the time that the Archimandrite, Antonius, had read the Metropolitan's letter and introduced me to the Archimandrite-Rector of the Academy, with whom I was to lodge, he said it was time to go to the church for the Lesser Vespers, it being then about three o'clock. Accordingly we went into the Church of the Holy Trinity, the crowd making way and kissing his hand, and asking his blessing all the way. CHAPTER CV. The feast of the Holy Trinity.-The Trinity H Church. The Anniversary Service. AVING entered the church at the northern door, we passed into the Prothesis, and round the altar to the Diaconicum, or vestry, on the south side, where I stood under the arch between the diaconicum and the sanctuary, the Archimandrite taking his place against the Iconostasis, in a chair, and a small carpet set for him immediately before the royal doors, on the south side. There is his place to stand, or sit, when he does not officiate. In the place answering to it on the other side of the royal doors, there was an ex-bishop of Ekaterinoslav, who, from age and blindness, has obtained permission to retire. from his see, and prepare for death in this convent. As for the appearance presented by the church of the Trinity, it had an iconostasis, like those of the Moscow churches, with four upper tiers of icons of saints, large, long, dark pictures bordered with gold, a cross. besides the lower row above the steps of the solea, and on the doors, which were all over gold, or silver gilt, except the faces and hands, as was also the screen itself and its ornaments. At the south end of the solea, against the wall of the church, was a silver shrine, or grotto, containing the relics of St. Sergius, and on the top of the iconostasis, over the royal doors, Lamps of solid silver, a lesser and a larger one alternately, but all very large, with chains and huge wax lights, were hanging one before each icon, all the length of the solea, from branches bending out from above the first story of the iconostasis: two magnificent silver candelabra stood on the floor in front of the door; and there were again other massive lamps, like those along the solea, attached to the two pillars and hanging from them, and from the central dome. The pillars being very bulky, and also high, and only two in number, the church looks small, and too lofty for its other dimensions. Standing in front of the sanctuary, one looks up into the chief central dome, and two lesser concavities. The whole of the walls and roof, the pillars, the arches, and the cupolas themselves, within and above, were painted in fresco, with gilding, beginning from where the gold sheathing of the pillars terminates, about twelve feet or more from the ground. The ambo juts out from the solea, as in all the churches here, and within the royal doors and the veil is a very elegant massive tabernacle, or canopy, raised on four twisted columns over the altar, all of solid silver. The altar itself was a square, rather higher than usual, and had a covering of light silk, with beautiful festoons of grapes and flowers on each side. A very small gospel, set upright, the cross laid on one side, the antimense, and a larger gospel, were all the furniture upon it, covered over with a loose outer covering or carpet, before and after service. Immediately behind the silver canopy, and so adjoining the back of the altar, was a silver stand, or table, with an ornamented tabernacle, or artophorion, upon it, of the same material, and a single lamp, and behind that, again, a tree rising from the ground, in dead silver, solid, having seven branches, terminating in calices and coloured glass lamps of four colours; blue, green, red, and yellow, like flowers rising out of them, and culminating towards the seventh, which was in the centre, as to an apex. The walls of the sanctuary, at least six feet thick, are covered all over with bishops and saints in fresco. The windows were all of the same form, as are also still those of the larger and more recent Church of the Assumption, but when the church was last restored, at the end of the last, or beginning of the present century, some of the lower windows had their tops squared. However, none of them have the square sash window-frames and glazing, so common at Petersburg, but the glazing is with diamond-shaped panes, and lead or iron to hold them. There is a circular seat running round the apse with the metropolitan's throne, or chair, rising one step above it, in the centre, and the fans, or wings of cherubim, are fixed on either side of it. After the Lesser Vespers, the Archimandrite gave me a cup of tea, but without offering bread or anything else to eat. At six p.m. we went to the Vigil Service, which lasted till near eleven. At first there was only the officiating priest, whose turn it was, bareheaded, in epitrachelion (stole) and mantle, to say the secret prayers as usual on the solea during Psalm civ., and the ArchimandriteVicar took the chief place in front of the altar in a most splendid mitre covered with pearls and jewels. When all was over the Archimandrite gave me in charge to the Rector of the Spiritual Academy, now Bishop of Riga, with whom I was to lodge. It was a fine summer night, and we passed out from among the lights and a multitude of people, and crossed to the opposite (east) side of the vast silent precinct of the monastery with its many massive buildings and projecting shadows. The Academy, which was once a palace for the reception of the Tsars when they came here, occupies the east side of the precinct, with a garden laid out with walks and hedges before it, where all |