by allowing its priests to adopt, to a slight extent,
the old customs in villages where all the inhabitants are Raskolniks.
This can the more readily be understood when it is remembered that
the Old Believers hold in all essential points the same creed as
the Orthodox; they are--and their name implies--believers in the
old faith of the Russian branch of the Greek Church, as expressed
since the day of St. Vladimir until the Seventeenth Century, but
not in the so-called innovations of Nikon. The points of difference
are so small that it seems impossible a Church should by them have
been cleft in twain. The Orthodox sign the Cross with three fingers
extended, the dissenters with two, holding that the two raised
fingers indicate the dual nature of Christ, while the three bent
ones represent the Trinity. It does not seem to have occurred to
either party that the reverse holds true as well. The Orthodox
Cross has but two beams, while that of the Raskolnik has four,
and is made of four woods--cypress, cedar, palm, and olive; the
latter, too, repeats his Allelujah thrice, the Orthodox but twice.
Such are the points to which in all probability, the peopling of
the outlying portions of the Empire of the Tsars is due.

The Raskolniks have set a far higher value upon education than the
Orthodox; the instruction given in their settlements often sheds
a strong light upon the darkness of Orthodox ignorance around, and
with the spread of education so does the sect extend and multiply.
Their house can generally be distinguished by cleanliness, the
presence of many Eicons, brass and silver crosses, and ancient
books; its mistress by her greater thoughtfulness and capability.
Old Believers are always glad to seize the opportunity, given so
well by the long northern winter, with its almost endless night,
of reading, and on their shelves are seen translations of our best
authors, from whom, perhaps, it is that they have taken their advanced
political views, and the outcome of whose perusal is that the hunter
and fisherman will often propound to one questions which show a
mind well trained in logical thought. The Raskolnik is generally
fairly well to do, for, like the Quaker and the Puritan, he finds
a turn for business not incompatible with religious exercise, and
to this is in part due the superiority and comfort of their homes.
Most of them in the far North are fishers and hunters, sealers and
sailors, and in these and kindred trades th