d-worn, and beaten. We went along the middle of
the roadway like a procession, observed of all observers; in one
sense scarcely worth looking at, yet in another the most significant
spectacle of the day or of the time. We were--religious Europe just
arrived at the Heavenly City.

Certainly it would have been difficult to know the happiness and
exaltation of our hearts; perhaps to do that it would have been
necessary to step into line and follow us to the Cathedral and the
Sepulchre; perhaps even necessary to anticipate our coming, and join
us long before, on the way in Russia.

But we went forward unconscious of our own significance, indifferent
to the gaze of the curious. There was one thought in our minds: that
we had actually attained unto Jerusalem and were walking the last few
miles to the Holy of Holies.

We passed in through the gate of the Russian settlement, and in a
moment were at the monastery doors. How gladly we threw off our packs
on the green grass sward and hurried into church to the Thanksgiving
Service, buying sheaves of little candles at the door and pressing in
to light them before the sacred ikons. When the priest was given the
great Bible to read, it lay on the bare heads of pilgrims; so close
did the eager ones press together to share in the bearing that the
Holy Book needed no other support. We sang the _Mnogia Lieta_ with
a deep harmonious chorus; we prostrated ourselves and prayed and
crossed. I stood in the midst and sang or knelt with the rest, timid
as a novice, made gentle by the time, and I learned to cross myself in
a new way. One by one the peasants advanced and kissed the gold cross
in the hands of the priest, and among them I went up and was blessed
as they were. And we were all in rapture. Standing at the threshold
afterwards, smiling peasants with wet shining eyes confessed to one
another their unworthiness and their happiness; and a girl all in
laughing tears fell down at our feet, kissing our dusty boots, and
asking our forgiveness that she had been permitted to see Jerusalem.

We were taken to the refectory and seated at many tables to a peasant
dinner: cabbage soup and porridge, bread and _kvass_, just as they are
served in Russia itself. We passed to the hostelry and were given,
at the rate of three farthings a day, beds and benches that we might
occupy as long as we wished to stay in Jerusalem. The first night we
were all to get as rested as possible, the next we were to sp