I felt as alone in the city as in the wide steppes.
There were thirty-three versts to the monastery, and I immediately
started on my way to it and on the next day I said early mass there.
Around me were nuns, a whole black crowd, as if a mountain had fallen
apart and its broken pieces were lying about in the church.
The monastery was rich. There were many sisters, all rather heavy,
with fat, white, soft faces, as if made of dough. The priest said mass
energetically, but a little too hurriedly. He had a good bass, was
large and broad and seemed well fed.
The nuns in the choir were every one of them pretty, and sang
wonderfully. The tapers wept their white tears and their flames
trembled with pity for men.
"My soul struggles to reach Thy temple, Thy holy temple," their young
voices sang out humbly.
Out of habit I repeated the words of the litany, but my eyes wandered
and I tried to pick out the hermitess. There was no reverence in my
heart, and it hurt me to admit it, for I had not come here to play. My
soul was empty and I tried to collect myself. Everything in me was
confused and my thoughts wandered, one after the other. I saw a few
emaciated faces, half-dead old women, who stared at the holy images and
whose lips moved but made no sound.
After mass I walked around the church. The day was bright and the
white snow reflected the glistening rays of the sun, while on the
branches the tit-mice piped and sent the hoar-frost from the twigs. I
walked to the churchyard wall and looked out into the distance. The
monastery stood on the mountain, and before it Mother Earth was spread
out, richly dressed in its silvery blue snow. The little villages on
the horizon looked sad, the wood was cut through by streams, and the
pathways wound in and out like ribbons which some one had lost. Over
all, the sun sent its slanting winter rays and stillness, peace and
beauty were everywhere.
A little later I stood in the cell of Mother Fevronia. I saw a little
old woman with browless eyes, who wept constantly. On her face, with
its myriad wrinkles, a good-natured, unchanging smile trembled. She
spoke low, almost in a whisper, and in a singsong tone.
"Do not eat apples before the day of the Lord. Wait till the Lord in
His love has made them ripe; until the seeds are black."
"What does she mean by that?" I thought to myself.
"Respect your father and mother," she continued. "I have no father or
mother," I said.
"Then pray for the peace of their souls."
"Maybe they are still alive."
She wiped the tears from her eyes and looked at me with a pitying
smile. Then again she began shaking her head and continued in her
singsong:
"The Lord God is good; He is righteous toward all and covers all with
His rich bounty."
"That is just what I doubt," I said.
I saw that she started, her arms sank, and she remained silent, while
her eyes continued to sparkle. Then she controlled herself and sang on,
quite low:
"Remember that prayers have wings which fly even faster than birds and
reach the throne of the Lord. No one has yet entered heaven on his own
horse."
This much I understood: that she represented God to herself as some
noble lord, good natured and lovable, but still, according to her
opinion, bound by no law. She expressed all her thoughts in allegories
which, to my disappointment, I could not understand. I bowed and went
my way.
"Here they have broken the Lord God into many pieces," I thought to
myself, "each one to his own need. One makes Him good-natured, the
other stern and dark. And the priests have hired Him as their clerk and
pay Him with the smoke of incense for His support. Only Larion had an
infinite God."
Several nuns passed me, drawing a sleigh full of snow, and tittered.
My heart was heavy and I did not know what to do. I went out from
the gate. All without was still. The snow sparkled and shone, the
frost-covered trees stood motionless, and heaven and earth seemed sunk
in thought and looked in a friendly manner at the quiet monastery. A
fear arose in me lest I break this stillness with my cries.
The bells called to vespers--what sweet chimes! They were soft and
coaxing, but I had no desire to enter the church. I felt as if my head
were full of sharp little nails. Suddenly I made the resolution:
"I shall enter a monastery with severe regulations. There I shall live
alone in a solitary cell; will reflect and read books, and perhaps I
shall in this loneliness become the master of my scattered soul."
A week later I found myself before the Abbot of the small monastery of
Sabateieff. I liked the Abbot. He was a good-looking man, gray headed
and bald, with red, firm cheeks and a promising look in his eyes.
"Why do you flee the world, my son?" he asked me.
I explained to him that the death of Olga disturbed the peace of my
soul, but further I did not dare say anything. Something seemed to hold
me back from speaking.
He pulled at his beard, looked at me searchingly and said:
"Can you pay the initiation fee?"
"I have about a hundred rubles with me."
"Give them to me. Now go into the guest room. To-morrow, after the
noonday service, I will speak to you."
The care of strangers fell to the lot of Father Nifont, and him, too, I
liked.
"Everything is very simple in our monastery," he said. "It is
democratic. We all work equally in serving God, not as in other places.
True, we have a gentleman here, but he does not mix with any one or
bother us in any way. You can find peace and rest for your soul here
and attain blessedness."
