CHAPTER X

After he had brought to an end the investigations connected with his

son’s trial, Peter left Petersburg for Reval on August 8, at the head of

a fleet, consisting of twenty-two men-of-war. The Tsar was on board the

new ninety-gun frigate, _The Old Oak_, which had only quite recently been

launched from the Admiralty dockyard. This was the first ship which had

been built according to the Tsar’s own designs, by Russian workmen, from

Russian wood, without the help of foreigners.

One evening, as they were passing out of the Finnish Gulf into the Baltic

Sea, Peter stood at the helm and steered.

The weather was bad. Black, heavy iron clouds massed over the black,

heavy, also as it were, iron waves. It was rough. The sea was fretted

with hoary surge, suggesting the pale arm of menacing phantoms. At times

the waves would wash over the ship and a shower of salt water would

drench all those upon deck, the Tsar-helmsman most of all. His clothes

were wet through; the cold icy wind cut his face. Yet nevertheless he

felt, as he usually did when on the sea, vigorous, strong and joyous.

With his gaze fixed on the gloomy distance he piloted the vessel with a

firm hand. The huge body of the frigate trembled under the pressure of

the waves, yet _The Old Oak_ was strong and obeyed the rudder like a good

horse obeys the bridle; she was tossed from wave to wave; sometimes the

colourless deep would all but engulf her, it seemed well-nigh impossible

for her to come up again; yet every time she reappeared—triumphant.

Peter was thinking about his son. For the first time he thought about all

that had happened as belonging to the past. There was infinite sadness in

his reflections, but no dread, no anguish, no repentance. He felt here,

also, just as all through his life, the manifestation of the divine will.

He remembered his son’s words addressed to the Senate: “Peter is great,

very great, but he is heavy, he crushes. The earth groans under the

burden.”

How else could it be? thought Peter. The anvil groans under the hammer.

He, the Tsar, was only the hammer with which God was forging Russia. He

had roused her with a massive blow; but for him Russia would be still

sunken in a deep sleep.

And what would have happened had the Tsarevitch remained alive?

Sooner or later he would have come to the throne, and returned the power

to the priests, the monks, the “long-beards,” and they would have turned

away from Europe back to Asia, extinguished the light of civilization,

and Russia would have slowly crumbled and perished.

Peter had founded the new empire; but he had knowingly sealed that

foundation-stone in the blood of Alexis, his son.

“There will be a storm,” said the old Dutch captain, approaching the Tsar.

Peter made no answer and continued to gaze into the distance.

Darkness was swiftly approaching. The black clouds descended lower and

lower towards the black waves.

Suddenly, at the very edge of the sky, the sun peered through a narrow

cleft from under the clouds; it seemed as if blood was gushing from a

wound. The iron clouds and waves became flushed as with blood. Wonderful

and terrible was the aspect of this sea of blood.

“Blood! Blood!” thought Peter, and to his mind came his son’s prophecy.

“You are the first to stain the block with the blood of a son, the blood

of Russia’s Tsars; this blood shall descend upon successive generations

of thy lineage unto the last Tsar; all will perish in blood. God will

visit your sin upon Russia!”

“Not this, O Lord!” again, as on that night before the ancient icon,

portraying a dark face surrounded by a crown of thorns, Peter was praying

direct to the Father who sacrificed His Son. “Let it not be so! Let his

blood come upon me, me alone! Punish me, O God! Spare Russia!”

“There will be a storm,” repeated the old captain; thinking the Tsar had

not heard him. “I advised your Majesty to return——”

“Never fear,” answered Peter with a smile. “Our new ship is strong; she

will weather this gale. God is with us.”

And with a firm hand the helmsman steered his vessel across the blood-red

waves towards the unknown.

The sun had set; it grew dark, the storm began to howl.

Epilogue

THE COMING CHRIST

CHAPTER I

“Our faith is not the true one; it is not worth perishing for. Oh could I

but find the true faith, I would let my body be cut to pieces for it!”

Tichon often remembered these words while on his long wanderings after

he had fled from Cornelius and the Red Death: they were the words of a

wanderer, too; one who had tried all creeds and accepted none.

Once, late in the autumn, after his flight from the priests of

the Vetlouga, Tichon was resting at the Pestchersky monastery in

Nishni-Novgorod, doing the duties of a copyist, one of the monks, Father

Nicodemus, talking with him about religion, said:—

“I know what you need, my son. Wise people are living in Moscow. They

possess the water of life. Having once drunk of it, you will never thirst

again. Go to them. Should you be found worthy, they will reveal to you a

great mystery.”

“What mystery?” Tichon asked eagerly.

“Don’t be so hasty, my son,” retorted the monk with kindly severity. “The

more haste the less speed. If you really desire to be initiated in that

mystery, accept the trial of silence. Whatever you hear or see, keep it

to yourself. You know the prayer: ‘I will not deliver your secret to the

enemy, I will not give you the kiss of Judas.’ Do you understand?”

“I understand, Father; I will be as silent.”

“Good,” continued Father Nicodemus. “I will give you a letter to the

Moscow flour merchant, Saphiannikoff. Take him my greetings, and, as a

humble gift from me, a small barrel of smoked cloud-berries. We are old

friends; he will receive you. You are skilled in bookkeeping and he will

employ you in his shop. Will you go now, or wait until the spring? Winter

will soon be here, and your clothes are but poor. You might easily get

frozen to death.”

“I will go now, Father, at once!”

“Well, God speed your journey, my son.”

Father Nicodemus gave Tichon his blessing and the promised letter, which

he allowed him to read:—

“To my beloved brother in Christ, Parfen Paramonitch, grace be unto thee.

The bearer of this letter is the youth Tichon. He is no longer satisfied

with stale bread, he craves for savoury cakes to satisfy his hunger.

Peace be unto you all, and grace from our Lord.

“The humble Father Nicodemus.”

Tichon started for Moscow with a cart-load of fish, as soon as the winter

roads could be depended on.

Saphiannikoff’s flour stores were at the corner of the third Mieshanski

Street and the small Suhareff Square.

In spite of the letter from Father Nicodemus, Tichon was received

not without suspicion. For a trial he was appointed to assist the

house-porter in heavy manual work. When they found he did not drink, but

worked well and knew how to cast figures up correctly, he was taken into

the shop, and entrusted with the account books.

There was nothing special about this shop. There was buying, selling,

and talks about gain and loss. Only now and then, in corners, mysterious

whispers were exchanged.

One day, Mitka the porter, an awkward kindly giant, white with flour

dust, while removing the flour sacks, began to sing in Tichon’s presence

a strange song:—

Once in holy Russia,

Stonewalled mother Moscow,

In the street Mestchanskaia,

Two dear friends encountered,

Both radiant as the sun.

Low bowed Ivan Timofeyevitch,

Salutes his friend, the other—Daniel Philipovitch,

“Welcome to my palace,

Welcome to my table

To eat bread and salt.

I have longed to hear thee say

What thy designs are for the Judgment Day.”

“Mitka, Mitka, who are they? Daniel Philipovitch and Ivan Timofeyevitch?”

asked Tichon.

Taken by surprise, Mitka stopped short, bending under the weight of a

large sack, his eyes expressing great amazement:—

“Don’t you know the God Sabaoth and Christ!”

“How can the Lord Sabaoth and Christ be said to meet in Mestchanskaia

Street?” continued Tichon with increasing surprise.

But Mitka already realized he had said too much and went off, growling in

a gloomy voice:—

“Much knowledge will make you old before your time.”

Soon after this Mitka fell ill. He had probably strained himself with

lifting the heavy sacks. For days he lay in his underground room, moaning

and groaning. Tichon went to see him, gave him sage-brandy to drink and

rubbed him with camphorated spirit and other medicaments, obtained from a

friendly German apothecary. It was damp in the cellar and Tichon removed

Mitka to his own warm bright room over the main storehouse. Mitka was

affectionate. He became attached to Tichon, and began to talk more openly

with him.

Tichon gathered from these talks and Mitka’s songs, that at the beginning

of the reign of Tsar Alexis Michailovitch, in the Murom district,

before a great crowd of people, the Lord Sabaoth, surrounded by angels,

archangels Cherubim and Seraphim, had come down from heaven in a fiery

chariot. The angels returned to heaven, the Lord remained and entered

the pure body of Daniel Philipovitch, a soldier deserter, declaring the

peasant Ivan Timofeyevitch to be his Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ, and

they set out wandering through the world in the guise of two beggars.

Escaping from persecutors they suffered cold and hunger; they were

obliged to hide themselves in pig-sties, in fetid ditches, or to

sleep under haystacks. One day a peasant woman concealed them in the

cellar under a cattle shed. The cattle drainage from the floor oozed

through into the cellar. Daniel Philipovitch on seeing it, said to Ivan

Timofeyevitch: “You will get wet,” and Ivan answered: “It is nothing, if

only you, my king, remain dry.”

They spent the last years of their lives in Moscow, on the Mestchanskaia

Street, in a separate house, called “Zion.” They both died there and in

glory ascended into heaven.

* * * * *

After Ivan Timofeyevitch, the same as before him, many Christs revealed

themselves, since the Lord resides nowhere more readily than in a pure

human body. It is written: “Ye are the temples of the living God.”

God begets a Christ whenever the world is in danger of dying. Christ

accomplished His work in one body and has begun it in several others.

“This means there are many Christs?” said Tichon.

“There is one spirit, Christ, yet the bodies in which He appears are

many,” replied Mitka.

“Is there a Christ now?” continued Tichon, his heart sinking in

anticipation of a mystery.

Mitka assented with a nod.

“Where is He?”

“Do not question. I dare not answer. You will see for yourself, if you

are found worthy.”

Mitka would say no more.

“I will not deliver your secret to the enemy,” remembered Tichon.

A few days later he was busy at his account books. It was Saturday

evening. The shop was closed. A train of waggons had come, and men were

carrying in the flour bags. The cold white air rushed in through the

open door, footsteps sounded on the snow, the church bells were ringing.

