The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-07-13

clean, warm sheepskin. Bags of meal and potatoes stood about in corners; so did tubs of pickled cucumbers and salted cabbages. From the roof hung rows of sausages and some smoked ba- con. I washed at the pump in the back yard. The priests bedroom was a comfortable room, and was placed un- reservedly at my disposal, but I did not wish to deprive the good father of his bed The sitting room contained a long deal table, with gray cloth over it, six chairs, a rough cupboard, in which were cups, saucers, glasses, a small box containing tea, larger one with sugar, sundry pieces of string, old newspapers, candles writing materials, Q few bottle of medicine for man and beast, and 13 books Only eight of the books were printed, the others were the records and registers of his parish. The eight books were a eNw Testament, Psalter in Russian and one in the an cient Slavonic language, two almanacs for two different years, history of the Orthodox church, we'll thumbed treatise on family medicine, and q book of jokes, still better thumbed and very greasy. Let those who profess to know man by his books judge of the char acter of Father Sergei.
 And what was he like? A great, bur ly man, over six feet high, with voice like the blast of trumpet. You should hear him in church reading the gos- pei It sounded like the rumbling of distant thunder. Long brown hair, r,a -l,Jx, ! I nesday and Sunday and festivals, fell over his shoulders. He had magnif- cent beard, of which he was very proud, for he kept continually strok- ing and streaking 1t. The forehead was narrow and low, the eyes small and blue, the mouth coarse, but always twitching, as though he were on the point of bursting out laughing. Over his undergarments he wore a long black, shiny surplice sort of garment, and on his feet top boots smelling of- fensively of tallow and reaching to his knees. When I first saw him, he was wearing tattered broad brimmed straw hat on his head. He apologized once for the scanty nature of his ward robe. How can man dress we'll" he asked, with 250 rubles ($120) a year?"
 But this was not all that Father Ser gei had to live on. He had his free house and farmed in addition 20 acres of rye and garden land His 10 cows pastured on the common grazing ground, and his four horses were let out to the villagers for consideration. Nor does this exhaust the fathers l,, utn CTS partook of the sacrament they al- ways remembered the priest, and every baptism, confirmation, marriage and burial brought him in a trifie. Father Sergei was the richest man In the vil- lage, and had 800 rubles in the bank of the provincial town. His wife had been m ordinary peasant girl, She could neither read nor write. She was blX- pm jolly woman, always in the kitchen or out houses. She never thought of sitting at the table with her lord and master She was the house slave, and enjoyed it. You should see her on Sunday mornings in her green md black brocade skirt and with the | crimson silk handkerchief over her | head, which she had as a wedding | present. There are two sons away at | Moscow in the ecclesiastical seminary. | It is the Russian traditions that a priests sons must be priests, s4nd his l daughters marry priests. Father Ser yei loved his boys and was proud of | he progress they were making but | le regretted to bear that they were | earning thinghs which were not | bought necessary when he was boy, md this boded no good for the future. still they were coming home at Christ mas, and he would narrowly examine | hem.
 Poor Father Sergei was unfit to ex- lmine a boy in a primary school. He ould read and write; but he was abso- utely ignorant even of professional The routine of his village york he could manage, but outside this e was lost He knew nothing of the logy, nothing of the scriptures, noth- ng of the history of the church, noth-