have occasion They wear Bootes but with the Furr on the outside which Garb appears so horrid that it is a hard matter at first sight not to be frighted to see them habited in furs like savage Beasts Under their Vests they wear shirts made of the skins of young Reine Deer which are much softer than linnen and under those shirts Drawers They use also a very large sort of Bonnets which hang down round about their shoulders and are commonly made of cloth and lined with furr Their Stature is but low their Faces flatt and broad like the Tartars and their Hair long Two or three of these Samojedes were brought to his Excellency with whom he entertained himself for some time with several questions which he askt them touching their manner of living He had the diversion also to see them dance after the mode of their Country which was the most ridiculous in the World The Preparation his Excellence made for his Voiage up the River consisted of six barges or great boates for his train and baggage of which one was set apart for his Kitchin and a hearth and Chimney contrived in it and an other for his Coach horses Besides these six there was one Barque peculiar to the Pristaff who resolved to carry his wife along with him The day of our departure being at hand his Excellence and all his Gentlemen provided themselves with gowns and coats lined with furr some of martin others of sables beaver fox or squirell to defend themselves from the severity of the Cold which was sufficiently increased at Archangel when we arrived there The most of them bought Caps lined with furr according to the Polonian fashion some bought also their Caps like the Samojedes others for curiosity sake bought whole suits ready made which cost them but about ten shillings The Governor of the Town also would needs give us supplyes against the Winter and present most of my Lord Ambassadors domesticks with Sheep skins drest after the fashion of Moscovie and some fair Buck skins to ly upon instead of quilts Of his Excellencies Voiage from Archangel to Vologda upon the Rivers of Duina and Sucagna ON Saturday the twelfth of September his Excellence departed from Archangel with all his Train and came the next day to Colmogro and on the nineteenth to Arsinoa which is two hundred and fifty Versts every Verst being the fourth part of a League from Archangel On the two and twentieth we parted from Arsinoa and on the seven and twentieth arrived at Yagrish one hundred and thirty long Versts and from Yagrish to Vstiga which is one hundred and fifty Versts in five days The third of October we left Vstiga which is almost half way betwixt Archangel and Vologda and on the twelfth arrived at Tetma which from Vstiga is two hundred and fifty Versts From thence in three days we came to Chousca one hundred and forty Versts and on Saturday the seventeenth of October we arrived at Vologda which is ninety Versts from Chousca So as this Voiage of two hundred and fifty Leagues took us up five weeks compleat in the Relation of which I shall first speak something in general concerning the manner of our Navigation We made no use of Horses for the haleing our Barques from Archangel to Vologda but notwithstanding it was up the River we performed all with men so that ordinarily we had no less than three hundred with us The River is not very rapid but in certain places where we were sometimes constrained to imploy the Water-men of two boats for drawing up a single one against the opposition of the stream But his Excellence fearing and not without reason the River would freez before we could finish our Voiage he entreated the Pristaf Bogdan to go before that we might have fresh watermen ready at our arrival in every relay that all necessary provisions being provided before hand we might have no occasion lo lose our time But this care was very ill seconded by our Pilots who ran us several times upon ground so that sometimes we spent two or three hours in disengaging a boat from the Rocks And sometimes we received so horrible concussions that it was a wonder the barque was not broke to pieces under us and this gave one occasion to say that peradventure the Boats did break the Rocks In the night time ordinarily the Boat-men made fires in the Woods as if they would have set all Moscovie on fire and when they had done laid themselves down by it to sleep very civilly upon the banks of the River We had alwaies very good provision of Victuals and especially of strong Waters of Wine Mead and Quaz
the Examples of other Countries which have lived and do live under the same maxime The Lacedaemonians amongst others who gloried and boasted that they lived under the greatest liberty were subject notwithstanding to this Law forbidden any Commerce with forreign Nations Whereas the Muscovites are permitted to Traffick with them in their own Country Which gives me some hopes they will in time leave off that rustick and barbarous humor which is so natural to them and learn by degrees to live with more civility for they are already delighted with the Conversation of forreign Merchants and do please themselves very much in their manner of living And were they under a gentler Government and had a free Trade with every body no doubt but this Nation would in a short time be taken with our civility and decent way of living But this maxime that we do now discourse of has no less effect towards the maintenance of