The Bennington banner. [volume] (Bennington, Vt.) 1858-1894, 1889-11-14
NUMBER 43.
A RELIGIOUS SPREE.

rum OeOTRe heu0dnB 8 adventures
in Eastern Siberia in the November
Century, we quote the following I'VE
bad no difficulty in getting post horses
until just before DARK Monday evening,
when we reached the station of Turin
opovorotnays (Too-in-o- po. .vo-rote-nah-
yah,) about fifty miles from Chita, and
found the whole village in a state of hill
arIous intoxlcatiOn. Sleighs filed with
young men and boys we're careeripg
hither and thither with wild whuop4
and halloos; long lines of peasant girls
in bright colored calico dresses were un-
steadily promenading blck and forth in
the reefs with their arms around onr
another and singing khoroUOd songs; ;
the statiOn-house was flied with flushed
and excited people from neighboring
settlements, who had evidently been
participating in a celebration of some
kind and we're about starting for their
homes; the stationmaster. who perhaps
had not finished his celebration. was
nowhere to be- found; there WAS not
driver about he stable; and the 'starosta
(,tah-ro stah), short tat old man, VIII,
looked like 0urgher from Amsterdam,
was so drunk that even wi the AID ~
y boNC NOhlNA H'dUl bil nNs itti
II vain We tiled ~ ssrert il he rpa ",
for this surprising ep demc Of inebria
ton. Nobody was sober enough to ex
plain to us what had happend. From
the excited and more or less iucoherent
conversation of the intoxicated travel
ers in the station-house, learned thai
even the village priezt was so drunk thai
he. had to be sept home in sleigh by
the sOberest parishoners. II the station
master, the srarosta, the village priest
the drivers, and all of the inhabitant,
were drunk, there was evidently nc
prospect of our being able to get horses
In fact we could not find anybody who
seemed sober enough TO know the differ
ence between horse and his harness. We
therefore brought our baggage into the
crowded statIon-house and sat down in
an uDoccupied corner 10 study intoxIca
ted humanity and await further devel-
opments. Every person in the house
was drunk, except ourselves and one
About nine o'clock the noise, tumull
and shouting in the village streets be
gan to subsIde; the station. master who's,
intoxication had taken the form oi
severe official dignity, suddenly appear
ed, and in tone of stern menace want
ed to know where the post drivers were
and what all this disorder meant
finally, when we had almost abandoned
he hope of ever getting away, a really
sober man in ragged sheep,kin coat
emerged from The daT'igls7 suJ reppr.sl
IL busEesH bE' mauuar - thr -tnfi an-
W,stsr tuaf fha horse were ready ,u
us Tue drunken ar5 irsrs oHofsl EH.
. seemed aeaguus u rinding,cg ta ity
, uity n0d agthrrH5 10 some uay, over
| wos.u"d the unfortunate driver A4tE
tDuse, Hud coded by flung him iii,
| suprck.-whether for being sober NJ
having he horses ready, do no know
We pled our baggage into the gh
cllmed in upon it, and rode Out OF III,
intoxicated settlement with thankful
hearts, AS the last faint soUnds OF rev
-iry died away in the distance behinC
u, SAID to the driver What's tn
matter with everybody in this village
| he whole population seems to bt
drunk
THEY'VE been consecrating a new
church said the driver, soberly.
'Consecrating church : exclaim
ed in Amusement, Is that the way yot
consecrate churches =
81 don't know he replied, Some
times they drink. After the service
they had a gulainia a sort OF holda,
promenade with music and spirituoui
refreshments and some of them crooket
their elbows TO often.
"'Some of them 7 repeated. 'All o
them. you mean. You're the only sohe
man I've seen in the place. How doet
it happen that you're not drunk
" I'm not Christian he replied
with quite simplicity. I'm a Buriat.
AS Christian-if not member oil
the Holy Orthodox Church-I was 81
fenced by the unconscious irony of tn
reply. The only sober man in village
Of three or four hundred inhabitants
proved to be pagan, and he had JUS
been fined fifty kopecks by a Christian
officer for not getting drunk with Other
good cltiz MS and thus showing his re-
sppct for the newly cousecrated edlficg
and his appreciation of the benign lntiu
ence of the Holy Orthodox Faith T.