The Slavs and Finns in Novgorod meanwhile find the blessings of freedom harder to bear than the authority of their late conquerors. After two years of anarchy and internal dissension they send messengers to Constantinople, inviting the Norsemen, whom they had thrust out, to return and resume the government. “We have a goodly country,” say they, “and large. All we need is the strong arm to keep it orderly. Come, then, be our princes, and rule our state.” In response to this petition Rurik and his two brothers, Sindf and Truvor, with a large following of Varangian families, returned to Novgorod. Here Rurik established himself as supreme ruler; and to prevent the success of a fresh uprising of the Slavs, invited into the country a large accession of Varangian population. To his brothers he gave the principalities of Bielozero and Izborsk; but they soon dying, Rurik assumed again authority. So strong did this new Scandinavian kingdom become that we find ere long an army raised for the storming of Constantinople. The project was, however, abandoned, and the vikings who had planned it contented themselves with seizing the little province of Kiev. This also in a few years was brought under the dominion of Novgorod. Thus was laid the foundation of the great “Empire of All the Russias.” The bulk of the population was composed of Slavs and Finns: the nobles were Varangians, and Rurik was the first Czar. It was but just that the superior race thus installed in the government of this vast region should give its name to the new nation. The first Varangians or Swedes who traversed Russia on their way to Constantinople had been called by the Finnish natives “_Ruotsalaiset_,” or Russians, from the name of the district (Roden or Rosen) whence they had come.[D] This name adhered to Rurik and his followers, and so the whole empire came finally to be called Russia. The line of Rurik continued to furnish Czars to the Russian throne until the death of Feodor, in 1598.