Come with me, and let us take a trip far away to the North Country, to the coast of the White Sea, to the land of the midnight sun, to the shores of Russian Lapland. There is very much in those parts that is still quite unknown. The district to which we journey has never yet been described, nor has it even been explored. The fisherman has not visited it. The rivers, with their flowing streams, and their beautiful pools swirling beneath the waterfalls, remain in their virgin purity, and have never been whipped by the salmon-fisher. No one has pulled a line or trawled a net across the lakes, nor has anyone passed to and fro over them, dragging that miserable implement which is known as an oter.1

No sportsman has been to these parts. The hares skip about, and are as tame as if they were in the Garden of Eden. The hills and dales have never echoed to the hare-hunters’ halloo, to the baying of hounds in full cry to the sound of a gun, or to the death-shriek of the quarry.

The last time I was in this district of Lapland I was sitting, at eleven o’clock one evening, in beautiful sunlight, outside the door of a Lapp who lived on the banks of a river which we [2]shall very soon reach in our journeyings. Suddenly, I observed on the other side of the river, on a sunny knoll where the herbage springs up early in the season, five or six dark-coloured animals skipping about. I thought they were sheep, and I asked the Lapp whether they were his sheep.

‘A sheep,’ said the Lapp; ‘that isn’t a sheep, it is a jenesiä; that is to say, a hare.’

‘Well,’ I thought, ‘what a scrimmage, what an awful scrimmage there would be if one were suddenly to let loose in this place a couple of spirited Christiania harriers!’ At any time of the year, hares are to be found in almost incredible numbers, and at eleven o’clock at night, when all is calm and quiet, and the sun is still above the horizon, they may be seen coming out of their hiding-places, and feeding and playing about.

Ptarmigan and snipe are also found in great numbers, but none of them know what a setter or a pointer is like. Not one of them has ever seen a dog come snuffing and sneaking along, and then suddenly stand stock-still, as if turned to stone, ready to make a desperate spring.

Too much ink has not been wasted in describing the people who dwell in this region, and their surroundings. And yet it is a country which has a remarkable history. It was quite by accident that I was led to make inquiry about it, and the reader will be able to gather from the narrative that follows the result of my studies.

First of all, we will make for Finmark, but when we arrive at Hammerfest we must not forget to apply to the Russian Consul for a passport, as we then shall be within the territory of the great Russian Empire. If any of our party can speak a little Russian, it will be sure to come in useful, as nearly all Russian Lapps can speak that language after a fashion. From Vadsö we will travel by one of the small fjord steamboats across to Elvenaes in South Varanger. Perhaps we may be lucky enough on our way to see a whaler give chase to a whale, and harpoon one of those monsters.

From South Varanger we can go by foot to our destination, across a tract of country extending for three or four miles, or we can go by sea. I propose the latter plan. In a good eight-oared boat we can (we are three in number—sportsman, fisherman, and botanist) take with us all that we shall need: tents, bed-clothes, meat and drink, as well as hunting and [3]fishing tackle. We can sail or row according to the state of the weather. If we wish to do so, we can, as we go, fish for huge cod and wonderful haddocks, which bite very differently from the small fish which are taken in the Christiania fjord. The bait which we shall need is not an artificial fly from Christiania, but something as thick and solid as the line itself which is used there. If we have a fair wind, and do not want to be delayed by fishing, or by shooting sea-fowl, we can reach our destination in about four-and-twenty hours. We shall sail past a projecting promontory or peninsula called Normanssaet, where there was formerly a colony of Norwegians. Then we must turn to the south, up a small fjord which is called in Russian Petschenga, but in Norwegian Munkfjord. The latter designation can scarcely fail to attract attention, but the visitor looks in vain for the slightest sign or trace of monks or of monasteries. The banks of the fjord are very lovely; there are undulating ridges of ground clothed with birch, but the banks are in other parts wild and desolate. Not an individual is to be seen anywhere. No smoke rises from a single hearth to point out the dwelling of man. A short way up the fjord, on the east side, there is an inlet which is rather narrow where it enters the fjord, but wide, deep, and broad inside, and this inlet affords the chief harbour for vessels, as it is never blocked by ice. This harbour is called the Warehouse Inlet, a name which suggests former inhabitants, but there are no more indications of warehouses now than there were of monks in Munkfjord.