their Religion than their civil Customes and is so exactly observed that the very Strangers themselves that have entred into the service of the Tzar or have otherwise embraced their Religion are not exempt from it For to have made himself a servant to the Great Duke is to have made himself his Slave and to have taken up his Religion is to have abandoned his own Country and to be always confined within the Limits of Muscovie In short by this Policy it may be easily imagined the Muscovites understand little of Navigation seeing they exercise it so little and indeed they know no other Compass than the Earth nor do any of them except some few fisher-men expose themselves to the Sea and they no farther than within sight of the Shore The Second Maxime the Tzars make use of for maintaining the Policie of their Estate is That they marry no forreign Princesses nor look out any farher for a Wife than their own proper Slaves The other Princes of Europe who are solicitous of nothing but the good and happiness of their Subjects do comport themselves cleer otherwise they marry themselves with forreign Ladies for the Alliance of their Nations and in order to establish a reciprocal and perpetual Amitie betwixt them for the benefit of both By which means they avoid the insolence of their Wives Relations which is almost inevitable where a Prince takes a Wife out of his own Subjects Moreover it is certainly more honourable and more worthy the Majestie of a King to espouse a Princess that is not of the number of his Subjects uniting and mingling as it were their Crowns as well as their blood to produce a Posterity perfectly Royal. Whereas to take a Wife from that infinite distance which there is betwixt a King and a Subject to join her to the Crown to descend from his Throne as it were to raise her up thither who perhaps is very unfit for so great an elevation is no less than to prostitute and debase the Majestie of a Monarch Yet amongst the Tzars of Moscovy it is very usual lest by introducing a foreign Princess she should bring some new Customes along with her which in time might cause some alteration in the State And from hence it was that this present Tzar vouchsafed on Shrove-Sunday 1647. which was then the seventeenth year of his Age and the second of his Reign to marry the eldest Daughter of Ilia-Danilovitz Miloslausky a person at that time in no excellent Condition for to speak properly there was nothing but the Beauty of his Daughter to induce the Tzar to honour him with so great a Relation The Third Maxime by which their Policie and Religion is preserved is their Ignorance of Learning which is so well established in this Country that they never learn farther than to write and read their own Language And indeed Experience doth teach us this truth that Seditions and Revolutions have not been any where so frequent as in Commonwealths where Learning was commonly in great esteem and even when it triumphed most The reason of which is plain forasmuch as Ambition and Pride march alwaies in the Rear of great Knowledge whereas Ignorance as is evident amongst the Peasants and common People every where renders them more supple and obedient And this Valentian and Licinius Emperors of Rome had experience of when they termed Learning the Plague and Poison of a Kingdom Lycurgus was not far from this opinion when he establisht Ignorance in his Republique And we see at this day the greatest Enemy of Christendom triumphing partly by vertue of this Maxime over all the Monarchs of this Age. The Tzars of Muscovie also find great benefit by this Policy which conduces much to the easie Conservation of Obedience in their Subjects towards their Soveraign Empire So that the Muscovites have this advantage that they quietly enjoy their apprehensions of Nature as they are at first sight represented to their sense or their reasons without any scandalous Imputation of Ignorance They do not trouble themselves with the heighth of the Heavens nor the greatness of the Earth whether the Sun as Anaximenes thought be as flat as a Trencher or whether it be hunch backed underneath like a Cockboat as Heraclitus held or whether it be round or square They disturb not their heads with the dimensions of the Moon to know whether she be hung loose in the Air or inhabited or not whether the Stars be but Earth Muminated as Thales maintained or whether perfect fire as Plato They leave Nature to it self and think it sufficient to know who is its Author to discover the use of things by experience and to give God thanks as they are able They amuse not themselves to make Syllogismes after the Model of Barbara or of Festino to dispute whether Logick be an Art or Science nor to determine sundry other curious and impertinent questions which though of no use but to molest and torture the brain are yet at this day amongst the learned people in great practice and use upon a meer principle of Curiosity Ambition or Interest In stead of Books the Muscovites use Rolls of Paper as the Jews did sometimes they glue every leaf together by the ends with a certain Glue they have out of Siberia a Province of the Tzars which they moisten only with the end of their tongue and drawing it upon the Edges of the two leaves they are to joyn they put the Edges upon one another which fasten so close it is scarce perceivable where they are joyned and in this manner they make Rolls sometimes of seven or eight Fathoms long Furthermore amongst the Magistrates that Govern Muscovie in their Councel of State there are in the first place thirty Noblemen or Boiars so properly called which the Tzar obliges to be Resident in Mosco After them there be the a Ockolnitz that is to say a Privy Councellor Ockolnitz the b Dumeny Duorainy signifies the same Office but in lower degree Dumeny Duorainy the Sin Boyarsky the Chancellor two