The snow-covered roofs of the weather-beaten log-houses, flushed with

the evening glow, stood out against the golden purple of the sky. It was

quite dark in the shop; only at the end, amidst the towering flour sacks

the darkness was relieved by a lamp glimmering before the icon of St.

Nicholas.

Saphiannikoff, a fat, white-haired old man, a veritable Father Christmas,

and the chief clerk, Yemelian Retivoi, a corpulent red-haired, bald man,

with the ugly intelligent face of a faun, were drinking hot “sbiten” and

listening to Tichon’s narrative about the settlers of Kerjenetz.

“And what is your opinion, Yemelian Ivanovitch?” asked Tichon, “where can

salvation be found, in the old or the new books?”

“There once lived in Russia a man called Daniel Philipovitch,” began

Yemelian with a smile, “he read all the books, and finding little good

in them, he gathered them all together in a bag and threw them into the

Volga. Salvation lies neither in the old nor in the new books, but in

The Golden Book,

The Book of Life,

The Book of the Dove,

The Holy Ghost Himself.”

the last words he sang in the same rhythm Mitka used for his strange

songs.

“Where is that book?” asked Tichon in a shy eager voice.

“There, look!”

He pointed to the sky through the open door.

“That is the book; the Lord God Himself writes upon it with the golden

words of eternal life. Having read them, you will fathom all mysteries in

heaven and on earth.”

Yemelian looked steadily at him, and Tichon felt thrilled by sudden fear,

as though he had looked into some dark, transparent, bottomless pool.

Yemelian, exchanging glances with his master, suddenly stopped.

“Does this mean that salvation can be found neither in the old nor the

new Church?” Tichon hastened to question, afraid lest Yemelian, like

Mitka, would say no more.

“What is your Church?” Yemelian shrugged his shoulder in contempt. “An

anthill, a dilapidated synagogue, a Jewish market! Its spiritual life has

been lost in its rites and buildings. She used to be a spirit and a fire,

but now she has become precious stones and gold, or icons and priests’

palls. God’s word has become stale, like old dry bread which breaks the

teeth and cannot be chewed.”

And leaning over to Tichon, he added in a whisper:—

“There _is_ a true, mysterious, new church, a bright hall of Zion, whose

framework is made of cypress, barberry and anise-wood. Not dry crusts,

but soft fresh cakes, straight from the oven, are served out there; words

of life out of the mouths of prophets. Heavenly joy abounds in it, and

spiritual drink about which the Church sings: ‘Come! and drink from

the new, incorruptible spring which flows from the tomb of the living

Christ!’”

“Ah, what a drink! there is no need to sip it, to look at it is

sufficient,” exclaimed Parfen Paramonitch, and raising his eyes, he began

to chant in a quite unexpectedly high-pitched voice:—

God Himself has brewed the drink,

The Holy Ghost has mingled it.

Yemelian and Mitka chimed in, beating time with their feet, twitching

their shoulders, as if eager to whirl away in a dance. All three had a

Bacchantic look in their eyes.

God Himself has brewed the drink,

The Holy Ghost has mingled it,

The Holy Virgin tapped it,

Together with God they worked;

Holy angels, Cherubim,

Took it round and carried it.

Tichon thought he could hear the stamping of many feet, the echo of a

whirling frantic dance; there was something wild, and mænad-like in this

song, which robbed one’s breath and at the same time roused the longing

to be ever listening to it.

All at once, as suddenly as they began, the three men stopped.

Yemelian started to look over the account books, Mitka lifted up the bag

and went his way. Parfen Paramonitch passed his hand over his face, as if

wiping something from it. He rose, yawned, stretched himself lazily, and

crossing his mouth, said in his usual voice, as he was wont to say every

night:—

“Go and have your supper, lads! the soup and kasha will be getting cold.”

And again all became ordinary and common place.

Tichon, too, had risen, but all at once, as if impelled by some power, he

fell on his knees, pale and trembling, stretched out his hand and cried:—

“Friends, have compassion on me! I can endure it no longer. My soul has

worn itself out with longing for the courts of the Lord! Accept me into

your holy communion, unveil to me your great mystery!”

“See, see, how impatient the lad is!” Yemelian looked at him with his

cunning smile, “You are too hasty, my friend. The Father has first to be

asked. Perhaps you will be found worthy, but meanwhile remain silent.”

They all went to supper, as if nothing had happened. Neither on the

morrow nor on the following days was there any mention made of mysteries.

Whenever Tichon ventured to allude to what had happened, the others

remained silent and looked at him with suspicion. It was as if a curtain

had been drawn up for a moment and then suddenly dropped again. Yet he

could not forget what he had seen. He went about no longer his old self.

What was said to him he did not understand; he answered wrongly and made

mistakes in his accounts. The master scolded him. Tichon feared he would

be dismissed.

The next Saturday, late at night, he was sitting alone in his room, when

in came Mitka.

“Come,” said he, in a hurried voice.

“Whither?”

“To see the Father.”

Afraid to question, Tichon hurriedly dressed and came down. He saw his

master’s sleigh waiting at the door. In it sat Yemelian and Parfen

Paramonitch, the latter wrapped in a fur coat. Tichon cowered at their

feet, Mitka seated himself on the box and away they sped through the

dark, deserted streets. The night was calm and bright. Pellucid,

pearly cloudlets covered the moon. They crossed the river on the ice

and for some time wound their way along the dark narrow lanes about

Samoskvosetchia. At last the dull pink walls of the Donskoi Monastery,

surmounted by white pinnacles and towers, appeared through the luminous

gloom.

At the corner of the Donskoi and Shakelskoi Street they got out of the

sleigh, and Mitka left the horse in a court. They continued their way on

foot past old wooden fences banked with snow. Then they turned into a

lane where the snow came almost up to their knees. On reaching a double

gate, hung on iron hinges, they knocked. They were only admitted after

they had said who they were and whence they came. They stepped into a

court surrounded by buildings. Yet with the exception of the gate-keeper

nobody was visible, no light, not even the bark of a dog was heard—dead

silence. On leaving the courtyard they continued their way along a

narrow, well-used path, between two high banks of snow, across some

back-yards: whether wastes or gardens it was difficult to say. Passing

through a second gate, they entered an orchard; the apple and cheery

trees in their wintry dress seemed covered by white blossoms. The silence

was so intense that they might have been a hundred miles away from human

habitation. At the end of the garden rose a large wooden house. They went

up to the door, knocked and again they were questioned. A stern-looking

lad whose dress suggested a monastic novice admitted them. In the

spacious hall, the walls, chests, and benches were covered with a number

of overcoats, belonging to men and women: simple sheepskins, rich fur

coats, ancient Russian caps, new-fashioned hoods.

When they had taken off their coats, Yemelian thrice asked Tichon:—

“Dost thou desire, my son, to be initiated into God’s mystery?”

And Tichon thrice answered:—

“I do.”

Yemelian blindfolded him and led him by the hand.

They went along endless corridors, now going down, now going up

staircases.

At last they stopped. Yemelian ordered Tichon to undress, and then put on

him a long linen tunic, on his feet cotton stockings, repeating the words

from Revelation:—“He that overcometh shall be clothed in white raiment.”

After this they continued their way. The last staircase was so steep that

Tichon was obliged to grip with both hands Mitka’s shoulders, for fear of

slipping.

They were met by a smell of damp earth, which seemed to issue from a

cellar. A last door opened and they entered a heated apartment, where

judging by the whispering and jostling of feet a large number were

assembled. Yemelian made Tichon kneel, bow thrice to the ground and

repeat the words he was whispering into his ear:—

“I swear by my soul, my God and His terrible last Judgment, to suffer the

knout, the fire, the axe, the block, every torture, even death, rather

than forsake the Holy Faith, and also to relate to no one, neither to my

confessor nor my father, whatever I will hear or see here. I will not

deliver thy secret to the enemy, nor give the kiss of Judas. Amen.”

When he ended he was led to a bench and the bandage was removed from his

eyes.

He saw a large low room; holy icons stood in the corner. Before them

numerous lit tapers; the whitewashed wall was marked with dark spots of

damp; water penetrated through the cracks between the black tarred planks.

The air was as close as in a vapour bath. Circles of iridescent light

surrounded the flames of the candles, the benches along the walls were

occupied by men on one side, and women on the other, and all were wearing

the same white tunics, cotton stockings and no boots.

“The Queen, the Queen,” they reverently whispered. The door opened and in

came a tall, slender woman in a black dress with a white handkerchief on

her head. All rose and bowed low to her.

“Akoulína Makejevna, the heavenly Queen,” Mitka whispered to Tichon. The

woman went up and sat down under the icons, herself resembling an icon.

All began to go up to her and bow before her, kissing her knee.

Yemelian took Tichon to her and said:—

“Baptise him, mother. He is new.”

Tichon knelt and looked at her: she was dark, no longer young, about

forty, with little wrinkles in the corners near her dark eyelashes; her

black thick eyebrows were almost grown together, and she had a slight

black down on her upper lip, “quite like a Tzuigane or a Circassian,” he

thought. But when she looked at him with her large, soft, black eyes he

realized how beautiful she was.

The Queen thrice made a sign of blessing him with a lit taper, almost

touching his forehead, chest and shoulders with the flame.

“In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Tichon, the

servant of God, is baptised with fire and the Holy Spirit!” Then with a

quick, adroit, and evidently accustomed movement, she opened her dress,

and he saw her beautiful naked body, fresh as a young maiden’s, amber

coloured, as if carved from ivory.

Yemelian pushed him forward whispering:—

“Kiss the holy womb, the pure breasts.”

Tichon cast his eyes to the ground in confusion.

“Fear not, child!” said Akoulína, and such tenderness was in her voice

that Tichon seemed to hear in it the voice of a mother, sister, and

beloved all in one.

