s face.

"Very glad to make your acquaintance, little sister," he said,
kissing Yulia's hand. "You're very welcome."

He led her upstairs on his arm, and then along a corridor through
a crowd of men and women. The anteroom was crowded too, and smelt
of incense.

"I will introduce you to our father directly," whispered Fyodor in
the midst of a solemn, deathly silence. "A venerable old man,
_pater-familias_."

In the big drawing-room, by a table prepared for service, Fyodor
Stepanovitch stood, evidently waiting for them, and with him the
priest in a calotte, and a deacon. The old man shook hands with
Yulia without saying a word. Every one was silent. Yulia was overcome
with confusion.

The priest and the deacon began putting on their vestments. A censer
was brought in, giving off sparks and fumes of incense and charcoal.
The candles were lighted. The clerks walked into the drawing-room
on tiptoe and stood in two rows along the wall. There was perfect
stillness, no one even coughed.

"The blessing of God," began the deacon. The service was read with
great solemnity; nothing was left out and two canticles were sung
--to sweetest Jesus and the most Holy Mother of God. The singers
sang very slowly, holding up the music before them. Laptev noticed
how confused his wife was. While they were singing the canticles,
and the singers in different keys brought out "Lord have mercy on
us," he kept expecting in nervous suspense that the old man would
make some remark such as, "You don't know how to cross yourself,"
and he felt vexed. Why this crowd, and why this ceremony with priests
and choristers? It was too bourgeois. But when she, like the old
man, put her head under the gospel and afterwards several times
dropped upon her knees, he realised that she liked it all, and was
reassured.

At the end of the service, during "Many, many years," the priest
gave the old man and Alexey the cross to kiss, but when Yulia went
up, he put his hand over the cross, and showed he wanted to speak.
Signs were made to the singers to stop.

"The prophet Samuel," began the priest, "went to Bethlehem at the
bidding of the Lord, and there the elders of the town with fear and
trembling asked him: 'Comest thou peaceably?' And the prophet
answered: 'Peaceably: I am come to sacrifice unto the Lord: sanctify
yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice.' Even so, Yulia,
servant of God, shall we ask of thee, Dost thou come bringing peace
into this h