The people had an old rhymed proverb, "Koli khud knyaz, tak v gryaz!" "If the prince is bad, into the mud with him!", and they habitually acted according to it.

So unpleasant, indeed, was the task of ruling those sturdy, stiff-necked burghers, that some princes refused to undertake it, and others, having tried it for a time, voluntarily laid down their authority and departed.

But these frequent depositions and abdications--as many as thirty took place in the course of a single century--did not permanently disturb the existing order of things.

The descendants of Rurik were numerous, and there were always plenty of candidates for the vacant post.

The municipal republic continued to grow in strength and in riches, and during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries it proudly styled itself "Lord Novgorod the Great" (Gospodin Velilki Novgorod).
"Then came a change, as all things human change." To the east arose the principality of Moscow--not an old, rich municipal republic, but a young, vigorous State, ruled by a line of crafty, energetic, ambitious, and unscrupulous princes of the Rurik stock, who were freeing the country from the Tartar yoke and gradually annexing by fair means and foul the neighbouring principalities to their own dominions.