On the tour of which some details are now given, after passing a small river known as Trifon’s River (a name pointing to events which occurred long ago), we reached the head of the fjord where the Petschenga River discharges itself. Here, at a place called Barken, a few Lapps live. From these people we each hired a boat of the kind that is now in use in Finmark. They are long and narrow, almost exactly like those which are used on the Hallingdal River. The same kind of river has produced the same type of boat. We transferred our luggage to these river-boats, and arranged it in the centre, so that, according to our inclination, we could either sit or lie down in the boats. Then we set off, with a couple of men in each boat, one in the bow and the other at the stern, each furnished with a long pole. The boats glided on as [4]the boatmen, encouraged by us, pushed along the banks of the river, competing with one another. The banks are covered on both sides with beautiful white-stemmed birch trees. Here and there a solitary fir is to be seen, which looks almost black by contrast with the bright green birch leaves. Further toward the south the firs are more plentiful, and quite in the distance dense pine-woods appear. The fact is, that the river rises in the south, and in travelling up it we take a southerly direction.

A quarter of a mile up the river we reached such a lovely spot that we decided at once to disembark, and pitch our tents for the night. There is a level plot of ground a few feet above the river-bed, and it is as smooth and as flat as a parlour floor, so that it must have been made at some period by the river itself. Here and there are clumps of trees that are a hundred years old, birch, aspen, and mountain-ash; and in the open spaces between the clumps a luxuriant herbage is growing. It looks as if somebody, a long time ago, had laid out plantations here. From this level piece of land there is a view across the river, which flows still and deep just below, and there is another view over the fjord towards the north, while very far to the south-east, mountains with the snow upon them can be seen. A more lovely spot for a dwelling could scarcely be found anywhere, even in Norwegian Finmark.

For about an hour we were busily occupied in pitching our tents, strewing thin fragrant birch twigs on the ground, spreading reindeer-skins over the twigs, and arranging our baggage according to each one’s taste, and idea of order. When all was finished we paid calls on each other, and discussed the question, what should we have for supper, or, to speak more correctly, for dinner; for in those parts one is often at dinner when it is midnight in Southern lands.

‘Fresh salmon,’ said the sportsman.

‘And young ptarmigan,’ said the botanist.

‘And cloudberries for dessert,’ said the fisherman.

‘Do salmon come up the river as far as this?’ I asked of one of the boatmen.

‘Salmon indeed!’ he replied, ‘why, I should think so; they come up here, and many miles further to the Harefos, then they can’t get further, and are packed like herrings in a barrel.’

Out, then, with salmon rod, reel, line, and gaff, and so into [5]the boat once more. It is just eight o’clock in the evening, and this is not too late for a bite, before the fish are away to rest for the night. The sportsman at the same time took his gun, and sallied forth with Pan, the dog. I put a bright spoon on the line, and got the Lapp to row off with a single stroke, so as to row ‘poiki, poiki,’ backwards and forwards, across the stream. It was not necessary to work very long. The third time of crossing, the line ran buzzing violently off the reel.

‘Lohi on, lohi on! That’s a salmon, that’s a salmon!’ shouted the Lapp.

‘Yes, yes,’ said I; ‘but surely you aren’t afraid of a salmon? Why, a salmon is what we want for dinner!’

At that very moment the salmon took a vigorous leap of three feet into the air, so that the evening sun glittered on its shining silvery scales, and it fell again with a splash.

‘Iso on! It is a big one!’ said the Lapp.

‘Yes, it’s an eighteen-pounder,’ I replied. ‘I have taken so many of them with the line that I am not far wrong, if I can only see the fish once.’

