Russka - Edward Rutherfurd [162]
Yet how fabulously rich it was, too. Since no one knew who these visitors were or where they came from, the English party had been kept almost in confinement in the north while their hosts awaited instructions from the capital.
‘These people’s hospitality is so great I can hardly tell if we are guests or prisoners,’ Chancellor had ruefully remarked to him.
It had been winter before they were taken to the capital, and so Wilson had seen the cargoes from these barges off-loaded on to a thousand sleds to be carried from the collecting points to the inner cities. He had never seen such a concourse of vehicles. Every league, every day, hundreds of sleds passed them on their way to or from the cities that rose out of the snowy wastes. Goods, all manner of goods, passed by: grain, fish, but above all he saw furs, furs, and more furs. Could there be so many sables, ermines, beavers and bears in all the world? This forest hinterland, he thought, must be greater than all the lands he had ever heard of.
But above all, one huge realization opened in his mind – an understanding that grew greater, more insistent, more awesome with every league they went: they were going further and further from the sea. This is the hugest country in the world, he thought, yet it has no shores.
How utterly different from his English home in London: nowhere in England were you far from its indented coastline; how utterly unlike the French, the Germans, the other folk who plied the busy North Sea and Baltic ports. These people in their vast, landlocked world of forest and snow were different, cut off, a race apart.
‘Truly, this is a rude and barbarous people,’ as Chancellor had remarked to his companions.
Yet their welcome in Moscow had been astounding. It had made an unforgettable impression on George Wilson. For no sooner had they arrived than they were summoned to attend the Tsar.
Even George Wilson, cunning and cynical little fellow that he was, found his knees shaking as they were ushered into the royal presence. He had already heard that, in this huge land, all men were the Tsar’s slaves: now he understood what that meant.
Ivan stood at the end of a great hall in the Kremlin Palace. On each side of him stood the huge forms of his boyars, in their heavy, rich kaftans. How tall he was – made taller by the high pointed hat he wore, trimmed with fur. A pale, hawk-like face; a terrible, piercing eye. He commanded all, dominated this heavy, Asiatic magnificence. The party were awestruck. As Ivan meant them to be, for he was anxious to impress these merchants from this strange and distant country. They might be useful to him.
He was friendly. Their letter of recommendation, written in Latin, Greek, German and other languages, was explained to him. Then they were invited to a feast.
It surpassed anything they could have imagined. A hundred sat down: they ate off solid gold. Stuffed fish, great roasts, strange delicacies like elk’s brains, caviar, blinis; wine served in goblets encrusted with gems. Everything was lavish, splendid, heavy. Tsar Ivan sat apart from the mere mortals he was honouring. From time to time he sent a morsel of food to one of the guests as a mark of his favour. Each time, all stood, while the name of the recipient was called out, and the Tsar’s own long title was proclaimed. Wilson noticed that the pious Tsar crossed himself, from right to left, each time he raised food to his own mouth. He also noticed that it was the fashion, amongst these huge, bearded people, to drink off a goblet of wine at a single draught.
The banquet went on for five hours.
‘I think we are at the court of Solomon himself,’ he whispered to one of his companions.
‘Or the court of Babylon,’ the other replied.
But it was only afterwards, when they were escorted round the royal palace, that Wilson truly appreciated that this strange, mighty empire was like no other.
For how splendid, yet how barbarous it was. Room succeeded cavernous room. It was like being in some endless succession of antechambers to a Russian church. Candles lit up the gloom.