He remembered how, in the dark wood near the Round Lake, he had buried

his head among the grass and kissed the earth, how looking up towards

heaven, he had felt that the earth and the sky were one, and how weeping

he had prayed:—

O wondrous Queen, Mother of God,

Earth, thou bountiful mother of all.

He reverently kissed the beautiful body thrice, like a holy image. A

subtle scent rose from it; a subtle smile flitted across her lips. This

scent and the smile terrified him.

But the dress closed, and again she sat before him, majestic and severe,

a saint,—an icon among icons.

When Tichon returned with Yemelian to their place the whole assembly

began to sing in a melancholy drawn voice:—

Send us Lord Thy Christ,

Send us Lord Thy Son,

Send the Holy Spirit, the Comforter.

For a moment they remained hushed; and then the singing was renewed, but

this time it was merry, quick, as if for a dance; the people stamped

with their feet, clapped with their hands, and their eyes had a look of

ecstasy:—

On the river Don

Christ dwells in our homes,

With His Angels

And Archangels,

With cherubim

And seraphim,

And the holy host of Heaven.

Suddenly a venerable old man started from his seat, his ascetic face

resembled Holy Sergius, as he is painted on icons; he ran out into the

middle of the room and began to whirl round.

Then a young girl, about fourteen, quite a child, yet already pregnant,

slender as a reed, with a neck long as the stalk of a flower, also

started up and went round with the grace of a swan.

“That is Marioushka the idiot,” said Yemelian, pointing to her, “she can

hardly speak, mostly lows, but when filled with the spirit she sings like

a nightingale.”

The girl sang in a child-like silvery voice:—

’Tis enough for you to sit,

Time has come for the birds to flit,

From prison and cells,

And shadowy caverns.——

Her waving arms suggested wings.

Parfen Paramonitch ran up to Marioushka, took her by the hands and began

to whirl her round and round, like a polar bear dancing with a snow

fairy. Tichon would have never believed that this huge, portly body could

dance with such ethereal lightness. Spinning round like a top he sang in

his high-pitched voice:—

In the seventh heaven

Christ is spinning round.

Ah, friends! ah, friends!

Christ has shoes

Made of Saphia leather,

Stitched with finest stitches.

Other people rose and began to spin round.

A man with a wooden leg went round as nimbly as the rest. Tichon was told

afterwards that his name was Captain Smoorigin; he had lost his leg at

the storming of Azov.

A short fat lady with dignified gray curls, Princess Khovánsky, spun

round like a ball. Next to her a loose-limbed cobbler was prancing,

throwing his feet and arms about; he twisted and twirled himself like a

huge gnat, a “Daddy-long-legs,” ejaculating from time to time:—

Dancing and burning,

On we go to Zion’s hill!

By this time nearly all had joined the dance, not only singly but in

pairs and groups representing “walls,” “corners,” “crosses,” “David’s

ship,” and “flowers,” etc.

“The various figures,” explained Yemelian to Tichon, “represent the

dances of the heavenly hosts of angels and archangels round the throne

of God; the waving of arms imitates the beating of angel’s wings. The

heavens and the earth are one; what happens there is enacted here also.”

The dance grew more and more rapid; it seemed as if a whirlwind filled

the room, and they were no longer dancing themselves, but some external

power was whirling them round with such rapidity that their faces could

no longer be discerned; the hair on the head stood upright, the tunics

blew out like funnels, and men were transformed into white spinning

columns. Some hissed, others cackled, others again screamed in frenzy,

and again it seemed that not they themselves, but some external power was

screaming through their mouths.

He has filled us, He has filled us,

Holy, Holy Spirit,

Fill us, fill us, fill us!

They fell on the ground in convulsions, with foaming mouths, like madmen;

they prophesied, but for the most part it was impossible to make out

what they meant. Some stopped short in exhaustion, their faces either

crimson or deadly white. Sweat poured down them in streams; they mopped

themselves with towels, wrung their drenched tunics out, making pools on

the floor. And after a brief rest they recommenced their dance.

Suddenly the dancers stopped, and fell with their faces to the ground. A

dead silence ensued, and again, as before the Queen’s entry, a reverent

whisper passed through the room.

“The King, the King!”

In came a man, of about thirty, arrayed in a long white semi-transparent

gown. He had a feminine face, like that of Akoulína Makejevna. It was not

Russian, yet of singular and winning beauty.

“Who is this?” asked Tichon.

“Christ, the Lord,” answered Mitka, who lay next to him.

Tichon learnt afterwards that he was a runaway Cossack, Averian by name,

the son of a Cossack and a captive Greek woman.

The King went up to the Queen, who respectfully rose before him, and

embraced and kissed her three times.

Coming into the middle of the room, he stepped upon a little round

platform, made of boards like those which cover springs.

Then all began to sing in a loud solemn voice:—

The seventh heaven opened,

A golden chariot descended,

Both golden and fiery.

The Holy Ghost Himself is driving,

His white horse is marvellous,

The tail is of strings of pearls,

Fire burns within its nostrils,

Its eyes are precious stones.

He descends, He descends,

Holy, Holy Spirit,

Come, come to us!

The King blessed his children, and again the dancing began, only more

frenzied than ever; the Queen at the end of the room, the King in the

centre of the whirling circles, alone remained motionless. From time

to time the King slowly raised his arms; and every time the dance grew

faster. Inhuman shrieks rose up:—

“Eva, Evoe; Eva, Evoe!”

Tichon remembered reading in old Latin commentaries of Pausanias, that

the ancient Bacchantes were supposed to greet the god Dionysus with

almost the same sounding cries: “Evan, Evoe!” By what miracle did

the mysteries of the dead god penetrate here, filtering by channels

of subterranean waters, from the summit of Mount Cithaeron into this

out-of-the-way corner of Moscow?

He contemplated the white troop of whirling dancers and at times he

lost consciousness. Time had stopped; everything had vanished; there

was nothing but whiteness, a white abyss, into which white birds were

falling. Nothing existed, he himself no longer existed. Only the white

precipice,—the white death.

He recovered when Yemelian took him by the hand, saying:—“Let us go!”

Although the daylight did not penetrate into the cellar, Tichon felt

that dawn was near. The burnt-down candles were smoking. The air was

unbearably close and unpleasant. The pools of sweat on the floor were

being mopped up with rags. The night watch had come to an end. The King

and the Queen had gone out. Some of the people, groping their way towards

the exit, crept along like stupefied flies. Others had fallen to the

ground and lay as in a deep swoon. Others, again, hanging their heads sat

on the benches with faces like drunkards taken with nausea. The white

birds had fallen to earth, mortally wounded.

After that night Tichon did not miss a single meeting, Mitka taught him

how to dance. At first he was shy, but he got used to it, and soon the

dance became a necessity to him.

Each time new mysteries were revealed to him.

Yet it seemed that the essential and most terrible mystery was as yet

concealed. From what he saw and heard he gathered that the brethren and

sisters lived in carnal intercourse.

“We Cherubin and angels, live in purity of the fire,” said they. “There

is no sin, when a brother and sister of the faith live together in true,

christian love; but vile and sinful is the wedlock sanctified by the

Church. Before God it is vile; before men insolent. A husband and wife

are the abode of the devil; children are unclean brats.”

Children born of husbands not belonging to this sect were exposed by

their mothers in public baths, or else strangled.

One day Mitka naïvely told Tichon that he lived with his own two sisters,

both nuns; while Yemelian, a teacher and prophet, had thirteen wives.

Whoever confessed to him had become his mistress. Tichon was naturally

troubled by these unspeakable revelations. For some days he avoided

Yemelian, and dared not look into his face. Yemelian noticed this

confusion, and said to him when alone:—

“Listen, young man, I will reveal to you a great mystery. If you wish

to live, mortify for God’s sake, not only your body, but your soul, your

reason, even your conscience. Free yourself of all rule and law, of all

virtue, of fasting, abstinence, virginity. Discard all sanctity. Descend

into yourself, as into a tomb. Then, mysteriously dead, you will rise and

the Holy Spirit will dwell within you and will not leave you whatever you

do.”

Yemelian’s ugly face, the faun-mask, lit up with such sly audacity that

great fear possessed Tichon; he asked himself whether he was in the

presence of a prophet or a madman.

“You are scandalised to see us commit what ordinary people call

immorality. We know that we do not conform to your code of morality.

Yet how can we help it? We have no will of our own. The spirit works

in us and our most frantic actions are the mysterious results of God’s

providence. To quote my own case, my conscience does not accuse me for

living with women; on the contrary it fills my heart with inexpressible

joy and sweetness. Should an angel come down from heaven and tell me,

‘Your life is evil, Yemelian,’ I would not listen to him. My God has

justified me, and who are you to judge. You know my sin, but you ignore

God’s grace towards me. You tell me ‘Repent,’ and I answer, ‘I have

nothing to repent of!’ He who has reached the goal, does not trouble

about the way he has come. If you banish us to Hell, we shall be saved

even there; send us to Paradise, we shall not find there greater joy than

here. We are immersed in the Spirit as a stone in water. Yet we have to

conceal ourselves; we assume guilelessness to prevent discovery. That’s

our position, my child.”

Yemelian looked at Tichon with an ambiguous smile, and the latter

experienced that same sensation which the dance roused in him: the

sensation of whirling flight. But whither? Whether up to God or down to

the devil he knew not.

One night during the week preceding Palm Sunday, the Queen distributed

small branches of palms and holy scourges, made of narrow twisted

napkins. The brethren let down their tunics to the waist, the sisters

lowered theirs, at the back down the waist, in front to their bosom, and

they all began to spin round, beating themselves with the scourges and

the palms. Some were singing:—

Serve the Lord,

Despise your bodies,

Serve the Lord,

Despise Martha.

Others chanted in a whistling tone:—

The lash whizzes through the air!

We are seeking Christ!