Secretaries of State There are six appartements in the Councel of the Great Duke the first is designed for forraign affairs the second for Military the third for the Exchequer and the Treasury of the Tzar the fourth for receiving the Accounts of his Factors and such as have the Superintendance of the Taverns the fifth for Civil Processes and the sixth for Criminals Their Councel is commonly held in the Night and the Tzar changes the Governours of his Provinces every three Years There is no room for subtilties or wrangling in this Country they dispatch their Suits in a short time according to the plainness and paucity of their Laws So that the Atturneys and Sollicitors are there of as little use and concernment as the Philosophers Amongst other punishments that they use they have one they call Battoki which has much affinity with that which God ordained in the time of Moses for the people of Israel as appears in the 25. Chapter of Deuteronomy They strip the condemned person to his Shirt e. g. for having been the Author of some Riot pilfering or some other such small crime as is not worthy of death Who then laying himself flat upon his Belly on the ground there are two Men placed on each side of him which give him as many blows with a Cudgel one after another as the Judge that presides does condemn him to sixteen twenty or thirty more or less according to the quality and proportion of the offence he has committed And as soon as his accompt is made up he rises and makes his reverence to the person that condemned him Not much unlike the Persians who after correction returned and gave their King thanks for his great Bounty in remembring them The Muscovites use this kind of Chastisement in their private Families also especially the Nobility who have commonly great store of Slaves who without respect of their Society are oftentimes constrained to beat one another till the blood follows They have another sort of punishment with a Whip which is much crueller and inflicted by the hands of the Executioner when the correction is publique The Whip is made of the skin of an Elke cut into several thongs which pierces the skin in such manner that at the very first lash it oftentimes leaves bloody impressions behind it their Capital punishment which they use commonly for those that are condemned to die scutting off their heads and to extort Evidences they use the Strapado As for their Money they have but one kind which they call Copeca fifty of which make a Crown 't is of Silver of an Oval figure and so small that the value of two Crowns will scarce bear the bulk of four pence in French Deniers that which they call Muscofske is the fourth part of a Copeca Poluske is the half an Alim is three pence a Grifna is ten a Rouble a hundred but these are not to be had of one piece There are two things further remarquable in the commune Society of the Moscovites one is that they begin their day at the rising of the Sun and end it at the setting so that their Night begins as soon as the Sun is down and ends when it rises By which means they confound that which we call the Natural day with the Artificial which extends it self from the rising to the setting of the Sun The other is that they begin their Year the first day of September as allowing no other Epoche than from the Creation of the World which they believe was in Autumn And they reckon according to the opinion of the Greeks five thousand five hundred and eight Years from the Creation of the World to the Nativity of our Saviour whereas we accompt but three thousand nine hundred and sixty nine So that in the Year of our Lord 1663 when we arrived in Moscovie they reckoned 7175 Years from the Creation whilst we accounted but 5686. Every first day of the Year they have great Processions in their considerable Townes And thus far we have given you the Policie or publique Comportment of the Moscovite in the World I shall now give you some hints of their Religion The Religion of the Russes is the same with the Profession of the Greeks they follow their Faith their Rites and their Ceremonies The principal part of their Devotion after they are Baptized consists in the Invocation of their Saints For every Family hath its Saint pictured and hung up against the wall of the Chamber with a small wax Candle before it which they light when they make their Invocations Their Churches also are all adorned with Pictures very ill drawn and in flat painting for they will endure no bâ— ages embost Over the Porch of their Churches in their Market places and over the Gates of their Cities they have alwaies the picture of the Virgin Mary or their Patron St. Nicholas And amongst them these Images are in such Veneration that all that pass that way make a stand for a while before them till they have made Reverences to them five or six times one after another which is performed by crossing themselves with three Fingers of their right Hand and by saying with a low voice Gospodi Pomilui