THE GROWTH OF RUSSIA 173 



None the less we who look back to those times along the unrolled 

 panorama of a thousand years can trace the energizing, might}^ forces 

 which even tlien were shai»ing the Slavic nature and the Slavic Em- 

 pire like i)lastic clav. A nation is never horn except in anguish. 

 The pioneer period of national existence ma)' alwa3'S be traced, like 

 the march of A\'ashington's arm}' through the snows of New Jersey, by 

 the stains left from bleeding feet. Amidst dissension and fratricidal 

 strife the sense of ])ossible national life was quickening and the goal 

 of national existence was being slow!}' apju'oached. It was much 

 that the strength of the Finns had been broken ; that more tlian one 

 attack from Lithuanians had been repressed ; that on the banks of 

 the Neva Alexander Nevski had won over the Swedes a decisive vic- 

 tory, which the Russian church commemorates with hymns and 

 thanksgiving annually to tliis day. 



Of momentous consequence was the fact that their newly embraced 

 Christianit}' had come from Constantinople and not from Rome. 

 The other leaders of the Slavic race, the Bohemians and the Poles, 

 had been converted b}' apostles whose spiritual head was the Pontiff 

 upon the Tiber. The Russian church had found its -father in the 

 Patriarch upon the Bosphorus, and its brethren in the adherents of 

 the Eastern Orthodox faith. In coming 3'ears, when religion and 

 politics were to be strangel}' blended, Russia, because of that earl}' 

 and unbroken bond, would be of necessity the sympathetic champion 

 of her coreligionists throughout the East. 



But it was most of all under the blows of the Mongol invasions 

 that Russia found her need of union and was hammered into shape. 

 Against the resistless might of overwhelming numbers, the courage 

 and desperate resistance of the Slavs were of no avail. During two 

 liundred and thirty-seven years Mongol conquerors racked the land 

 Avith tlieir merciless rule. One-half of the countiy was occupied by 

 their hordes. A j^ortion of the otlier half was left to the inha))itants, 

 who paid heavy ti'ibute and wlio, princes and ])eople, acknowledged 

 themselves the liumble vassals of the Khan. Poland, favored by the 

 Mongol conquerors, seized the southwestern ])ortion of the plain. 

 Thus Pohind was eual)h'(l to span Europe from the P>altic to the 

 lilack Sea; but her gains were destined to l)ear Intter fruit. Born 

 from it was that traditional Russian hatred for Pohind and all things 

 Polish which future wars were to perpetuate, l»ut could not intensify. 



Yet, crushed and mangled, the nation was taking definite form. 

 Ju the twelfth century a prince, pursuing a defeated rival, had halted 