Many were beating themselves with bullets tied in rags, like slings;

others were cutting themselves with knives, blood was flowing. Looking at

the King, they all shouted:

“Eva, Evoe! Eva, Evoe!”

Tichon flogged himself with his scourge, and under the tender gaze of

Akoulína, who appeared to be looking at him alone, the pain became more

and more pleasant. Like wax before fire, so his body seemed to melt in

voluptuousness; he wished to melt and burn away before the Queen, like a

candle before an icon.

The lights now began to go out, one after another, as if the whirl of

the dance were blowing them out. Darkness ensued, and in the darkness

(as in the chapel of the “Self-burners” on the eve of the Red Death)

strange whispers, rustles, kisses and sighings of love were heard. Bodies

interlaced; they became in the vast darkness one immeasurable body. Eager

and tenacious hands reached out after Tichon, caught hold of him and

threw him down.

“Tichon, Tichon, darling, my bridegroom, my beloved Christ!” a passionate

voice whispered to him. He recognised it as the Queen’s.

It seemed to him that some huge insects, male and female spiders, had

rolled together and were devouring one another in loathsome lust.

He repulsed the Queen, leaped to his feet, and tried to escape. But at

each turn he came upon naked persons, stepped on them, slipped, fell,

and again rose. Meanwhile greedy and tenacious hands were clutching him,

seeking to detain him, caressing him with obscene caresses. He grew weak

and felt that he would soon sink into this terrible body of carnality, as

if absorbed into the dark warm mud of a hot swamp; that everything would

be reversed, and that in this final fear he would attain ecstasy.

With desperate effort he disengaged himself, rushed forward, reached the

door and caught hold of the handle. He tried to open it. It was locked.

He fell to the ground exhausted. Here there were fewer persons than in

the middle of the room, and he gained momentary rest.

Suddenly again, hands were touching him, little thin hands like those of

a child. He heard the stuttering of Marioushka the idiot; she was vainly

trying to speak. By degrees he caught several words.

“Come, come—— I will lead you out——” She dragged him by the hand. He felt

a key in the hand of the girl; and followed her.

She led him along the walls to the icons. Here she stopped and made him

do the same; then, raising a curtain which hung under the icon of Christ,

she found a little door, a kind of trap-door, opened it, disappeared into

it with the swiftness of a lizard. Tichon followed her. A subterranean

passage led them to a staircase, familiar to Tichon. They ascended and

entered the big room, where the worshippers changed their clothes. The

moon was looking through the window and the white tunics hung on the

walls resembled phantoms in its light.

When Tichon breathed the fresh air and saw through the window the blue

sparkling snow and the stars, immense joy filled his soul. He pressed

ecstatically the thin hand of Marioushka.

He noticed that she was no longer with child; and remembered Mitka saying

a few days ago, that she had been delivered of a boy. The child was

pronounced a little Christ, being born of the King by the will of the

Holy Spirit, not from the flesh, nor the will of man, but by the will of

God Himself.

Marioushka made Tichon sit down on a bench, placed herself next to him,

and again with great effort tried to speak. But instead of words, all

she could articulate was vague lowings of which he could make nothing.

Finding that she could not make herself understood, she stopped and

began to cry. He put his arm around her, and pressing her head against

his bosom, he began to caress her soft light hair, lighter still in the

moonlight. She was trembling, and it seemed to him that a captive bird

was fluttering in his arms.

At last she raised to him her large, limpid, dark blue eyes, two

cornflowers beaded with dew, and smiled through her tears, started as if

trying to catch a sound, straightened her neck, long, thin, like the stem

of a flower, and suddenly in a clear, silvery voice—the voice she used to

sing with in the night watches—she warbled into his ear. The stuttering

had disappeared, the words half sung, half whispered had become distinct.

“Ah, Tichon, my friend, save me from the fiends. They will kill

Ivanoushka——”

“What Ivanoushka?”

“My son, my poor little boy!”

“Why should they kill him?” said Tichon in bewilderment. She seemed to be

speaking in a delirium.

“In order to partake of the living blood,” she whispered, nestling to him

with infinite terror. “The little Christs they say, the stainless lambs,

are born in order to be killed, to give themselves for holy food to the

faithful. The child, they say, is not alive; he is but an appearance, a

holy icon, an imperishable body, which can neither suffer nor die—— but

they lie, the accursed ones, I know it, I know it, Tichon. My son is

alive. He is not a Christ, but Ivanoushka, my own darling! I will not

deliver him to anybody. I would rather perish than give him up—— Oh,

Tichon, save me from the enemy!”

Again the words became confused. At last she stopped, and leaning her

head on his shoulder, she lost consciousness or else fell asleep.

Day began to break. Steps were heard behind the door. Marioushka started,

as though ready to fly. They took leave of one another, Tichon promising

to save Ivanoushka.

“Poor little fool,” he said, trying to calm himself. “She does not know

what she is saying. I dare say it’s pure imagination on her part.”

A night watch had been fixed for the Thursday of Passover week. From

vague allusions Tichon had gathered that some great mystery was to be

enacted that night.

“Will it not be the one Marioushka spoke of?” he asked himself with

horror! He sought her everywhere, but she had disappeared, maybe she had

been purposely hid. The torpor of a nightmare held him. He dared not

think of what was going to happen, but for Marioushka’s sake he would at

once have fled.

On Thursday, about midnight, as usual they went to the night-service.

On entering the room, Tichon scanned carefully the faces of those

present, and it seemed to him that the same torpor of some awful

nightmare held everybody. They seemed to act against their own will.

The Queen was absent.

In came the King. His face, deadly pale, of extraordinary beauty,

reminded Tichon of the image of the god Bacchus Dionysus, as he had

seen it carved on stones and cameos, in the collection of antiquities

belonging to James Bruce.

The night-watch service began. Never yet had the dance whirled so madly.

It seemed white birds were flying in terror towards a white abyss.

To avoid rousing suspicion Tichon had also joined the dance, yet he

forced himself not to surrender up to its intoxication. He often stopped

and sat down on a bench, as if resting. He watched everybody, and thought

about Ivanoushka.

The wildest frenzy was now beginning to possess the dancers. They cried

with voices no longer their own, “He is descending!”

In spite of all his efforts Tichon felt he was growing weaker and losing

control over himself. He convulsively gripped the bench he was sitting

upon, in order to resist the impetuous desire to whirl away in this mad

dance, growing swifter and swifter at every moment. He suddenly shrieked

and felt himself lifted up and carried away by this hurricane.

A last roar of voices:—

“Eva, Evoe!”

Then suddenly all stopped and prostrated themselves on the ground as if

struck by lightning, covering their faces with their hands. The white

tunics on the floor resembled white wings.

“Here cometh the stainless lamb to offer himself as food for the

faithful!” These words were said by the Queen in a sepulchral, mysterious

voice from the subterranean apartment below. To Tichon it seemed to be

the voice of the Earth, the Bountiful Mother of All.

The Queen appeared. She held in her hands a large silver cup, a kind of

small baptismal font, in which on white swaddling clothes there lay a

naked infant. He was sound asleep; some sleeping draught had probably

been administered to him. Numerous burning tapers had been fixed on

a hoop round the foot of the cup; the flames, coming up to the rim,

surrounded the infant with a luminous aureola. He seemed to be lying in a

white water lily with a fiery nimbus.

The Queen brought the cup to the King, saying:—

“What is thine is brought to thee for the salvation of all.”

The King blessed the child with the sign of the cross.

“In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost!”

Then he took him in his hand and raised a knife over him.

Tichon lay prostrate on the ground, his face hid in his hands. Yet he

looked through his fingers and saw everything. It seemed to him the body

of the infant was radiant as the sun, that it was not Ivanoushka but the

mysterious Lamb, slain from the beginning of the world, and the face

of him who held the raised knife was the face of God. He was waiting

in great terror, and was wishing with an intense desire for the knife

to plunge into the white body and the living blood to be shed. Then

everything would be accomplished; in the final terror there would be the

final ecstasy.

Suddenly the child began to cry. The King smiled, and the smile

transformed the face of the god into the face of the beast.

“The beast, Satan, Antichrist!——” flashed across Tichon’s brain, and a

sudden intolerable, overwhelming anguish gripped his heart. At the same

moment some one seemed to rouse him and the spell was broken. He jumped

to his feet, rushed upon Averian Bespaly, caught hold of his hand and

averted the stab.

All jumped up and threw themselves on Tichon. They would have torn him

to pieces, had not heavy knocks at that moment sounded at the door. It

was being battered from the outside. The double doors gave way with

a crash, and fell forwards. In rushed Marioushka and, after her, men

in green kaftans, three-cornered hats, with drawn swords; they were

soldiers. To Tichon they seemed to be angels of God.

It grew dark before his eyes.

His shoulder felt heavy. He put up his hand and touched something warm

and sticky. It was blood. He had been probably wounded in the scuffle.

He closed his eyes and saw the red flames of a burning house, the Red

Death. White birds were flying into the red flames. He thought, “More

terrible than the Red Death is the White Death,” and fell senseless to

the ground.

CHAPTER II

The case of the heretics was investigated by the newly established Holy

Synod.

The runaway Cossack, Averian Bespaly, and his sister, Akoulína, were

condemned to suffer death on the wheel. The rest, after being flogged and

having their nostrils torn, were condemned, the men to forced labour, and

the women to weaving-workshops and prison-cloisters.

Tichon, who nearly died of his wound in the prison hospital, was saved

by his former protector, James Vilimovitch Bruce. Bruce took him to his

house to recover, and interceded with the Bishop of Novgorod, Feofan

Prokopovitch, on his behalf. Feofan became interested in Tichon; he

wanted to display towards him that pastoral mercy for erring sheep which

he was always preaching: “Opponents of the Church ought to be met with

kindness and reason, and not as they are nowadays with hard words and

alienation.” At the same time he hoped that Tichon’s abjuration of the

heresy and his return to the fold of the Orthodox Church would serve as

an example to other heretics and Raskolniks.