Another leap into the air, and it became so tractable that we were able to row with it towards our encampment. There I landed, and soon had it close to the shore; then, with a final effort, it was off again into the middle and deepest part of the river. It was, however, quite powerless to rise, and lay flat on its side. The line was quickly wound in, and the fish guided to the shore through deep water, when the Lapp plunged the spear into it. It was ours, and weighed eighteen and a half pounds. So we had enough fish for ourselves and for the men.

As if by a preconcerted arrangement, at the very same moment a double report was heard, one shot immediately after the other, from a bleak spot a little distance off. The sportsman had come upon some ptarmigan. He is a crack shot, as the two reports following each other so quickly showed. Immediately afterwards two more shots were heard. Clearly we had got three young birds at least, one for each of us.

‘But how about the cloudberries?’ I remarked to the botanist, who was standing and gazing at the salmon.

‘Oh, I have sent a Lapp to pick them,’ he replied; ‘he knows better than I do where to find them.’

While we were cutting up the salmon the sportsman and Pan [6]returned. The latter seemed quite crestfallen at the expedition having proved such a short one.

‘How many reports did you hear?’ the sportsman inquired.

‘Four,’ we replied.

‘Just so: two double ones,’ he said. ‘I have only shot four young birds; they are, however, enough for us to-day.’

The botanist was with one voice condemned to pluck the ptarmigan, as he had been too lazy to pick the cloudberries. He went away with the birds, but, shameful to say, when he came back he had skinned them instead of plucking them. What barbarism! A fire was lighted, and a couple of pots were set over it. There was plenty of fuel, and we had an excellent kitchen. The smoke soon began to curl in the air, and protected us from the mosquitoes, so that we were able to take the veils off our faces.

After having regaled ourselves with a capital meal, some of the party retired to rest. The Lapps laid themselves down on the ground under a birch-tree. They needed no tent. They drew themselves up, head, legs, and arms, within their coarse-woven garments, and had by this means both over and under clothing, as well as a protection from mosquitoes. Only an old Lapp, Nilas, and I remained sitting at the fire chatting, and smoking our clay pipes over a glass of grog. The nectar of life excited the Lapp; he became communicative, and I began to question him as to whether he knew anything about what had occurred in those parts in former times. I could see that there must have been people living in the district at some period. The grassy mounds were in places so regular, and of so remarkable a shape, besides being so neatly formed, that they must originally have been the work of man.

‘Have you seen the big wonderful stone that is lying close to the Kujasuga River?’ asked the Lapp.

‘No,’ I said; ‘I have never been here before, and I have neither seen nor heard of any stone. But let us go and look at it.’

Two thousand feet or so behind our encampment a small rivulet emptied itself into the river; it was as bright and clear as crystal. Probably it was not flowing far from its source, or it would not have been so free from mud, and so wonderfully clear and cold. Just below a little waterfall which the rivulet forms, a huge round stone was lying. At first I thought it might be an old idol which the Lapps formerly worshipped, [7]but in this I was mistaken. When I got down close to it, and had cleared it of the branches and rubbish which covered it, I saw to my amazement that it was—a Millstone. There was no possible mistake about it. It was a real millstone, and so big that I doubt whether, at the present day, a bigger one could be found in any water or wind mill. The hole in the centre was so large that I could easily put my head through it. It was also quite evident that the stone had been in use at some time. But how on earth did it get there? How did it find its way there in the seventieth degree of north latitude, where not a single blade of corn ever grew, to say nothing of ripening? It could not have lain there since the Deluge. Nor could it have been brought there by the ice, like a stray log of wood, for the motion of the ice is from north to south, and surely in olden times people were not using millstones at the north pole, unless it should really turn out to be the case, in accordance with the very newest theory, that Europe has been peopled from the north! It was an enigma, and one which completely puzzled me.

A shipwreck? Perhaps, thought I, it was brought there by a shipwreck. But no; the millstone is about a quarter of a mile from the sea. It was clear that somebody must have taken it there, and must have had a mill at that place. But who?

