building materials, others cart water, and on the shore the fisher monks repair their nets. In the monastic workshops within the walls cloth is woven, clothes are made, leather is tanned, boots are made. Coopers, cap makers, candle makers, net makers all have plenty of work to do. In a large studio, artist monks paint and gild the holy pictures that decorate the shrines. A brewery reeks where quvass is brewed, and at the bakery ovens and kitchen cauldrons, bakers and cooks are busy, for the mouths of a thousands monks and twelve hundred pilgrims must be filled. But nearly all this work is done by lay brothers and novices of whom there are about six hundred. Pilgrims to Solovetsk often renounce the world and remain for years at the monastery giving their labour to the monks, and many end their days as lay members of the brotherhood. Others come to work as penance, or to fulfil a vow, or for relief from sickness, or in gratitude for health restored, or answered prayer. But a large proportion of the lay members are boys and youths. Many are sent by their parents for the discipline of monastic life. Others have been vowed (sometimes before they were born) to the monastery by pious parents. Some sort of elementary education is given to the lads, and a few have a kind of mechanical training, but these are quite inadequate, and the industrial methods in the workshops are centuries old, Here the monastery which has great wealth and influence, ignores a splendid opportunity of usefulness. It might and ought to justify its existence by becoming a great centre of education, and by giving substantial benefit to the youths who in such numbers come temporarily under its influence. But the spirit of the Greek Church cloister is antagonistic to such enterprise, and Solovetsk neither fosters learning nor encourages proselytism. The monks of Solovetsk are of plebian type, large and coarse of feature, and many of them-but not the officiating clergy-are quite illiterate. One very hairy hermit whom I had photographed, wished to have a copy of the picture sent him, but could not write his name. This is no exception, for the Solovetski brothers are mostly recruited from the peasantry, and sink into a life of stagnant indolence. But this is not true of all Russian monasteries, for they are often the refuge of the world weary, and open their gates to many a man who has drunk deep of the cup of experience; and as the higher offices in the Orthodox Church are only open to the Black Clergy, many ambitious men of good family adopt monachism as a stepping stone to ecclesiastical advancement. But the Solovetski monks are merely drones who have withdrawn into monastic seclusion to seek a selfish salvation by prayer and penance. They lead an indolent existence, and when not engaged in the purposeless routine of their mechanical devotions, they gravely stroll about and lazily watch the lay brothers work. But the short summer when outdoor work is active, and the churches teem with worshippers, is succeeded by eight months of winter. Solovetsk is then indeed a hermitage, for over the lonely isles nature draws the curtain of the dayless arctic night, and round the distant shores builds the wide barrier of ice. The monks must then retire within their massive walls, and in pious isolation sleep and pray the cheerless winter through. At last when summer comes, and the night is but the night-long dawn of day, surely the most ascetic hermit must hail with glad welcome the first shipload of pilgrims from the great world beyond his narrow view. A large proportion (nearly two-thirds) of the pilgrims are women. The sacrifices and penance of pilgrimage seem to have a greater attraction for women than men, and they travel long distances in groups of four or five to visit holy places. The younger generation travel by steamer or train, but the older ones prefer to walk for the same reason that many old presbyterians in our own country prefer to walk to Church. After a season of prayer, the God-worshippers return to the mainland and disperse toward their distant villages radiating and distributing throughout the land the fame of the far-off island cloister, and of miracles and cures by its saints. There is a grievous contrast between the poverty of the peasant worshippers and the accumulated wealth of the cathedrals. For centuries costly gifts have been lavished on the shrines until in the light of the clustered tapers the golden ikons are all ablaze with many coloured jewels of great size and price, and the Sacristy is a store-house of rich treasures. But not even the poorest pilgrim comes empty handed, and although no charge is made for their entertainment, the monks afford the God-worshippers many opportunities to give donations. While the services are in progress, a pair of monks will wend their way among the pilgrims; one of them carrying on a short handle an offertory bag with bell attached, so that those who do not wish to see must hear it, and the other carrying a plate with money, to give change to any who cannot spare their smallest coin. Throughout the day the medieval cloister teems with reverent pilgrims wandering through the Churches doing homage at the altars, and gazing fervently upon the sacred relics of the saints; devoutly kissing the cases that contain them, and lifting the children that they may do the like. In the spacious covered corridors they stroll and loiter in groups, speaking only in subdued voices, without noise or laughter; feasting their awestruck eyes upon the mural pictures that show in lurid colours and shocking detail the tortures of the damned. In gruesomeness and crudeness of conception these coarse pictures are not a whit behind the Buddhists' illustrations of their hells. Sometimes a monk conducts a party, and from the Slavic characters of the inscription, reads to the wondering listeners of the terrors that await the unbeliever, for their salvation is by faith and not by works. Services are in almost continuous progress in one or other of the Churches from early morning until the evening, and when the great bells boom, or the little ones jingle, the pilgrims hurry hither or thither to obey the summons to prayers. All doors are open wide, and mingling with the deacons' sonorous tones come the noisy voices of the gabbling gulls that like tame poultry in the courtyard strut about the pilgrims' feet. Besides the principal monastery there are many other shrines upon the islands hallowed by association with saintly men. And after morning prayers and the forenoon meal are over, the monks for a small charge convey the pilgrims by horse or sail to the holy places. One of the most interesting of these excursions is to the adjoining island of Ansersk, where on the summit of a wooded conical hill, "Golgotha," there stands a hermitage commanding an extensive view of the Holy Isles. Ansersk was the retreat of the recluse Nikon who afterwards became one of the most famous of Russian Metropolitans, and who, by revising the prayer books caused a revolt in the Orthodox Church, and incidentally to a siege of Solovetski Monastery when the stubborn monks behind their fortress walls defied for ten years the soldiers of the Tzar. The outing to Ansersk includes an eight miles' drive, a four miles' sail and a six miles' drive, and return journey by the same route. On land the monkish charioteers drove like very Jehus, but afloat, when the wind failed, the sailor monks left the oars to the willing hands of tough-thewed pilgrim women. Even old women tugged the heavy oars with tireless energy, while the men lay idle, and the pilot monk steered. |