country idiom Nemen. Vilna is surrounded by a wall, and contains many temples and houses built of stone; there is an episcopal palace there, in which on our return we were kindly received by Ivan, the natural son of King Sigismund, who was a man of great kind-heartedness and lived in the palace at that time. It has also a parish church and several monasteries, with a convent of Franciscans, which was constructed at immense expense, and remarkable for the strictness of its discipline. The Russian churches in it are much more numerous than those which have been built for the observance of the Roman ritual. There are three Roman bishoprics in the principality of Lithuania, namely, those of Vilna, Samogithia, and Kiev. The Russian bishoprics in the kingdom of Poland and Lithuania and their incorporated principalities, are the archbishopric of Vilna and the bishoprics of Plotzk, Vladimir, Lutsk, Pinski, Kholm, and Premisl. The Lithuanians traffic in horns, wax, and cinders, in which they principally abound, and great quantities of which are exported to Dantzic, and thence into Holland. Lithuania gives an abundant supply of pitch and timber for ship-building, and also wheat. At the time that Christian was ejected from the throne of Denmark, and when the sea was infested with pirates, salt was not imported from Britain but from Russia, and the same is now used among the Lithuanians.
At the time that I was in Lithuania, there were two men principally distinguished for warlike renown, namely, the Knes Constantine Ostroski and the Knes Michael Linzki. Constantine had routed the Tartars very frequently. It was his custom not to attack the horde while out on their predatory excursions, but to pursue them when returning laden with booty; for as they retired to a spot where they thought they might have an opportunity of resting and refreshing themselves without fear of disturbance, but which spot was known to him and fixed upon as the point of attack, he would give notice to his own soldiers to cook their food