Bishop Feofan exempted Tichon from flogging and exile, and took him to

Petersburg to do penance in his house.

The bishop’s residence was situated on the Aptekarski Island in a dense

pine wood. The library was on the ground floor. Noticing Tichon’s love

for books, Feofan gave him permission to put his library in order. It was

summer and the days were hot. The windows, which looked straight into

the wood, were often left open. The peace of the wood mingled with the

peace of the library, the rustle of leaves with the rustle of pages. The

woodpecker and cuckoo could be heard. A couple of elks were visible in

the clearing of the wood; they had been brought here from the Petrovosky

Island, which was wild country at that time. A green twilight filled the

room. It was cool and pleasant within. Tichon spent whole days rummaging

among the books. He felt as if he had returned to the library of James

Bruce, and his four years of wanderings were but a dream.

Bishop Feofan was kind to him. He did not press him to return to the

Church. There being no Russian catechism, he chose for Tichon’s reading

some German theologians; when he was free he would talk with him about

what he had read and correct the Protestant teaching according to the

Greco-Russian Church. Otherwise Tichon had entire freedom to do what he

liked.

Tichon gave himself up to mathematics. In the calm, cold atmosphere of

reason he sought repose from those fires of madness; and the nightmares

of the Red and the White Death.

He re-read the philosopher Descartes, Leibnitz and Spinoza. And the words

of Pastor Glück, would often come back to him: “True philosophy, when

read superficially leads away from God; when studied deeply, leads to

Him.”

To Descartes God was the prime mover of the first matter. The universe

was a machine. There was neither love nor mystery nor life, nothing

except reason, which is reflected in all worlds, as light is reflected

in the transparent crystals of the ice. Tichon was frightened by this

lifeless God.

“Nature is full of life,” asserted Leibnitz in his Monadology, “I will

prove that the origin of every movement is the spirit, and the spirit

is a living monad, which is made up of ideas, as the centre is made up

of angels.” All monads are united into a whole by the pre-established

harmony of God. “The universe is God’s clock, horologium Dei.” “Again

instead of life, a machine; instead of God, mechanics,” thought Tichon,

and once more dread took hold of him.

But the most dreadful, because the most lucid, was Spinoza. He expressed

what the others dared not say. “To assert that God took on Himself the

nature of man, is as foolish as to assert that a circle had assumed

the nature of a triangle or a square. ‘The word became flesh’ is an

Eastern phrase, which has no meaning whatever in the light of reason.

Christianity is distinguished from other religions not by faith nor by

love, nor by its gifts of the Holy Spirit, but only by the fact that it

is founded on a miracle, that is ignorance, which is the source of all

evil, and in this way the faith itself is transformed into superstition.”

Spinoza revealed the secret thought of all modern philosophers: either

with Christ against reason or with reason against Christ.

One day Tichon spoke of Spinoza to Bishop Feofan.

“This philosophy is based on absurdities,” declared the bishop with a

disdainful smile. “He has woven his reasoning out of contradictions and

hid his lack of intelligence in pompous and sonorous words.”

This abuse neither convinced nor tranquillized Tichon. The works of

the foreign theologians also helped him but little; they dismissed all

ancient and modern philosophers as easily as the Russian bishop had done

Spinoza.

Sometimes Feofan would let Tichon copy papers concerning the affairs

of the Holy Synod. He was struck by the wording of the oath in the

Ecclesiastical Regulations: “I swear to recognise as supreme judge

of this College the Monarch of all the Russians, our most gracious

Sovereign.” The Sovereign—the head of the Church, the Sovereign in the

place of Christ!

“Magnus ille Leviathan, quae Civitas appelatur, officium artis est et

Homo artificialis.” Tichon remembered reading those words in “Leviathan,”

written by the English philosopher Hobbes, who asserted that the

Church should be part of the Empire, a member of the great Leviathan,

the gigantic automaton. “Is it not the image of the beast created in

the image of the god-beast, which is spoken of in Revelation?” Tichon

wondered.

The cold reasonableness of this lifeless church of a lifeless God chilled

Tichon and became as unbearable to him as the fire of passionate madness,

the fire of the Red and White Death.

The day had been fixed when Tichon should be solemnly anointed with holy

baptismal oils in the Troïtsa Church, as a mark of his return to the

Orthodox Church.

On the eve of that day Bishop Feofan had visitors.

In his Latin letters, Feofan termed such assemblies “noctes atticae.”

Pickles and fumados were served and washed down with the famous beer

brewed by Father Gerasem, that stout economist. They discoursed on

philosophy and the “laws of nature” in a free “liberal” tone, that is,

they talked atheism.

Tichon listened to the conversation from the glazed gallery which united

the dining room with the library.

“Disputes on the subject of faith can never arise between men of great

intelligence,” Bruce was saying, “for an intelligent man does not

question the faith of another. Be he Lutheran, Calvinist or Pagan, it is

not the faith but the actions and character alone which count.”

“_Ubi boni vini non est quaerenda regio, sic nec boni viri religio et

patria_,” replied Feofan.

“Those who condemn philosophy are either ignorant or else over-cunning

priests,” remarked Basil Nikitch Tatesheff, President of the Mine

Department.

Father Marcellus, a learned monk, demonstrated that many of the records

of the lives of saints are without foundation in fact.

“There is much deception, much deception”; he repeated the celebrated

saying of Theodosius.

“Miracles don’t happen nowadays,” agreed Doctor Blumentrost.

“I went to see a friend recently,” began Tolstoi with a malicious smile,

“and there I met two non-commissioned officers. They were arguing

together. One affirmed, the other denied the existence of God. The

free-thinker cried, ‘Don’t waste your breath, there is no God.’ I joined

in the conversation and asked, ‘Who told you that God did not exist?’

‘Sub-lieutenant Ivanoff told it me so yesterday, at the Gostinni-Dvor.’

‘He has chosen a nice place to announce it in, indeed,’ said I.”

All laughed.

But Tichon, again, grew afraid. He saw the end of all this. He felt

certain that these men were on a road which it was impossible not to

follow to that end; and that sooner or later, they, the Russians, would

reach the stage which had already been reached in Europe; and either

stand with Christ against reason, or with reason against Christ.

He returned to the library and sat down at the window next to the wall,

lined with books in uniform leather parchment bindings. He gazed at the

sky, white over the black pines, the empty lifeless abyss of the sky, and

remembered the words of Spinoza.

“There is as much in common between God and man as between the

constellation of the Dog and the barking animal. Man can love God, but

God cannot love man.”

And it seemed to him that in that lifeless sky there dwelt a lifeless

God, incapable of love. It were better to know that God did not exist.

“Perhaps He really does not exist,” he thought, and he felt the same

terror as in the moment when the baby Ivanoushka cried and Averian, with

his raised knife, had smiled.

Tichon fell on his knees and began to pray. Looking up to heaven he

repeated one word again and again:—

“Lord, Lord, Lord!”

But the heavens remained silent. Silence was in Tichon’s heart. Infinite

silence, infinite terror.

Suddenly out of the depths of this silence a voice replied and told him

what had to be done.

Tichon straightway rose, went into his cell, pulled his sack out from

under the bed, took from it his old monk’s habit, the leathern belt, the

rosary, the hood, the little icon of St. Sophia, the Wisdom of God, given

to him by the girl Sophia; he took off his kaftan and the rest of the

foreign dress he wore, put on the religious habit, fastened round his

shoulders the wallet, took the staff, made the sign of the cross and,

unnoticed by any one, passed out of the house into the wood.

The next morning, when it was time to go to church for the rite of

anointing, Tichon was called. For a long time he was vainly sought; he

had disappeared, leaving no trace behind him. Had he vanished into space?

CHAPTER III

Tradition says that the Apostle Andrew, who had come from Kiev to

Novgorod, crossed in a boat to the island Varlaam, in the Lake Ládoga,

and planted there a stone cross. And long before the conversion of Russia

to Christianity, two monks, St. Sergius and St. Herman, came to Russia

from the Orient and founded a monastery on the Isle of Varlaam.

And from that day the Christian faith gleamed in the North, like a holy

lamp in the arctic midnight gloom.

The Swedes, on taking possession of Lake Ládoga, several times destroyed

the monastery. In 1611 they razed it to the ground. For a century the

isle remained abandoned. In 1715 Tsar Peter ordered the reconstruction

of the monastery. A small wooden church was built over the tombs of St.

Sergius and St. Herman in honour of the Transfiguration of Our Lord, a

few humble cells were erected around it, to which monks from the Kirilo

Beloserski Monastery were transferred. The light of the Christian faith

was lit anew. According to prophesy it would remain there until the

Second Coming.

Tichon escaped from Petersburg in the company of a monk belonging to the

sect of the Runners.

The Runners taught that true believers, in order to escape Antichrist,

should flee from town to town, village to village, unto the ends of the

earth. The monk invited Tichon to follow him to an unknown kingdom,

Oponskoye. This kingdom consisted of seventy islands on the “White

Waters,” where, in its one hundred and seventy-nine churches of the

Assyrian tongue, the Old Faith was supposed to have remained intact. It

lay beyond Gog and Magog at the ends of the earth, where the sun rose.

“With God’s help we shall reach it walking, in ten years,” said the monk.

Tichon had no strict belief in the existence of this Oponskoye kingdom,

but he went with the Runner; it was a matter of indifference to him where

and with whom he went.

The pair reached Ládoga on rafts and went on board a small lake-vessel

bound for Serdobal. On the way a storm overtook them. For a long time the

vessel was tossed about by the waves and narrowly escaped being wrecked.

At last they succeeded in entering the harbour of the Varlaam Monastery.

The storm subsided towards morning, but the boat needed repairs.

Tichon went ashore.