‘Can you tell me anything about the stone, Nilas?’ I asked. ‘Do you know what such a stone is used for?’

‘No,’ replied Nilas; ‘I don’t know.’

‘Do you know whether it has been lying here for a long time?’

‘Yes,’ said Nilas; ‘it has lain here for hundreds of years. I heard that from my old grandfather.’

‘God bless both you and your old grandfather!’ I said; ‘but who brought the stone here?’

‘It must have been the monks,’ said Nilas.

‘The monks, do you say? Why, what monks?’

‘The monks who lived here a long time ago, about whom my grandfather has told me.’

‘You are my friend, Nilas,’ I said; and I rubbed my hands together for joy. ‘Come, let us get back to the fire, good Nilas, and sit down. You must tell me all you have heard from your grandfather about these monks. You mustn’t forget anything. I shan’t let you go till you have told me all that you know.’ [8]

‘Well,’ thought I to myself, ‘here is the explanation of the names Munkfjord, Warehouse Inlet, Trifon’s River, and others.’

We went back to the fire, and remained sitting through the light night-time, and far on into the morning, Nilas squatting on the ground, half in the smoke of the fire, with which he mingled the smoke from his own pipe, looking, with his red head-covering, just like an imp. I sat with a veil over my face, and with paper before me, he relating and I listening, and scribbling down on the paper, as fast as my pen would go, his strange tales about a big monastery which had once stood where our tents were pitched, and about a magnificent church, and monks who used to go in procession, and sing psalms, and burn incense. If I had not found the millstone, I should most probably never have learnt the history of this monastery, but the millstone gave me the first clue, which I resolutely followed up, carefully searching through legends and manuscripts and books, among the State archives, and in libraries in Norway, Finland, and Russia. I have picked up and collected every trustworthy piece of historical and ethnographical information, and woven these together with the old legends which I heard from the Lapp Nilas that night on the banks of the Petschenga River.

Before we left the neighbourhood I went once more to the millstone, to look at it somewhat more closely, and to take leave of it. It had been the upper of the two stones which are used in a mill. It lay with the hollowed part uppermost, and a quantity of dead leaves—yellow, green, and red birch leaves—had collected in the hollow. While I was sitting quite alone and dreaming of the old times, a little whirlwind arose which whisked the leaves round in a circle on the stone, and swept them into the hole, rolled them up again, and then whirled them into the air, so that they danced about, chasing one another hither and thither as if at play, just as if they had all of a sudden come to life, and had been transformed into a variety of yellow, green, and red butterflies.

Are they the souls of the monks, I thought, which have come back here again, and are carrying on a sprightly dance over the solitary relic of their former glory? and is it for joy because now at last, after the lapse of three centuries, they are to be rescued from oblivion and brought to the light of day once [9]again? If this be so, then I hope they will not be altogether displeased with my endeavour to serve them.

We will now take our leave of both the sportsman and the botanist, and endeavour to recall, and to present to our readers, scenes and incidents which belong to the middle of the sixteenth century.

[10]

Not many persons are acquainted with the fact that in Finmark, far away to the North, and on the very shores of the Arctic Ocean, there once stood a large monastery, which was famed, in its day, throughout the Greek Church for its sanctity, its wealth, and its industry.

That monastery was the most northerly one on the globe. It was situated on the seventieth degree of latitude, not far from the mouth of the Petschenga River, and immediately to the east of the present boundary between Norwegian Lapland and Russia. The districts of Neiden, Pasvig and Petschenga (or Peisen) formed, as is well known, a debateable territory, on which both Norwegians and Russians levied taxes.

At the present time the monastery of Solowetski, which stands on an island in the White Sea, is the most northerly in the world, as the monastery of Petschenga no longer exists. There are not even any remains or ruins of its numerous buildings or of its handsome churches to be found. All are gone; they are either overgrown, or buried, or removed, and have entirely disappeared. Trees which are a hundred years old have grown up on the site. Traditions concerning it still exist among the older folk of the country, and vague, romantic, and wonderful tales are told about the monks, their wealth, their shipbuilding, their whale fishery, and their commerce with foreign lands.