which is as much as to say God have mercy on me They do address themselves with the same Veneration and Prayers to the Crosses they meet by the way so that they are observed to stop themselves every moment And these profound Reverences to their Images and the signing themselves with the Cross at the same time and crying Gospodi Pomilui is almost all the Devotions the Parents do teach their Children When a Moscovite enters into another Man's house he first looks about for the Saint and having paid his Reverence there he turns about and salutes the Family When they buy any of these Images they take great caution of saying they have bought them but choose rather to say they have changed them for Silver When they grow old or rotten they either bury them with some Ceremonie or throw them into some River and expose them to the mercy of the Current In short the sign of the Cross is so usual amongst them that they are perpetually at it and do make it the ordinary preface of all their civil Actions On Sundays and their Festival days they go three times to Church Morning Noon and Evening and are standing and uncovered all the time of Divine service for which reason they have neither benches nor seats in their Churches The most devout enter not into the Church but perform their devotion at the door amongst the Women who being lookt upon as more impure than the Men have not so easie an admission as they A person who that day hath had knowledge of his Wife ought not to enter into the Church till he hath washed himself and put on a clean shirt They have no preaching amongst them so that their whole Service consists in the reading of certain Psalmes or Chapters in
of which we laded a barque at Archangel to serve us the whole Voiage The Barque which we had made our Kitchin furnished all the rest with meat and in particular his Excellencies by getting them close one to another in such a manner that those that were in the Ambassador's Vessel received the dishes from the hands of the Cooks to carry them two or three steps to his Table Whereas the other boats were glad to make use of their skifs to fetch their provision dayly In this Voiage Walking was our greatest Recreation for whilst our barques were drawn by the men and advanced but a small pace we went a-shore in our skifs The Shadows and Umbrages which the continual Forests cast upon the River the excellent Verdure wherewith they were adorned all the way together with the favourableness of the Weather invited us to it and many times made us lose all sense of weariness sometimes also we had the diversion of Shooting by reason of the many wild Ducks and Pigeons that Moscovie is provided with In short we saw never a Town considerable enough to have any particular Description Vstiga which is the principal in a Province of that name is the greatest we saw but it is built of wood as the rest are and paved only with piles of Firr True it is here we had now and then liberty to see their Churches which in Mosco they will not permit to Strangers of another Religion for they believe them profaned when any such set their feet in them Betwixt Archangel and Vstiga we saw several Rocks of Alabaster or white Marble as we passed upon the River This being the manner of our Voiage it remains now that we present you with some circumstances that happened in our Navigation And first of all it was usual as we past by any Village to have the Priest come to his Excellencies boat with a present of Fish autumnal Goose-berries or sometimes a Hen with some few Eggs in hopes of receiving some reward from the Ambassador And drinking Aqua vitae which they gusled down with so much pleasure they commonly went home again drunk The next day after we parted from Archangel the Pristaf brought his Wife into the Ambassadors barque She was very richly dressed with Pearls and precious Stones and had she not been painted might have past for very handsom however his Excellence vouchsafed to honour her with a Salute and entertained her with great Civility presenting her according to the custome of the place with a Cup of Aqua vitae till Dinner came in Within a little time after she was unhappily deprived of her Husband for being arrived at Vstiga he found himself seised with a distemper which in a short time ended both his Life and Voiage Being arrived near Arsinoa the Ambassador expecting to have found boat-men ready for his departure was constrained himself to provide them after he had attended three whole days The Governour of this Town had had advertisement from the Governour of Archangel to have all things ready in good time and the like notice he had also from the Pristaf but he despised all and ranted as if he had been in a frenzy against all such as were employed in the business resolving the Ambassador should go back if he pleased rather than he would be troubled with any thing So that his Excellence was necessitated at his own proper charges to hire some of the Water-men that had brought us from Colmogro to carry us to Yagrish and to engage the rest at Arsinoa In the mean while we saw a Wolf upon the bank of the River running up and down which some fancied was the Governour dressed in that disguise to take a view of the Ambassador and his train We clapt some dogs after him immediately but he ran the foile so cunningly that we lost him in a moment On the 26. of September at Night there was an unlucky