The island was of granite, with high cliffs overhanging the water. The

soil was so shallow that only small trees could grow there. On the other

hand there was moss in abundance; it spread over the roots of the pines

like cobwebs and hung down from the trunks in long green tufts.

The day was hot and misty. The sky, milky white, with the blue just

peeping through it, merged with the glassy surface of the lake, so that

it was impossible to tell where the water ended and sky began. The

heavens appeared to be the lake, the lake the heavens. The quietness

was absolute, even the birds were silent. Tichon’s soul was filled with

infinite calm and peace by this gentle austere arctic paradise. He

remembered the song he used to sing in the woods of the Banks of Mosses.

Wonderful Mother Solitude....

A monk of Varlaam had once told him: “Our island is a paradise. You might

wander for three days in the woods without meeting any one, either wild

beasts or outcasts! You are alone with God!”

Tichon wandered for a long time, further and further from the Monastery,

till at last he lost his way. Evening came. He was afraid the boat would

go without him.

To discover his whereabouts he climbed a hill. The slope was overgrown

with pines. On the summit there was a round clearing, purple with

heather. A black rock stood in the middle, shaped like a pillar.

Tichon was fatigued. He found at the end of the clearing between the

pines a cavity in the rock covered with soft moss. He laid down in it, as

in a cradle, and fell asleep.

When he awoke again it was night. It was almost as light as in daytime,

only more peaceful still. The shores of the island were reflected in

the mirror of the lake to the last cross of the pine-tree tips, so that

it seemed a lower island, only reversed and joined to the upper and

suspended between two skies. On the rock in the middle of the glade an

old man was kneeling, perhaps some hermit who lived in the forest. His

black profile against the golden dawn remained motionless, as if carved

from the stone on which he knelt. His face expressed such pious ecstasy

as Tichon had never yet seen in a human countenance. The silence around

seemed as if due to this prayer, while the sweetness of the heather rose

like the smoke of incense.

Daring neither to breathe nor to move he gazed for a long time at the old

man, prayed with him and in the infinite sweetness of that prayer again

became drowsy and fell asleep again.

He awoke with the rising sun.

There was no one on the rock. Tichon approached it and noticed in the

thick heather a narrow path. He followed it. It led into a valley

surrounded by rocks. Further down was a birch grove, in the middle of it

a glade overgrown with tall grass. He heard the ripple of a hidden stream.

A hermit stood in the glade. It was he whom Tichon had seen in the night.

He was feeding an elk doe and her young one.

Tichon could scarcely believe his eyes. He knew how timid the elks were,

especially the female with their young. Had he suddenly surprised and lit

upon some eternal mystery of those ancient days when man and beast dwelt

together in Paradise?

Having eaten the bread the elk began to lick the old man’s hand. He

blessed her with sign of the cross, kissed her shaggy head and said:—

“May the Lord protect thee, mother!”

All at once she looked round backwards in alarm, jumped to one side and

rushed with her young one into the wood. Nothing could be heard but the

crackling of branches. She had probably scented Tichon.

He approached the old man.

“Give me your blessing, Father!”

The hermit blessed him gently as he had blessed the elk. “The Lord

protect you, child! What is your name?”

“Tichon.”

“Tichon! Tichon is a word of peace. Whence come you? This place is but a

desert and little known. It’s seldom we see pilgrims.”

“We were going to Serdobal from Ládoga,” answered Tichon, “when our

vessel was driven by the storm to this island. I went into the wood

yesterday and lost my way.”

“Did you spend the night in the wood?”

“Yes, in the wood.”

“Have you had any food? You must be hungry?”

The piece of bread Tichon had had with him he had eaten the night before.

He was hungry now.

“Come to the cell, Tichon, I will share with you what God has sent me.”

Father Sergius (this was the hermit’s name) to judge by the greyness

of his black hair was probably about fifty. Yet his walk and all his

movements were as brisk and nimble as those of a young man. His face,

dry and austere, was nevertheless young. His brown, short-sighted eyes

were always screwed up, as though smiling with an irrepressible smile,

almost frolicsome, slightly cunning: it looked as if he knew of something

amusing which others did not know, and was just going to tell it and make

every one laugh. But at the same time in the gaiety there was that air of

assured peace Tichon had noticed during the prayer.

They came to an abrupt rocky cliff. Beds planted with vegetables were

visible through a dilapidated wattle fence. On three sides the walls of

the cliff here formed a natural habitation. The fourth, or front, was of

wood. Logs had been placed across the entrance and provided with a window

and door. Over the latter an icon of the holy patrons of Varlaam, St.

Sergius and St. Herman. The roof between the cliff walls was of turf,

covered with bark and overgrown with moss, surmounted by an octagonal

cross. The valley ended in a sandbank which had been deposited on the

shore of the lake by the stream flowing into it at this place. Nets

stretched on sticks were drying in the sun. Another old monk, clothed in

a patched cassock made of coarse stuff, his naked legs up to the knees

in water, was mending and tarring an overturned boat. He was a robust,

square-shouldered man with a weather-beaten face and white scanty hair.

“A real Apostle Peter,” thought Tichon. The air was filled with a smell

of pine chips, fish and tar.

“Hilarionoushka,” Father Sergius called out. The old man turned round,

left off his work, approached them and silently prostrated himself before

Tichon.

“Don’t be alarmed, child,” said Father Sergius with a smile, noticing

Tichon’s confusion. “He salutes everybody in this manner, even little

children. He is so humble!” Continuing “Will you prepare our supper,

Hilarionoushka? We must give this pilgrim of God some food.”

Father Hilarion rose and closely examined Tichon. His “humble” gaze did

not lack severity. His look expressed that saying of St. Arsenius, the

hermit of Thebaid, “Love all men, and flee from the face of any man.”

The cell was divided into two. The front portion, quite small, resembled

the interior of a peasant’s hut; the other at the back had its walls

covered with icons, which were cheerful, like Father Sergius himself.

There was an icon of the Holy Virgin of the Merciful, one of the

Odoriferous Flower, one of the Blessed Womb, one of the Bestower of Life,

one of the Unhoped-for Joy. Before this last one, specially beloved by

Father Sergius, a lamp was burning. In this part of the cave, dark and

narrow as the grave, lay two coffins with stone pillows therein. In these

the old men used to sleep.

They sat down to the meal. A board laid on a moss-covered pine trunk

served as a table, Father Hilarion brought bread and salt, wooden bowls

with sour cabbage, salted cucumbers, mushroom soup, and a dish prepared

of sweet-smelling herbs.

Father Sergius and Tichon ate in silence while Father Hilarion recited a

Psalm:—

“The eyes of all wait upon thee, O Lord, and thou givest them their meat

in due season.”

After the meal Father Hilarion returned to his boat. Father Sergius and

Tichon sat down on the stone steps which led to the cell. Before them lay

the lake—another sky,—pale blue, smooth and tranquil, reflecting large

round white clouds.

“Have you made a vow of pilgrimage, my child?” enquired Father Sergius.

Tichon looked at him and longed to tell him the whole truth.

“I have made a great vow, Father. I am seeking through this world for the

_true Church_.”

And he recounted his whole life, beginning with his flight from

Antichrist and ending with a last abjuration of the lifeless Orthodox

Church of the day.

When he had ended Father Sergius remained for a long time silent, shading

his face with both hands. Then he rose and laid his hand on Tichon’s head

and said:—

“Thus spoke the Lord Himself: ‘and him that cometh to Me I will in no

wise cast out.’ Go then to the Lord Himself, my son, in peace. Fear

nothing, you will then be in the Church again, in the true Church! in the

true Church!”

Such power breathed through these words that he seemed to be prophesying.

“I implore you, Father,” exclaimed Tichon, falling at his feet, “let me

be your disciple! Let me remain here with you in the forest.”

“Remain here, my child, and the Lord bless you.” Father Sergius embraced

and kissed him. “You will not disturb our peace,” he added with his

habitual cheerful smile.

So Tichon remained in the desert with the two old men.

Father Hilarion fasted very strictly. Sometimes for weeks he would not

taste bread. He kept himself alive with pine bark, which he dried,

crushed in a mortar and baked with a little flour. He drank from

land-locked pools water which was tepid and tasted of rust. In the winter

he prayed standing up to his knees in snow. In the summer he would

remain naked in the marshes offering his body for food to the midges.

He never washed, following the precept of the Holy Isaac Sirine: “On no

account uncover your members. If you feel a desire to scratch cover your

hand with your shirt or trousers, and then only scratch. Never touch your

bare body or privy members with your hand. If your body suffers, let it

do so.”

Father Hilarion sometimes spoke to Tichon about his teacher Trifon, a

monk at the Kirilo Beloserski Monastery. This Trifon had been surnamed

the Sordid, because of his saintly sordidness, through which, it was

said, he had the special gift of prophecy. Water had never wetted his

feet nor his head; and yet he had no vermin on him, which caused him

distress, “For,” said he, “in the future life I shall be overrun by fleas

big as mice.” He repeated day and night the Lord’s prayer; his lips were

so used to saying it that they moved now perpetually, by instinct. On

his forehead, by dint of resting his fingers thereon in endlessly making

signs of the cross, there was a sore. When officiating he often wept so

abundantly that he used to swoon. During the eight days which preceded

his death he suffered a great deal, but never complained, never moaned

nor begged for a drink. When he was asked, “Father, have you much pain?”

he answered, “All is well!” One day Father Hilarion had gently crept up

to him and heard him murmur: “Oh for a good mouthful of water!” “Are you

thirsty?” asked Hilarion. But Trifon answered aloud “No. I do not want to

drink.” And by this Hilarion understood that Father Trifon was tormented

by a great thirst, but that he had imposed this upon himself as a supreme

privation.

“Notwithstanding all these fasts and works and prayers,” said Father

Hilarion, “it is almost impossible for a man to be saved. According to

a certain saint, out of thirty thousand souls which left the body only

two got into Heaven; the rest went to Hell. The devil is very powerful,”

Father Hilarion would sometimes sigh in great affliction: he seemed

doubtful as to which was the stronger, which would conquer, God or the

Devil.

