Up to this time the genius of Ivan seems to have been cautiously feeling its way, and so the part of his history already sketched may be regarded as a mere preliminary to his real career. His extraordinary capacity for ruling an empire upon the principles taught him by the Prince Gluisky was now about to show itself in all its greatness. A criminal of Novgorod, feeling himself aggrieved by the authorities of that city, who had incarcerated him for a time, wrote a letter offering to place the city under Polish protection. This letter he signed, not with his own name, but with that of the archbishop, and, instead of sending it to the King of Poland, to whom it was addressed, he secreted it in the church of St. Sophia. Then, going to Alexandrovsky, he told Ivan that treason was contemplated by the Novgorodians, and that the treasonable letter would be found behind the statue of the Virgin in the church. Ivan sent a messenger to find the letter, and upon his return the czar began his march upon the doomed city. Happening to pass through the town of Khur, on his way to Novgorod, he put all its inhabitants to death, with the purpose, doubtless, of training his troops in the art of wholesale massacre, before requiring them to practise it upon the people of Novgorod. Finding this system of drill an agreeable pastime, he repeated it upon his arrival at the city of Twer, and then, in order that the other towns along his route might have no reason to complain of partiality, he bestowed upon all of them a like manifestation of his imperial regard. It is not my purpose to describe in detail the elaborate and ingenious cruelty practised in the massacre of the Novgorodians. The story is sickening. Ivan first heard mass, and then began the butchery, which lasted for many days, was conducted with the utmost deliberation and most ingenious cruelty, and ended in the slaughter of sixty thousand people. Ivan had selected certain prominent citizens, to the number of several hundred, whom he reserved for public and particularly cruel execution at Moscow. Summoning the small and wretched remnant of the population to his presence, he besought their prayers for the continuance and prosperity of his reign, and with gracious words of farewell took his departure from the city.