By the following day I had examined the monastery well. In former times
it must have stood in the center of the wood, but now everything around
it was hewn down. Only here and there in front of the gates a few tree
trunks stood out from the ground. Toward the side the wood reached up
to the very walls of the monastery and embraced, as with two black
wings, the blue-domed church and the monastery. Nearby lay Blue Lake
under its ice cover, formed like a half moon. It was nine versts from
end to end and four versts wide. Behind it one could see the land on
the other side, and the three churches of Kudejaroff, and the golden
cupola of St. Nicholas of Tolokontzeff. On our side of the lake, not
far from the monastery, was the hamlet of Kudejaroff, with its three
and twenty little huts, and around it lay the mighty forests.
All was beautiful, and a quiet peace filled my soul. Here I would hold
communion with the Lord; would unfold before Him my innermost soul,
and would ask Him with humble insistence to show me the way to the
knowledge of His holy laws.
In the evening I attended vespers. The mass was said severely and
according to rule, and with ardor. But the singing did not please me;
good voices were lacking.
"O Lord, forgive me if my thoughts about Thee were too bold," I prayed.
"I did not do it out of lack of faith, but because of love and passion
for the truth, as you know, O Omniscient One!"
Suddenly the monk who stood near me turned and smiled at me. Evidently
I had spoken my repentant words too loud. As he smiled I looked at
him. Such a handsome face! I let my head sink and closed my eyes.
Never, either before or since, have I seen so handsome a face. I
stepped lightly forward, placed myself next to him and looked into his
wonderful countenance. It was as white as milk and framed in a black
beard sprinkled here and there with gray. His eyes were large, and they
had a soft mellow light and a bright expression. His figure was well
built and tall; his nose a little bent like an eagle's, and his whole
bearing was distinguished and noble. He made so deep an impression on
me that even at night he stood before me in my dreams.
Early in the morning Father Nifont woke me.
"The Abbot has assigned you some test work. Go to the bakery. This
worthy brother here will take you there. He will be your superior in
the future. Here, take your cloistral robes."
I put on a monk's garb. They fitted me well, but were worn and dirty
and the sole from one boot was loose.
I looked at my superior. He was broad-shouldered and awkward, with his
forehead and cheeks full of pimples and pockmarks, from which sprouted
little bunches of gray hair; his whole face looked as if it were
covered with sheep's wool; he would have been laughable were it not
for the deep folds on his forehead, his compressed lip and his little,
dark, blinking eyes.
"Hurry up!" he said to me.
His voice was harsh and cracked, like a broken bell.
"This is Brother Misha." Father Nifont introduced him, smiling. "Well,
go, and God be with you."
We walked out into the court. It was dark. Misha stumbled over
something and swore horribly. Then he asked me:
"Can you knead dough?"
"I have seen the women knead," I answered.
"Women!" he muttered. "You're always thinking about women! Always
women! On account of them the world is accursed, don't you forget that!"
"The mother of God was a woman," I said.
"Well?"
"And also there are very many virtuous women."
"If you speak like that the devil will surely drag you to hell."
"Anyway, he is a serious man," I thought to myself.
We arrived at the bakery and he made the fire. There were two large
kneading troughs covered with sacks, a large flour bin nearby, a big
sack of rye and a bag of wheat. Everything was dirty and filthy, and
cobwebs and gray dust lay over all. Misha tore the sack off from one of
the troughs, threw it on the earth, and commanded:
"Well, come and learn! Here is the dough. Do you see those bubbles?
That means it is ready--it has already risen."
He took a sack of flour as if it were a three-year-old youngster, bent
it over the edge of the trough, cut it open with his knife and cried as
though at a fire:
"Pour four pails of water here and then knead!"
He was white like a tree with hoarfrost.
I threw off my cassock and rolled up my sleeves. He shouted:
"Not that way! Take off your trousers! With your feet!"
"I haven't taken a bath for a long time," I said.
"Who asked you about that?"
"How can I, then, with dirty feet?"
"Am I your pupil," he roared, "or are you mine?"
He had a large mouth, and strong, broad teeth, and long arms, which he
waved angrily in the air.
"Well," I thought, "the devil take you; I don't care."
I wiped my feet with a wet cloth, stepped into the kneading trough and
began to work the dough, while my teacher ran here and there, grumbling.
"I will teach you to bend, my little mother's son. I will teach you
humility and obedience!"
I kneaded one trough, began another, and when that was done, started on
the wheat, which is kneaded with the hands. I was a strong fellow, but
was not used to the work. The flour filled my nose, my mouth, my ears
and eyes, so that I became deaf and blind; and the sweat kept dropping
from my forehead into the dough.
"Haven't you a piece of cloth," I asked, "to wipe the sweat off?"
Misha became raging mad. "We will get you velvet towels. The monastery
has been standing 230 years, and has only been waiting for your new
orders."
I had to laugh, unwillingly. "I am not kneading the dough for myself,"
I said. "There are others who have to eat the bread."
He walked up to me, bristling like a porcupine and every part of him
trembling.
"Take a sack and wipe yourself, if you are so tender. But I will tell
the Abbot about your impudence."
I was so surprised at this man that I could not be angry at him. He
worked unceasingly, and the heavy two-hundred sacks were like little
pillows in his hands. He was covered with flour, grumbled, swore and
urged me on continually.
"Hurry! Hurry!"
I hurried till my head swam.