At times it seemed to Tichon that should Father Hilarion press his

thought he would arrive at the same conclusion as the teachers of the Red

Death.

Father Sergius differed exceedingly from Father Hilarion. “An extravagant

and unreasonable abstinence,” said he, “does more harm than eating

sufficient food. Every one ought to decide for himself the amount of

food he should eat. It is right to taste all foods, even those which are

pleasant, for to the pure all things are pure. Every creature and gift of

God is good and none should be despised.”

Salvation, he said, depended not on the accomplishment of extraordinary

actions, but on the inward life. Every night he prayed, standing

motionless on the rock, and Tichon felt that in that motionlessness there

was yet a more powerful impulse than in all the furious dance of the

“Khlisti.”

“How should one pray?” Tichon one day asked Father Sergius.

“In thought,” the latter answered, “descend into your own heart and say

‘Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy upon me!’ You can pray while

standing, sitting or lying down. Confine your reason in your own heart;

and keep back, as much as possible, your breathing. At first you will

discover within yourself deep darkness and great hardness; you will feel

an obstacle, a kind of triple rampart of brass between God and yourself;

but do not get discouraged. Pray all the more perseveringly. At last the

brazen barrier will fall, and an ineffable light will fall, too, upon

your heart. Words will cease, and your prayer will change into sighs,

genuflections, yearnings of the heart and gentle sorrowings. This is the

perfect peace. This is the great ecstasy. Man no longer knows whether

he is within his body or without it. This is the awe and the vision of

God. _Therein Man and God are fused, and become one_; and the prophet’s

words, ‘God unites himself to a god, and will be known by a god,’ is

accomplished. That is what mental prayer is, my child.”

Tichon noticed that in speaking to him Father Sergius had the same

exalted, almost intoxicated, look the Khlisti had, only their drunkenness

was momentary and frantic; his, lasting and peaceable.

Father Hilarion and Father Sergius were so different in character that

it might have been imagined they could never get on together. Yet they

lived in perfect harmony.

“Father Sergius is a chosen vessel,” Hilarion used to say; “God has

chosen him for honour and me for dishonour. He is made of white ivory

and I of black. To him everything will be forgiven. From me everything

will be demanded. He soars like an angel, while I creep like an ant. His

salvation is certain, while mine is scarcely probable. But when I feel

myself perishing I will seize the hem of the skirt of Father Sergius, and

he will lift me up with him, perhaps.”

“Father Hilarion is a solid rock, a pillar of orthodoxy, an impregnable

wall,” Father Sergius used to say. “I am but a leaf driven by the wind.

But for him I should have fallen long since, and wandered away from all

the ancient traditions. He is my bulwark. I am as safe with him as in the

bosom of Christ.”

Father Sergius did not repeat to Father Hilarion his conversation with

Tichon, but Hilarion guessed everything. He scented a heretic, as the

wolf scents the lamb. One day Tichon by chance overheard a conversation

between the two hermits.

“Be patient, Hilarionoushka,” besought Sergius. “Be patient with him for

Christ’s sake! Live in peace and charity with him.”

“In peace with a heretic!” retorted Hilarion, “a heretic must be fought

with unto death. His pernicious spirit must be avoided. Love your own

enemies, not God’s. Shun a heretic, never talk to him about the true

faith, only spit on him. Truly he is worse than dogs or swine. Let him be

accursed, anathema!”

“Be patient, Hilarionoushka,” repeated Father Sergius, but his voice half

wavered.

Tichon went away apart. He suddenly realized that it was vain for him to

expect help from Father Sergius: this great saint, strong as an angel

before the Lord, was as weak as a child before men.

A few days later Tichon was again sitting with Father Sergius on the

stone steps which led to the cell. They were alone. Father Hilarion had

gone off fishing.

It was a hot white night, darkened by clouds. A storm had been beating

up for some days. On the earth there was absolute quiet, while on the sky

heavy silent clouds were sweeping across, like dumb giants hurrying to

a battle. From time to time a gentle, distant subterrannean rumbling as

of thunder was heard, like the grunting of a great sleeping animal. Pale

violet lightning flashed in the sky, as though the night was trembling

with apprehension. And at each repeated flash the lake reflected clearly

in every detail the island, even to the last cross on the pine-tree tops;

all the double island suspended between two skies. And after each flash

all relapsed into peace and gloom, only disturbed by the low muttering of

the thunder.

Tichon remained silent, while Father Sergius gazing at the darkness sang

a litany to Jesus. And the gentle words of the prayer mingled with the

gentle rumbling of the thunder.

Jesus, invisible force,

Jesus, infinite mercy,

Jesus, luminous beauty,

Jesus, unspeakable love,

Jesus, Son of the living God,

Jesus, have mercy on me, a sinner!

Tichon felt that Father Sergius wanted to say something to him, but

could not make up his mind to do it. Darkness had hidden the monk’s face

from him, but the swift flashes occasionally revealed on it an unwonted

sadness.

“Father!” said Tichon, at last breaking the silence, “I shall soon leave

you.”

“Where are you going, my son?”

“I do not know, Father, and it does not really matter. I will go straight

before me——”

Father Sergius took him by the hand and Tichon heard a trembling tender

whisper:—

“Return, return, my son!”

“Where to?” asked Tichon, and he felt afraid, not knowing why.

“To the Church, to the Church of God,” whispered Father Sergius, more and

more tenderly and in a more and more trembling voice.

“Into what Church, Father?”

“Oh temptation, temptation!——” sighed Father Sergius, then continued

with an effort, “into the one holy apostolic Church—” but his words

sounded sad and forced; as if he had not spoken them of his own free will.

“And where is this Church to be found?” groaned Tichon in great anguish.

“Ah, my poor, poor son, how is it possible to live without a church?”

Father Sergius murmured, and his voice expressed sympathy and great

anguish. Tichon felt that the hermit had understood him.

In the flashes of the lightning he saw the face of the old man with its

trembling lips and helpless smile, its wide open eyes filled with tears,

and Tichon understood what it was that filled him with such fear: the

fact that this face could be so pitiable.

Tichon knelt and stretched his hands out to Father Sergius with a forlorn

hope.

“Save me, help me, protect me!—— Don’t you see for yourself the Church

is actually perishing, the faith is perishing, the whole of Christianity

is perishing? Already the mystery of lawlessness _is_ being enacted, the

abomination of desolation _is_ in the holy places. Antichrist is being

born!—— Arise, Father, for a great work! Return to the world, yourself to

fight against Antichrist!”

“What are you saying, child? How can I, sinner that I am?” muttered

Father Sergius, with terrified humility.

Tichon understood that all supplications would be vain, that Father

Sergius had for ever cut himself off from the world, and was dead to it.

Tichon remembered the terrible words, “Love all men and flee from the

face of any of them.” “And what if it be truly so,” he thought, in great

despair, “what if one of the two had to be chosen? Either God without the

world, or the world without God?”

He fell with his face to the ground and remained there for a long time

motionless, unconscious of the hermit’s caressing and comforting hand.

When he came to himself he was alone. Father Sergius had probably gone

into the mountain to pray.

Tichon rose, entered the cell, slipped on his travelling habit, put round

his shoulders his wallet, on his neck the icon of St. Sophia, the Wisdom

of God, took up his staff, made the sign of the cross and went into the

wood to continue his endless wanderings. He wanted to go away without

taking leave of the hermit, for he knew farewells would be too painful

for them both.

Yet in order to have a last look at Father Sergius, if only from the

distance, he went into the mountain.

There in the middle of the glade stood as usual the old man praying on

his rock.

Tichon sought the cavity in the rock, the cradle lined with soft moss

where he had spent the first night, lay down in it and for a long time

continued to look at the motionless outline of the praying monk, the

blinding, dazzling white flashes of lightning and the silent clouds which

swept across the sky.

At last he fell into that slumber into which the disciples of our Lord

had fallen when the Master was praying in Gethsemane and coming towards

them found them asleep, being heavy with sorrow. When he awoke the

sun had already risen and Father Sergius had left the stone. Tichon

approached it and kissed the place where the old man had stood. Then he

left the mountain and took his way along narrow paths through the woods

towards the Varlaam Monastery.

After the heavy sleep he felt weak and broken, as after a swoon. He

seemed to be sleeping still, wanting and yet unable to awake. He was

filled with that deep anguish which used to forbode his fits. He felt

dizzy. His thought grew confused. Snatches of distant memories flashed

across his mind. Now it was Pastor Glück repeating Newton’s words

about the end of the world: “a comet will fall into the sun and this

will cause a heat so intense that the whole world will be consumed by

fire. Hypotheses non fingo!” Now it was the melancholy song of the

“Coffin-liers”—

Ye hollowed oak-trunks, ye will prove

Fit house for us....

Now it was the last cry of the victims in the blazing chapel, “The

bridegroom cometh at midnight.” Now the mad whirl of the dancers and the

piercing shriek:—

“Eva, Evoe! Eva, Evoe!”

Now it was the gentle cry of Ivanoushka, the stainless lamb, crying under

the knife of Averian—The quiet words of Spinoza about the intellectual

love of God, _Amor Dei intellectualis_, “Man can love God but God cannot

love man”—The oath in the ecclesiastical regulations which ordained

obedience to the Autocrat of Russia as to Christ Himself—The austere

humility of Father Hilarion: “Love all men and flee from any man,”—The

affectionate whisper of Father Sergius, “Return to the Church, the true

Church, my child.”

He recovered for a moment, looking round him and saw that he had lost his

way.