The founder of the monastery was known as Trifon, and his name is celebrated to-day throughout the Greek Church. He [11]is still regarded as a great saint, and is reverenced and invoked as such. But Trifon was not always a saint. Tradition relates that in his youth he was a wild freebooter, ‘a valiant warrior against a foe.’ He used to haunt the frontiers of Finland and Karelen with a band of outlawed comrades, and there ‘he plundered numbers of people, set fire to dwellings, and spilt much blood.’ It is evident that he was the captain of a band of brigands. It will be interesting to inquire how he came to be a saint, and who was the means of his conversion.

Traditions has it that during his wild career as captain of the brigands, Trifon was always accompanied by a beautiful young woman. Sometimes she dressed as a man, and followed him on horseback. But whether she was his lawful wife or his mistress, no one seemed to know. Her name was Ellen, and she is said to have been of noble parentage, and to have belonged to a Russian family of distinction; whereas Trifon, on the other hand, was of humble origin, the son of a poor priest at Torschok, in the department of Tver. He had been a teacher on her father’s estate, and what is constantly happening still, occurred in this instance—the daughter of the house fell in love with the tutor, and ran away with him, following him about in his unlawful and desperate career. Her gentle nature, by its influence over Trifon, often saved innocent persons, and curbed his fierce passions.

On one occasion she wished to save a young man from death who had, for some time, been in Trifon’s service. He had been brought to Trifon in bonds by his comrades, who charged him with meditating treason. There was no doubt of his intended guilt, and he was condemned to death. But just as Trifon was in the act of striking the death-blow Ellen threw herself in front of him so as to shield the young man. Trifon’s jealousy was so inflamed at this, and he was so maddened at her conduct, and with the strong drink which he had too freely taken, that he struck such a desperate blow at his beloved one as to cleave open her beautiful pale brow, and she fell forward, with her outstretched arms covered with blood, and soon lay dead at his feet. Trifon, appalled at what he had done, drew back a little, and gazed speechlessly at her, while his companions also stood terror-stricken around him. Then he threw aside the blood-stained sword, clasped his hands before his [12]face, and threw himself with a wild shriek of despair on the dead body.

After a time he raised himself up, and found that he was alone; but he was a changed man. He at once left the band of brigands and sought for solitude, hiding himself away from the haunts of men in lonely forests and desolate places. For a long time he would not look another person in the face, for there was constantly before his eyes, whether he was sleeping or waking, the vision of Ellen with her blood-stained, cloven brow. He had loved the woman, who, though rich and of good birth, had forsaken all on his account. Compunction and remorse so preyed upon him that he appeared like a living corpse. And the more his body wasted away, the wilder became his illusions and dreams.

One night he dreamt that Ellen was standing in the broad daylight, alive, before him, with the gaping wound in her brow, from which the blood, drop by drop, was trickling down her face, and she seemed to say distinctly to him:

‘Trifon, Trifon! you will never have peace or repose, either in life or in death, until you do penance. Do penance! Do penance!’

‘What am I to do?’ Trifon inquired

‘You are to go to a barren and inaccessible land, and preach the Gospel to the poor,’ she replied.

From that time he began to undergo further and greater hardships. He took a vow that he would never more taste ‘any drink brewed from hops,’ neither eat any flesh meat, but ‘subsist only on fish and the kindly fruits of the earth.’ He girded his loins with a common thong, in place of the costly sword-belt which he had before worn, and he never afterwards wore any linen next his skin.