accident befel fifteen of our boat-men who put themselves in a huddle into a skif to come to one of the barques and falling down the River suffered their boat to be carried away by the stream with that violence that it fell foul upon one of the barques and was overturned and seven of the fifteen were drowned the rest saving themselves by swimming Another time one of our water-men fell off the Decks into the River and having no skill in swimming he was in the greatest danger of the World But as he was just sinking a Boat was presently dispatched which took him up and after he had drunk two or three good draughts of strong Waters he found himself very well again Which made me imagine that had the water of the River been Aqua vitae he would have thought they had done him a great injury to preserve him and would rather have chose to have died with that plenty than to have lived in want of it About this time also we received the News that Archangel was burnt and almost all reduced into ashes presently after our departure The Governor of Vstiga expressed great Civilities to my Lord Ambassador and was clearly of another humour than the Governor of Arsinoa yet it was without violating a Custom they have to see no forreign Ambassadors themselves Neverthelesse he tendred his service and all that he was able to do by one of his Gentelmen and provided us abundantly with all things necessary for our Voiage by the means of two honest Officers which he deputed Pristaffs in the place of Bogdan lately deceased For this reason his Excellence would not depart from thence till he had made him some acknowledgment and presented him by one of his Gentlemen with three douzain bottels of Canary and French wine We stayed only two days in this Town and from thence made all possible hast because the Rever began to be frozen At this time every of our barques having two Masts one for our Sayles and another for our Ropes we were fain to cut our Sayls Mast to make our barques the lighter for betwixt Vstiga and Vologda they cannot in those large Boats upon the River Sucagna which runs into the Duina hard by make use of their Sayles by reason of the great number of Rocks betwixt Vstiga and Tetma His Excellence to lighten his Vessel yet more left there a hundred Ingots or Rigs of lead for notwithstanding it was still haled with threescore and ten men it nevertheless went the most heaviely of them all because of its bulk and freight For besides seven or eight boatmen who guided it there were always aboard the same thirty persons besides a great quantity of Goods which was the cause that several in that Vessel were very narrowly lodged This Lead above-mentioned was designed amongst the rest of the presents for the Tzar which the King of England sent him and for that purpose was brought to his Excellence a little after our arrival at Vologda And now by this time the Winter was so farr advanced that our Voiage
these Ceremonies and the slowness of our march took up so much time that the night overtook us before we could enter the Town our frequent stoppings and pawses having consum'd above three houres in going of about two miles Therefore because the Sun had withdrawn himself before we were ready to appear in the Town the Citizens had made great fires in their streets and provided great numbers of torches to render every thing visible about his Excellence so that the night as well as the day did seem to participate in the Glory of this Entry And the pretious stones darting about the rays of their refulgency made the clearness of the night in some respect more majestique than the brightness of the day not to mention the multitudes of people wherewith the streets were filled and the houses covered in all places where we passed every one clambring up here and there to behold this Magnificence The Tzar the great Dutchess and the young Princes also would needs be Spectators now as they had disposed themselves to be the day before But to the end they might see all without being perceived themselves they made choice of a place near the Gate of the Brick Wall whither they had ordered a great number of Wax-tapers to be sent And here the Moscovian Trumpets all stopt to sound at the time as the Ambassador past the Gate and was entred into the Town which was exactly performed but with so confused a noise it might very well be compared to that which the Geese made in the Capitol whilst the Gauls were climbing over the Walls After this terrible alarm which we were altogether surprised with under pretence of some little accident they made a stop for about half a quarter of an hour to the end the Tzar might at his leisure observe the whole Pomp and indeed the great number of Wax-Tapers which they had disposed of each side of the Gate discovered the design clear enough At length when his Majestie was satisfied with viewing the Magnificence of his Excellences Train he was conducted to the House which they had prepared for him the Moscovian horse trouping thorough the Town in a huddle without observing any order at all in their march From the Gate of the Town we past thorow the Tzars Guards which were drawn up on both sides of the streets from thence to the House where we lay Of the Ambassadors Residence at Mosco THere are three things which principally recommend themselves to our Consideration in this place Our manner of Living whilst we were here The Ambassadors