pretty large enclosure with trees and grass like a garden, but no tombs.

Going eastward, I came upon the Church of the Ascension-a church with five dusky-blue domes and a separate bell-tower. I could not get far in, as the church was quite full; but there was something so new and striking in the singing, which was sweet and distinct, and unaccompanied by instruments, and in the life and feeling with which the crowd joined in chanting frequent responses of Hospodi pomilui (i.e. Kyrie eleison), that I remained rivetted in attention for an hour or more, though I understood nothing. I observed some priests, who were not officiating, standing in chocolate-coloured gowns and wide sleeves, with beards and long hair, and boys, such as I had seen also in the morning, dressed as choristers in blue-striped cotton frocks or blouses, with girdles, and their ordinary dress below.

The secular, or white priests, all have beards, and wear when going about a close-fitting, long, cloth cassock and a loose gown-the cassock with tight, the gown with large open sleeves-and a low, broadbrimmed hat. In the house they often (when alone) wear only the cassock. The gown and the cassock are colour, which varies according

commonly of the same

to the taste of the wearer, and may be chocolate colour, dark green, dark blue, olive, or any other

colour, except black, which is the badge of the black or monastic clergy. Actual white, though they are called the white clergy, is not worn by the seculars; nor are any very light shades of other colours in use.

To return. The pictures were splendid, and all lighted up; only the chandeliers when I came in were not lighted. The sharp treble voices of the boys mixing with the deeper tones of the older singers of the

congregation, were very pleasing.

times prayers.

There were also at

Bells of different churches were going

on all sides at intervals, with their gong-like sound. The priests officiating in the Church of the Ascension were invisible, as I stood behind in the throng. I had never before heard anything so stirring and so congregational in divine worship. When all was over, there was the same general salutation of the icons as I had seen before. The crowd of beggars, who stood ranged in two rows both within the doors and without as we passed out, was great, and everybody seemed to give to them. I saw children giving.

CHAPTER XI.

Mr. Blackmore's illustrative anecdotes.

UNDAY, August 11 [o.s.].-Mr. Law took me

SUN

in the afternoon to Alexandrofsky (in the direction of Viborg and Archangel), where he has a datcha, or country-house during the summer, and where he has an evening service for a small colony of English and Scotch people employed in some Imperial establishments directed by a General Wilson.

August 12 [o.s.].-The next day General Wilson showed us two very good churches, besides a magnificent chapel attached to the foundling hospital, in which a great number of children sang, all together, the Creed in the Grace, before their dinner, producing a very sweet volume of sound. The country around looked bleak and bare, with only pines and birchtrees in parts. On Tuesday, August 13, the octave or ámódoσis of the festival of the Transfiguration (when all is sung according to the service-books, as on the festival itself), I returned to Petersburg.

The same day, August 13 [o.s.], I went down by the afternoon steamer to Cronstadt, to stay with Mr. and Mrs. Blackmore. His house and church have been built a mile from the commercial port; and so the two thousand sailors, who are generally here, come but little to the church. It owes its cross to the Emperor Nicholas, for he, when it was building, having asked what it was, and hearing that it was a new church for the English, exclaimed, "What! a church without a cross!" And the next time he came and saw it still without a cross, he sent word that they should put one on immediately. When some of the captains and sailors, Scotch and English, grumbled at this, Mr. Blackmore asked them whether they had never seen something of the kind in London on the top of St. Paul's?

Great part of the chaplain's income here comes from fees paid by captains and traders on taking the oaths required by the Russian regulations. As they would scruple to be sworn on the cross, they have to bring a certificate from the English pastor that they have been sworn before him after their own fashion. When, after being thus sworn, they have to give evidence, they are asked (as Russians also are asked) when they last received the Holy Communion (and of this, too, Russians need to have a written certificate). A very frequent reply is that they have never received it-some of

them being Scotch, and those from the north-east coast of England not being in general communicants. The Russians object, "Then your oath is worth nothing." To which the Scotchman or Englishman rejoins, "It is not our custom." They even wanted Mr. Blackmore to certify for them that it was not their custom.

For want of English, the servants of the English Church are Russians. One day, while the English were in the church, a ship was telegraphed, concerning which a Russian merchant had need to speak with an Englishman. So he went to the church, and asked the doorkeeper if Mr. N. was within, and wished to go in to find him. But he was told that could not be. Then he asked the doorkeeper to go in and bring him out, or to take him a message. That could not be done either. So he was obliged to wait, and hoped it would not be long. "No," said the man, "I think it will be over soon, as it is a long time since they all sat down to sleep."

Another story was told thus :-As some Russians were talking together rather idly, a lady said, “I always pity the English; they seem to be worse off than the rest. Even the Lutherans have Luther, and the Calvinists have Calvin, though they don't know how to use them; but the English have no saint at all to help them, so they must certainly go to a bad place."