For a long time he searched for the path among the heather. At last he

gave it up and went on at random. The storm had passed over. The clouds

had dispersed; the sun was very hot. Tichon was thirsty, yet not a drop

of water could he find in this stony desert. Nothing but grey mosses,

lichen, stunted pines overgrown with moss as with the cobweb; their thin

trunks, often broken, stretched out like the thin arms and legs of sick

people, covered with a reddish inflamed and peeling skin. Between them

the air trembled with heat and over all was spread an implacable sky like

copper heated to white heat. The stillness was intense. Inexpressible was

the terror of this dazzling, sparkling, midday stillness.

Tichon again looked round and recognised the place he had often

frequented and had only passed this morning. At the very end of the long

glade of the forest, a road made probably once by the Swedes, but long

since abandoned and overgrown by heather, glittered the lake. This was

a spot not far from the cell of Father Sergius. He had probably on his

wanderings made a circle and returned to the place whence he had started.

He was tired as if he had walked a thousand miles, as if he had been ever

walking. He asked himself whither he was going, and why? To the unknown

kingdom of Oponskoye or the invisible legendary city of Kitesh, places in

whose existence he no longer believed.

He sank in exhaustion on the roots of a dry old pine, which rose solitary

above the undergrowth. It was all the same, there was nowhere else he

could go. Could he but lie thus with closed eyes, motionless, on, on

until his death!

He remembered what he had been told by a teacher of a new religion. Those

teachers were called “Deniers,” because they answered every affirmation

of the Church with a negative. “There is no church, no clergy, no grace,

no mystery. Everything has been taken up into heaven.” “There is nothing,

there was nothing, there will be nothing,” thought Tichon. “Neither God

nor the universe exist. Everything had perished, everything had come to

an end. And even whether there is an end is doubtful. Nothing is sure but

the eternity of nothingness.”

He remained for a long time unconscious. Suddenly he recovered, opened

his eyes and saw on the west a huge black cloud spotted, as it were,

with purulent white spots. Slowly like a gigantic scorpion, with fat

protruding belly and hairy legs, it was creeping up almost stealthily

towards the sun. It stretched out a leg, and the sun trembled and went

out. Rapid grey shadows flitted across the ground and the air became

dim and sticky, as with cobwebs. Warm currents of air passed as though

exhaled from the mouth of an animal. Tichon was suffocating. His head

throbbed, it grew dim before his eyes. Cold sweat, produced by excessive

fatigue, bathed his body. He wanted to rise and creep to the cell of

Father Sergius, and die in his presence, but strength failed him. He

tried to cry out and could not.

Suddenly, far in the distance, quite at the end of the clearing, in the

dark cloud something white appeared, and trembled like a white dove

bathed in sunshine. As it drew nearer Tichon looked attentively and saw

that it was a small, old man, quite white, who was coming towards him

with quick movements as though floating in the air.

He came quite near and sat down next to him on the root of the pine.

Tichon felt he had seen him before, only he could not remember where and

when. The old man had quite an ordinary appearance. He seemed to be one

of those pilgrims who wander icon in hand from village to village, town

to town, collecting money for the building of a new church.

“Rejoice Tichon, rejoice!” he said with a tender smile; his voice was as

gentle as the hum of bees, or the distant sound of a bell.

“Who are you?” asked Tichon.

“I am Ivanoushka. Don’t you recognise me? The Lord has sent me to you. He

will soon follow me.”

The old man laid his hand on the head of Tichon, who felt appeased, as a

child by the caress of its mother.

“You are weary. Poor child! I have many children like you. You wander

about the world poor and abandoned. You suffer cold and famine, sorrow,

privation and cruel persecutions. Yet fear not, beloved. Wait a little,

I will soon unite you all in the new Church, the Church of Christ who is

to Come. There was the ancient Church of Peter the indestructible rock.

There will be the new Church of John, the Winged Thunder. The Thunder

will strike the rock and out will gush the living waters. The first

Testament was the Old, the kingdom of the Father; the second Testament,

the New, or the Kingdom of the Son; the third Testament, or the last, the

Kingdom of the Spirit, one in three and three in one. And the three make

but one. Faithful is the Lord who promises, who is and was and is to be!”

The old man’s countenance suddenly became quite young. It was the face of

an immortal. Tichon recognised John, the Son of Thunder.

The old man raised his arm towards the black sky and cried with a loud

voice:—

“The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come.

He which testifieth these things, saith, Surely I come quickly, Amen.

Even so, come, Lord Jesus!”

“Even so, come, Lord Jesus,” repeated Tichon; he too raised his hand to

the sky with great joy akin to great fear.

A lightning flashed white across the black sky; it seemed the heavens

were literally rent in twain.

And Tichon saw the image of a Son of man, his head and his hair were

white like wool, as white as the snow; and his eyes were as a flame of

fire; and his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace;

and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength. And seven

thunders uttered their voices:—

“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, which was and is and is to

come!”

And when the thunders stopped a great silence ensued, and through the

stillness sounded a voice more quiet than the stillness:—

“I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.

I am alive and was dead and shall live from eternity to eternity. Amen.”

“Amen,” repeated John, the Son of Thunder.

“Amen,” repeated Tichon, the first Son of the new Church of the Spirit.

He fell upon his face as one dead. He was struck dumb for ever.

* * * * *

He recovered in the cell of Father Sergius. The hermit had been troubled

about Tichon the whole day. He had a vague presentiment that some evil

would befall him. Again and again he came out of his cell, calling,

“Tichon, Tichon,” but no one replied, the echo alone broke the hush which

precedes thunderstorms.

When the cloud spread over the sky it grew dark as night in the cell. A

lighted lamp shone dimly at the far end where both monks were praying.

Father Hilarion was chanting the psalm:—

“The voice of the Lord is upon the waters: the God of glory thundereth:

the Lord is upon many waters.

“The voice of the Lord is powerful; the voice of the Lord is full of

majesty.”

Suddenly a dazzling white light filled the cell, followed by such a

deafening peal of thunder that it almost seemed as if the rock, forming

the cell, had been shattered.

The two old men ran out and saw the dry pine, which rose by itself above

the underwood on the border of the clearing, was burning like a candle,

against the black sky. The lightning had struck it.

Father Sergius began to run, crying in a loud voice, “Tichon! Tichon!”

Father Hilarion followed him. They found Tichon lying unconscious at

the very foot of the burning tree. They lifted him up, and carried him

into the cell, where they laid him, there being no other bed, in one of

the coffins. At first they thought he had been killed by the lightning.

Father Hilarion was getting ready to say the prayers for the dying, but

Father Sergius stopped him and began to read the Gospels. When he came

to the passage, “_Verily, verily I say unto you, the hour is coming and

now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they

that hear shall live_,” Tichon opened his eyes. Father Hilarion almost

fell to the ground. He thought Father Sergius had raised the dead.

Tichon soon recovered. He got up and sat down on a bench. He recognised

Father Sergius and Father Hilarion, understood all they said to him, but

unable to speak himself, answered by signs. At last they saw that he was

dumb. They surmised that the sudden shock had robbed him of his speech.

His face was radiant. There was something awe-inspiring in this radiance,

as though he had really risen from the dead.

They sat down to a meal. Tichon ate and drank. After the meal they

prayed. For the first time Father Hilarion prayed with Tichon. He seemed

to have forgotten he was a heretic and felt towards him a reverence

mingled with awe.

Then they went to bed. The old men as usual in their coffins, Tichon in

the front room on the stove.

The storm was raging; the wind howled; rain was pouring down. Waves were

beating up on the lake; the thunder rolled and the window was illumined

by an almost uninterrupted white light, which mingled with the red light

of the lamp, burning in the depths of the cave before the image of the

“Unhoped-for Joy.” Yet to Tichon that was no lightning but the white

radiant light of the old man who was bending over him, talking to him

about the Church of the Sons of Storm, caressing and loving him. He fell

asleep to the noise of the storm, as a child to the lullaby of its mother.

He woke early, long before the dawn. Hurriedly dressing himself he took

up his staff, went up to Father Sergius, who was yet asleep in his

coffin, like Father Hilarion, knelt and kissed his forehead very gently,

so as not to wake him. Father Sergius opened his eyes for a moment,

raised his head, and murmured “Tichon!” Yet the next instant he let it

fall back on the stone, which served him as pillow, and fell into a still

deeper sleep.

Tichon went forth out of the cell. The storm had abated. Again great

silence reigned upon earth. Only from the wet branches of the trees drops

were falling. The air was filled with the resinous scent of pines. Above

their black tips the pallid semicircle of the moon appeared upon a sky

flushed with the breaking dawn.

Tichon went on his way light of heart, vigorous and brisk, as if borne

along by an over-great joy. And he knew he would walk thus, eternally

dumb, till he had traversed all the ways of the world and entered the

Church of John. Then would he cry aloud, “Hosanna to the coming Christ!”

In order not to get lost he walked along the high ridges of the hills

whence he could see the shore of the lake. In the distance on the horizon

lay a storm-cloud, still livid, black and terrible, hiding the rising

sun. Suddenly the first rays pierced it like sharp spears and forth

gushed shafts of fire, streams of blood. It might have been fancied that

in the prophetic heavens the last battle, which would end the world, was

being fought already, “_Michael and his angels waged war against the

dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels_,

“_And prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in heaven._

“_And the great dragon, that old serpent, called the Devil, was cast out

of the heavens._” The sun was emerging from behind a cloud, radiant in

its force and glory like unto the face of the Coming Lord, and Heaven and

earth and all creation joined in the hymn to the rising sun.

“Hosanna! Light will overcome Darkness.”

Tichon ran down from the mountain as if flying to meet the sun. His

eternal dumbness was itself hymn to the Lord that was to come!

Hosanna! Christ will overcome the Antichrist!

FINIS

FOOTNOTES

[1] Minors are descendants of noble families who had not yet acquired the

right of alienation over their immovable property until they had served

seven years in the army or ten years in a civil capacity.—_See_ p. 98, “A

History of Russia.” W. R. Morfill.

[2] _Note of Fräulein Arnheim_: The Tsarevitch always thus designates his

father in the diary.