Negotiation And some Circumstances that happened during our Residence at Mosco Of which City it is necessary to give a precedent Description for the better comprehension of what followeth The City of Mosco hath the same inconvenience with the other Towns in Moscovie which is that it is built like them with Wood some princiâ—â—â— Houses excepted Instead of being paved they have only great pieces of Firr laid close together and cross the Streets When we were there its figure was almost Circular and at least four leagues in Cirumference but being much subject to Fire its form and extent doth not continue long in the same condition True it is their Streets are broad enough and from place to place there are certain Intervals left to break off and cease the fury of the Fire but the materials of their Houses being so combustible they have much ado to prevent its progress All the remedy they have is to pull down the Houses that are next to the end that by taking away the matter that should nourish it they may give the flame more room to extinguish But this not alwaies succeeding especially if the wind be high it happens sometimes that they see a great part of the Town in ashes in a very short space This Town hath three Walls one of Brick another of Stone a third of Wood separating the four quarters of the Town which are called Cataigorod Tzargorod Scoradom and Strelitza Sloboda The Brick-wall divides Cataigorod from the rest of the Town that of Stone belongs to Tzargorod and the Wooden one serves as Ramparts and Bastions to Strelitza Sloboda which is properly the quarter of the Strelitz or Musqueteers of the Tzars Guards Amongst the Rivers that pass by this City Mosca is a fair one which gives it its Name it rises in the Province of T were and loseth it self in the Volga where the same joines with the River Occa not far from Columna Besides these there are the Neglina and the Yagusa two little Rivers which run by the City and fall into the River Mosca But that which is the greatest Ornament to this City besides the Rivers I have named is the great number of Churches and Chappels which they have there together with the Tzars Castle which is called Cremelena Their Churches are generally of stone arched of a round form They are a great Ornament to the Town by reason of their steeples which are covered over with Lattin whose glittring seemes to redouble the brightness of the Sun As to the number of Churches Chappels in Mosco they are reckoned about two thousand The Tzars Castle is of that greatness that it is about two miles in Circumference There is in it a very fair Pallace of Stone built after the Italian fashion and another of Wood which the Tzar chuses to reside in as the more healthful of the two The Patriarch also and several Boyars have their Houses of Stone within this Castle besides two Covents one of Moncks and the other of Nuns There are also a great number of Churches and Chappels of Stone and amongst the rest one dedicated to St. Michael in which the Tombs of the Tzars are placed All the Steeples of these Churches are covered with Copper which the heat of the Sun hath burnished into a great resemblance of Gold but upon one of these Steeples there stands a Cross which is of massie Gold We saw there a Bell which was made some years since by a Moscovite of that prodigious bigness that fifty men might very well stand within it It is about nine fathoms in circumference which by consequence is three in diameter When we came first to Mosco it was upon the ground in a base Court where it was cast and during the four moneths and a half we remained there all they could do was to raise it though but a little from the ground with intention to build a Steeple for it in the same place The Fortifications of the Castle are also very considerable for besides that it is very well planted with Canon there is a large Ditch and three very strong Walls about it Some of our company that had the curiosity to survey this Ditch as they past over the bridg were desired by the Moscovites to march on and not trouble themselves with surveying their Works There are moreover in Mosco a great number of Greeks of Persians and especially of
Tartars but they admit no Jews The Greeks of all Strangers are most wellcome to them as being in many things conformable with them but particularly in matters of Religion The Protestants and Lutherans are well received also and have all of them liberty to hold publique Assemblies for the Exercise of their Religion which is not permitted to the Roman Catholicks for whom they have a particular aversion But to the end that forreign Christians may live together with more liberty there is a Sloboda or great Suburb without the Town where most of them live according to their own way And in this place it is the Germans English Hollanders and Polonians do most commonly reside The House we were lodged in in this Town was a large building of Stone no great distance from the Castle and one of the most commodious to be found The Chambers were all arched every window had its shutters of iron and every passage-door was also of iron which gave one occasion to say we were certainly in the iron Age though otherwise it be a mettle rare enough in that Country Our Chambers were most of them hanged with Serge or red Cloth and instead of chairs we had benches covered over with the same stuff without any Beds or other necessary