The Wilmington daily Republican. (Wilmington, Del.) 1890-1902, 1891-03-28

ppoSe W thS NhOAN bSiiE 700 =
afterward learned) the only daughter Of
prosperous corn dealer in the town,
who was quite capitalist in the eyes of
these simple folks. Her face impressed
me only by its extreme beauty, but the
moment heard her voice l recognized
the girl whose talk with her lover had
overheard half an hour before.
But amid all the merriment of our gay
party Maria Oisipovna (Mary, daughter
of Joseph was strangely sad and silent,
and her sadness was fully explained
when she at length said pensively:
"Ahl If only my poor brother were
here among us, how happy we should
be! Perhaps he's not dead after all; 1t
may have been only report. And il no
ever did come back, surely my father
couldn't be so cruel as to drive him out
againp
The honest postmaster answered only
with shrug of his broad shoulders (be-
ing evidently skeptical Of any kind deed
on the part of her father, Oisip MSsloff,
who had the name OF being the most
hard listed and hard hearted old fellow
in the whole district, and limited to us
that we must not sit too long over our
supper, as we would have to BIO at the
church in good time for the opening of
the night service.
An hour later we were in the church,
which was filed to overflowing, even
the romantic old graybeards and totter-
ing grandams of the community being
visible amid the crowd by scores, proba-
bly, for the first time since the previous
Easter. The whole scene was certainly
strango contrast to my last Easter
service in Russia, which had been cele-
brated not in an obscure provincial
church, but in the great Isaac cathedral
at st. Petersburg. In moment / re-
called the whole ceremonial-the massed
thousands Of assembled worshipers amid
the vast granite columns of the splendid
cathedral; the plaintive hymn dying
away in cadence of mournful sweetness
among the mighty arches overhead; the
gorgeous robes and long silky hair of the
priests in the center, grodped around the
coffin that typifed the death and burial
of our Lord; the tone of wondering dis
may in which the chief priest exclaimed,
"He is not herew as no turned away and
left the church with his comrades, as if
to seek the sacred body elsewhere-the
sudden and triumphant return of the
procession through the opposite gate,
with heads uplifted and banners dis
played and a joyous shout of ''Christ is
risen," and then the sea of light that
surged up through the shadowy throng
as thousands of tapers were lighted at
once, while the choir pealed forth the
grand resurrection anthem, and on every
side was heard the greeting which was
echoing at that instant throughout the
length and breadth of Russia, 'Christ is
risen! He is risen, indeedl
But here there were no pomp and
splendor, no bronzed gates or marble
cornices or pillars of polished granite.
All was rude and simple; plain timber,
plain stone, and the only ornament
worth naming was a massive silver cru
cifix above the altar, purchased with the
offerings Of the pious Cossacks of 1919
out of the spoils won by them from the
retreating armies of Napoleon.
just at that moment, however, made
discovery which put everything else
ont Of my head at once. In the fore
most rank of the crowd around the pint
form on which lay the symbolical coffin
stood directly opposite to the spot where
was placed man who seemed anxious
to avoid observation, for the lower part
of his face was hidden by the collar of
his long gray coat, and the upper part
by the cap which he carefully held be-
fore it; but a sudden movement of the
throng exposed his face for one instant,
and it was that of Masha's soldier lover,
young Sergt. Dmitri Rudenko!
The look of fierce and hungry expecta-
ton in this iron mans stern gray eyes
made me shudder, for saw by it that
his victim was still concealed in tho
church, and that he was ready to pouncc
upon him as soon as the fit moment ar
rived; and the sudden starting up of
this deadly pertinacity, this sleepless
ambush of death amid all the peace and
brightness and joy of the nations great
day of gladness, had an indescribably
CHASTITY effect.
Meanwhile the ceremony proceeded
and all went on as usual till the high
priest and his acolytes mounted the plat
form, and the former, raising the UNI
fall again, uttered in lbs deep voice the
wonted formula:
''He is not here.'
'He is hercl' shouted b voice of thun-
der, as Dmitri Rudenko, springiug with
one bound onto the platform, flung open
the coffin again and dragged from it a
small, slight, pale faced young man in
the dress of a peasant. "See, brothers,
the villain who would have murdered
our father the czarr'
Instantly all was confusion. A sea of
furious faces and tossing arms eddied
around the platform, and the air rang
with deafening clamor of conflicting
voices, through which pierced suddenly
shrek of mortal agony, as Mary Mas
loft, bursting like maniac through the
heaving throng, threw her arms round
the prisoners neck and cried wildly:
tsBrother brnthert T tboi,pbt vnr