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These small potentates were constantly at war, confusion reigned supreme, Kief was taken and degraded and a new capital, Vladimir, established, and Moscow, which was to become the fourth capital of Russia, was founded. Such was the state of affairs when Batou, with his vast horde of savage horsemen, fell on the distracted realm. Defence was almost hopeless.
His journey occupied six months: he first went through Bohemia, Silesia, and Poland, to Kiov, at that time the capital of Russia. Thence he proceeded by the Dnieper to the Black Sea, till he arrived at the head quarters of the Khan Batou.
Rubruquis was sent, about this time, by the king of France to the Mogul emperor: he passed through the Crimea, and along the shores of the Volga and the Caspian Sea; visited the Khans Sartach and Batou; and at length arrived at the great camp of the Moguls.
The victorious occupation of Moscow by Charles XII. would have quelled the Russian nation as effectually, as had been the case when Batou Khan, and other ancient invaders, captured the capital of primitive Muscovy. How little such a triumph could effect towards subduing modern Russia, the fate of Napoleon demonstrated at once and for ever.
In 1235, Batou, nephew of the khan, was sent with an army of half a million men to the conquest of Europe. This flood of barbarians fell upon Russia at an unfortunate time, one of anarchy and civil war, when the whole nation was rent and torn and there were almost as many sovereigns as there were cities. The system of giving a separate dominion to every son of a grand prince had ruined Russia.
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