Glinka's play "A Life for the Tsar" was featured heavily throughout the Romanov tercentenary celebrations. It was performed in a gala performance at Mariinsky Theatre, Performances were staged throughout Russia by schools, regiments and amateur companies. Pamphlets and the penny press printed the story of Susanin "ad nauseam", and one newspaper told how Susanin had shown all soldiers how to fulfill their oath to the sovereign. At the bottom of the Romanov Monument in Kostroma, a female personification of Russia gives blessings to a kneeling Susanin. In Kostroma, Nicholas II was even presented with a group of Potemkin peasants, who claimed to be descendants of Susanin.