Then he began his wanderings northwards, towards the unknown shores of the Arctic Ocean. He went further and further, and on and on, until at last he reached the sea-shore and could get no further. There he found people who were living in heathenism, ‘worshipping images, serpents, and creeping things.’ There, in the year 1524, he built a hut on the shore of the Petschenga River, about a mile from the head of Munkfjord. He lived on this spot for some years without mixing with other people, subsisting only on the ‘fish which he caught himself, and on the roots and fruits which he found in the [13]wood.’ The fame of this hermit, who was living in a wretched hut in this remote place by the Arctic Ocean, and of the saintly life of renunciation which he was leading, gradually spread southwards, and pilgrims began to flock to the place to see him and his wretched dwelling. Then he built himself a small chapel. He cut down the timber himself in the woods at Peisen, and carried it on his shoulders to the site. In this chapel he hung up pictures of the saints which he had brought with him, as well as a picture of Ellen, with her blood-stained brow, which he had painted himself. From that time forward more people came, and began to give their money to Trifon in large sums. There was something mysterious and beyond the Christian comprehension in this temple, or house of God, standing so far North, and in unknown regions which, according to the general belief, lay one half of the year in total darkness, or had night at high noon, and during the other half of the year had noonday light at midnight.

The most zealous of the pilgrims who went to the monastery at Solowetski sometimes extended their wanderings as far as the chapel at Petschenga, and made there, at the altar in the church, their pious offerings, crossing themselves, and beseeching and praying God for remission of their own sins and the sins of others. Before they departed they used to gather wild-flowers in the fields, as memorials of their pilgrimage, and these they would take home, and preserve as precious relics.

The inhabitants of the district also came to see Trifon and the chapel, and he began to interest himself in the heathen Lapps, and to instruct them in the Christian religion. But for a long time they would not listen to his preaching. Their wise men and sorcerers very violently opposed him. ‘They pulled him by the hair, threw him on the ground, and threatened to kill him if he did not leave their country. They often contemplated putting their threats into execution, but the Lord protected him.’ When Trifon went to them, and visited them in their huts, they would scarcely give him a night’s shelter. They mixed dirt and filth in the wretched food he obtained, and tormented him in all sorts of ways. But, as a true Christian, he did not grow weary of being ‘long-suffering and of great kindness. He bore all things, believed all things, hoped all things, and endured all things,’ and in the end they came to esteem, honour, and love him, and listened to his [14]preaching. He could not, however, baptize them into the Christian faith, as he was not yet ordained to the priesthood.

The Russian fishermen also, who sojourned during the summer in that district, attended the chapel and took part in the services. They made voluntary oblations and gifts, and by this means still more money reached Trifon’s hands. He now realized that something more had to be done, and that he must have assistants for his work. It became necessary for him to enter into communication with the outside world, from which he had been for so many years voluntarily separated. Accordingly, about the year 1530, he undertook a journey to Novgorod, where he obtained from Archbishop Macarius a letter of commendation, or indulgence, for the erection of the church at the Petschenga River. He immediately returned, but this time he was not to be alone. He took with him builders, and with their assistance he erected a handsome wooden church beside the Petschenga River, but much nearer to the fjord, only about a quarter of a mile from the place where the river empties itself into the fjord.

For a couple of years this church remained unconsecrated, but in 1532 Trifon made a tour through the district of Kola, whose chief town, Kola, was not built until 1582. In that district, in the year 1529 (or, according to other authorities, in 1475), by the mouth of the Kola River, a church and monastery had been erected by the Solowetski monk, Theodorit, and at this monastery Trifon met with a certain Bishop Ilija. He persuaded the latter to accompany him back to Petschenga to consecrate the church. This was done, and it was dedicated to the Holy Troitsa, or Holy Trinity. At the same time Ilija invested the builder of the church with the monastic habit, giving him the name of Trifon, and ordaining him priest. It is probable that before becoming a monk, and during his wild career as a brigand captain, he had borne some other name, but no record of it is to be found. During the same visit Ilija baptized all the Lapps whom Trifon had instructed in the Christian faith.

In this way was laid the foundation of the monastery, which was afterwards built beside the church. Trifon’s fame for sanctity soon caused both monks and lay people to come, and request permission to settle there. When they had increased [15]in numbers, they elected from among themselves a venerable old monk, Gurij, who had travelled to Petschenga on foot, to be their Superior.

