The sons of the disappointed uncle, however, conspired with success even after that; and finally, in a rage, Vasili ordered that the eyes of one of his cousins be put out.

But time brings its revenges.

Ten years later the Grand Prince, on an evil day, fell into the hands of the remaining cousin,--brother of his victim,--and had his own eyes put out.

So he was thereafter known as "Vasili the Blind." This wily Prince kept his oldest son Ivan close to him; and, that there might be no doubt about his succession, so familiarized him with his position and placed him so firmly in the saddle that it would not be easy to unseat him when his own death occurred.
Many things had been happening during these two centuries besides the absorption of the Russian principalities by Moscow.

The ambitious designs of Lithuania, in which Poland and Hungary, and the German Knights and Latin Christianity, were all involved, had been checked, and the disappointed state of Lithuania was gravitating toward a union with Poland.