accommodations besides tables and furnaces for the Winter Amongst the rest of the Rooms there were two great Hals one of them in which the Canopie of State was set up we made use of as our Chappel on those days wherein we had Sermons of the other for a Quarter for seven or eight of our Gentlemen who were constrained at their arrival to make their several lodgings distinct from one another For when he who had the charge of preparing the House was advertised that the Ambassador's Gentlemen could not lye crowded together as in a Hospital and that this manner of living would be very strange and incommodious to them he answered jestingly that it was best for them to lye together lest the Rats should run away with them being single Which Answer put some of us on a sudden upon a desire to know if the Rats were so big at Mosco for my part I imagined for the doing of such an exploit every Rat ought to be as big as two Boyars However we saw we had great reason to be impatient at Vologda for our arrival here where we had all that could be expected in this Country Our Publique devotion which had been suspended in our Travails was regulated here as at Vologda and at Easter we had a Communion We had moreover the diversion of seeing the Town and to visit our Friends in the Sloboda where his Excellence himself was sometime treated by the Merchants But this freedom was so regulated and restrained that for the four first days we were shut up close in our House and not permitted to stir abroad before the Audience They would suffer no Strangers to come near us nor could the Ambassador prevail that the English Merchants Wives might have access to his Lady It is true after the Ambassador's Audience we had liberty to go abroad but then for two or three moneths we were obliged to take some of the Tzar's Guards along with us which followed us armed with their half-pikes for which end there were commonly fifty of them attending us keeping their guards at the Gate and examining almost every one that came in The Ambassador himself was not permitted to stir unless he had a Pristaf with him and was attended with a Company of Strelits Whereby it happened that the Ambassador one day after a long expectation of the Pristaf who seemed to neglect him being upon the point of going abroad in his Coach without him the footmen running before as if they would have passed out of the Gate the Strelits stood immediately to their armes to hinder them which they did till the Pristaf was pleased to come and accompany the Ambassador None of the Boyars could have the sight of his Excellence in his House unless he was sent by the Tzar it being almost a Capital offence for any person of quality whatsoever to have any kind of Conference with an Ambassador without his leave Hunting which was our great divertisement at Vologda was the least of our recreations here but assoon as the snow was melted and the spring arrived we fell immediately to making of Horse-matches There was a challenge also betwixt twelve of our Company to play at Foot-ball At other times we ran at the Ring and on that day our repast was taken in the Wood where that exercise was performed Our Musique-master composed a handsome Comedie in Prose which was acted in our House As for their Baths they were as rare at Mosco as hunting for we used one as often there as the other But the most part of our Family would go now and then to their publique Stoves where sometimes they could see a great company of Women naked by the favour of some little hole or cleft in the Wall which served also as a passage for their immodest discourses About one mile from Mosco we observed in a little Lake an Iland floting as the Antients believed of Delos but it was very small It is kept above water by the roots of Trees with which it is enterlaced there were some of us took a boat and went upon it turning it as a piece of timber which way they pleased This being as near as I could relate the manner of our living at Mosco it follows now that we display the Ambassadors negotiation and at the same time the Ceremonies which are practised in that Court. In pursuance of which design I shall speak in the first place of the Audience which the Tzar gave the Ambassador on the 11. of February which was five days after our Entry The 7. of February which was the next day after we arrived at Mosco Pronchissof and the other Pristaf offered the Ambassador Audience from the great Duke on the ninth of that month and pretented it as a singular favour that he could have it so soon nevertheless the next day they thought fit to delay him two days longer In which time his Excellence was desirous to informe himself of all the Ceremonies which were to be observed according to the Custome of that Court and amongst other things he demanded of them whether it were expected that he should be uncovered in the presence of the Tzar To which they answer'd that the Tzar's Ambassadors were bare before the King of England and by consequence that he was to be so before his Tzarskoy Maty. But the Ambassador declared freely to them that his Master the King of England had commanded him to be so and for that reason he was obliged not to dispute it otherwise the Ambassadors of the Tzar could not so well represent the person of their Prince being but his Slaves and so stiled by him in their very Letters of Credence After this he demanded leave to visit the