At first the monks were very poor, and had great difficulty in supporting themselves. They had not as yet any ecclesiastical rights, but were wholly dependent on the charitable offerings of the poor inhabitants of the district, and the gifts of the pilgrims who visited them. Trifon therefore decided to make another journey into Russia, and this time not merely to visit Novgorod, but to get as far as the capital, Moscow, in order that he might personally present a petition to the Czar. The ruler at that time was Ivan Wasilievitsch, whom history has branded as the Cruel or Terrible, and apparently not without sufficient reason. It is related of him that ‘when he was a boy of twelve years of age, he began to put animals to death by throwing them downstairs or out of the windows; and in his fifteenth year he carried on the same sport with human beings.’ Sergius Koubasov says of him that ‘he was tall and ugly, with a long flat nose and gray eyes, thin, but broad-shouldered.’ As Czar he burnt and destroyed Novgorod, and caused twenty-seven thousand people in the town and its suburbs to be killed. Eventually, in a passion, he killed his eldest son, Ivan, with an iron bar, because on one occasion he complained that his father had been very cruel to his wife (although she was enceinte), solely because she was wearing a dress which he did not like, and he had struck her so violently that she was confined of a still-born child. But at times this tyrant indulged in fits of piety. He then retired to Alexandra Sloboda, a fortified village in the neighbourhood of Moscow, and conducted religious services, for which he dressed all his courtiers in cassocks and monastic habits, and then officiated as Prior.

One day, as he was going in solemn procession to church with his second son, the pious Prince Theodore Ivanovitsch, in order to hear Mass, there stood outside the church door a venerable-looking monk with a long white beard, who was clad in a shabby old habit. The Czar started at the sight of him, and stopped. The monk crossed himself, bowed low to the Czar, and then, kneeling down, presented him with a paper or petition. The Czar ascertained from the bystanders that this was a holy monk named Trifon, who had built the most northerly church in his realms. He accepted the petition, and [16]entered the church. There both he and his son read it, and the pious Theodore was so much touched by it, that he went into the sacristy and divested himself of his costly cloak, which he sent out to the poor monk, and offered it to him as a gift. The Court attendants could not be behind-hand in their gifts. The Czar was on this occasion accompanied by princes and boyars, among others by Vjæsemski, Nikita, Boris Gudunov (to whose sister, Irene Gudunov, Theodore was married), Morosov, Theodore Basmanov, Gregon, Skourlatov (his executioner, who was known as Malijuta), and others. All of these bestowed valuable gifts of gold and silver on Trifon, so that in a very short time, from being a poor pilgrim, he became a rich man.

The next day he was summoned to the palace, to an audience with Ivan the Cruel. The latter was anxious to hear from Trifon an account of those Northern regions in which he lived and laboured. Trifon spoke in glowing terms of his life in those parts, with the light summer nights and the dark wintry days. He told the Czar of the heathen people who lived there, the wealth of fish, both in the fjords and in the rivers, the enormous whales in the vast Arctic Ocean, the virgin forests, the herds of reindeer, and, above all, the need there was that the Russian Church should erect places of worship and monasteries, and thus, in a way, put the stamp of the Russian kingdom on those lands, and so take them into the Czar’s possession, seeing that Denmark was laying some claim to them. This had its effect, for Ivan, who after the fire of Moscow was in one of his fits of piety, was now entirely controlled by the priests Sylvester and Alexis Adasjev, and on their advice issued a deed of gift to the holy Trifon on November 22, 7065 (1556). This deed of gift has been preserved, and it runs as follows:

