his well-earned rest, he left his son Ivan in assured possession of the sovereignty in which he had been already for some time associated. The old mad folly of dividing the hardly-cemented territories between the dead Prince’s sons was still persisted in--Vasili’s eyes had not been opened even by being put out--but Ivan was emphatically Grand Prince of Moskva. FOOTNOTES: [63] The firman issued by the Khans to the prince of their selection. [64] K. Waliszewski: _Peter the Great_. [65] M’Kenzie Wallace: _Russia_. [66] V. B. Antonovitch. [67] N. Kostomarov, _Sieverno Rousskiya Narodopravstva_. S. Solov’ev. [68] _Geschichte der Ostseeprovinzen._ [69] S. Solov’ev. N. Kostomarov. [70] S. Solov’ev. [71] Karamzin. [72] S. Solov’ev. [73] Th. Schiemann. [74] A Russian expression for the dead. [75] S. Solov’ev. [76] Monastery of the Trinity near Moskva. [77] A. Rambaud, _History of Russia_. [78] Schiemann. [79] Karamzin. [80] S. Solov’ev. [81] _Histoire de l’Ordre Teutonique._ [82] S. Solov’ev; Th. Schiemann; _Geschichte der Ostseeprovinzen_. [83] Rambaud. [84] Reproduced by Schiemann from copy in Rath archives of Revel. [85] “From over the sea.” [86] Schiemann; S. Solov’ev; _Geschichte der Ostseeprovinzen_; _Histoire de l’Ordre Teutonique_; L. Ranke, _Preussische Geschichte_. [87] Rambaud, S. Solov’ev. [88] Karamzin. [89] New guard, corrupted into Janissaries. [90] Von Hammer-Purgstall, _Histoire de l’Empire Ottoman_. J. W. Zinkeisen, _Geschichte des osmanischen Reich in Europa_. E. A. Freeman, _Ottoman Power in Europe_. CHAPTER VII THE LAST OF THE PALEOLOGI AND THE FIRST OF THE AUTOCRATS With the accession of Ivan III. to the throne of Moskva, Russian history takes new shape and direction. This dark, watchful, brooding kniaz was but the continuator of a dynasty of like princes “of gloomy and terrible mien, whose foreheads were marked by the seal of destiny.”[91] “Time and circumstance and opportunity paint with heedless hands and garish colours on the canvas of a man’s life; so that the result is less frequently a finished picture than a palette of squeezed tints.”[92] Time and circumstance and opportunity gave Ivan the title of Great, and his principality an importance it had never before enjoyed. That he made the most of his possibilities will not be denied, but in the nature of things this might scarcely have been otherwise. The whole character of the man dovetailed into the part he was required to play.