"The Ambassador enters Ivan's presence; his followers kept back in a space with grates of iron between the Emperor and them; at which the ambassador chafes with a hellish, hollow voice, looking fierce and grimly. Four captains of the guard bring him near the Emperor's seat. Himself, a most ugly creature, without reverence, thunders out, says,--His master and lord, Devlet Geray, great Emperor of all the Kingdoms and Kams the sun did spread his beams over, sent to him Ivan Vasilievich, his vassal, and Grand Duke over Russia by his permission, to know how he did like the scourge of his displeasure by sword, fire and famine? Had sent him for remedy (pulling out a foul, rusty knife) to cut his throat withal." They hasted him forth from the room, and would have taken off his gown and cap, but he and his company strove with them so stoutly. The Emperor fell into such an agony; sent for his ghostly father; tore his own hair and beard for madness! Then sent away the ambassador with this message, "Tell the miscreant and unbeliever, thy master, it is not he, it is for my sins, and the sins of my people against my God and Christ. He it is that hath given him, a limb of Satan, the power and opportunity to be the instrument of my rebuke, by whose pleasure and grace I doubt not of revenge, and to make him my vassal ere long be." The Tartar answered, "He would not do him so much service as to do any such message for him."--_Horsey._ Ivan had to send his own emissaries to the Tartars and the Khan kept them imprisoned seven years, and in other ways showed his contempt for the ruler of Moscow. But for Ivan's newly-found friends the English, his enemies in east and west would have conquered him. The English, much to the disgust of Swedes and Poles, supplied Ivan with artillery and small arms; improved engines of war, much gunpowder, and showed his men how to use them--Russians are not slow to learn. In 1548 Ivan sent John Schlitte to Germany to enlist foreign artisans for his service. Attracted by the high remuneration offered, a hundred were willing to accompany Schlitte back to Moscow, but the Governments, anticipating danger to their territory if the Russ became enlightened, refused permission. Only a few determined stragglers reached Russian territory. The first printers in Russia were encouraged for a time, then, for their own safety, had hurriedly to seek exile. For Moscow Ivan did little: twice during his reign the town was destroyed by fire. After the first he built himself a new palace of wood within the Kremlin; later he had another constructed outside, between the Nikitskaia and the Arbat. For a long time he lived in neither, preferring a wretched dwelling in a far off village, whence he believed he could, at need, escape unobserved to England if any of his subjects took up arms against him.