‘According to the intercession of our sons, the Princes Ivan Ivanovitsch and Theodore Ivanovitsch, we have granted unto Gurij, the Superintendent of the monastery of the Holy Trinity at Petschenga, together with the convent of the same; and do also grant to every Superintendent and convent of that monastery, because of their poverty, and in place of clerical dues, and revenue from the saying of Masses, the Mototsk (Mutkafjord), Litsk (Litzafjord), Ursk (Orafjord), Pasrensk (Pasvig), and Navda (Neidenfjord), as hereditable property. [17]In like manner also the entire fishery, and wreckage as well—for example, that which the sea casts up on the land—whales and walruses, or any other sea-creatures, together with the foreshore, the land, all the islands, rivers, and smaller streams. Similarly all the forests, meadows, hunting-grounds, as well as the Lapps, who, moreover, at the before-named Mototsk and Petschenga fjords are bound to pay tax to us; and also all the pasture-land belonging to them, and all royalties which appertain to the Czar and the Grand-Duke, with all levying and collecting thereof. All of which is to serve the monks for the sustentation and erection of a monastery. And be it known that our Boyars of Novgorod and Dvina, and all the inhabitants on the coast, as well as the Karelen folk and the Lapps, and all others whom it may concern, have no right to acquire property, either in rivers, or jetsam, or fish, or any other thing.’1

By this means the foundation of the power and prosperity of the monastery was laid. By virtue of this deed of gift the monks obtained even greater rights over those parts than the people of Bergen obtained over Finmark about the same period (1562), and in the worst days of the tyranny of monopolies. The entire population was by this deed virtually sold to the monks, almost as if they were slaves, so that the monks could levy taxes and tithes as they thought fit.

Every year more and more monks and lay-brothers came to the monastery. Larger buildings were erected for them, and also a hospice for guests and pilgrims. Only thirty or forty years had passed since Trifon had come to Petschenga as a poor hermit, and in the year 1565 there were twenty monks and thirty serving-men.

At this time a large amount of money from shipping dues came to the monastery. It is related in one place that a number of persons came from Cholmogor and Sergopolis with goods, which they bestowed on the monastery for its adornment and for the conversion of the Lapps. About this time Trifon built a new church at the mouth of the Petschenga River, or (according to other accounts) on an island at the lower part of the [18]fjord. This church was called St. Mary’s Church. Thither at times Trifon retired and lived as a hermit, and performed Divine service. Close to the church, or near the spot where it stood, a small river discharges itself into the fjord; this is called Trifon’s River. It obtained its name because Trifon used to fish in it when he resided there as a hermit.

At this time he undertook the building of a chapel by the river Pasvig in honour of the saintly and pious princes, Boris and Gleb. This chapel is, as is well known, still standing in South Varanger; it was consecrated, according to the inscription on the cross, by the priest Hilarion on June 24, 1565. Finally, Trifon undertook the erection of a little chapel by the Neiden River as a sign that this district had also been bestowed on the monastery by the Czar, and that it belonged to the Russian kingdom. Nothing was, however, done on the part of Denmark in the matter of its claim, no effort was made to secure the districts for that country, though Denmark had undoubtedly a better right to them than the Czar.

Trifon died on December 15, 1583. He was probably born in 1500, or a year or two later. At any rate, he lived to a good old age. His birthday was probably February 1, as both that day, and December 15, were in after-times observed as festivals in his memory. He was buried, according to his will, in St. Mary’s Church, but at a later period his body was translated to the church which still exists, about a mile further from the sea, and which is called Trifon’s Church. The cross over his grave is now just outside the church door. This cross is a very tall one, and is esteemed so holy and so miraculous, that when the church was struck by lightning on one occasion and set on fire, the fire put itself out as soon as it had burnt down to the level of the cross.

When Trifon was nearing his end and felt death to be approaching, he sent for old Gurij in order to receive the Sacrament. When he had received it, he raised his feeble hand and pointed to the picture of Ellen which he had hung by his bed.

‘You see that red blood,’ he whispered, ‘which is dropping down over that woman’s brow? That is patent to everybody’s eyes, but nobody has seen the tears of my heart. Those colourless tears have for fifty years dropped like burning resin [19]on my sinful soul, and have tormented and crushed it night and day to my last breath.’

‘Trifon, thou art dying! The Lord have mercy upon thee!’ prayed the old Gurij, as he knelt by the bedside.

‘Ellen!’ muttered Trifon once more, and died with a smile upon his face. He saw her beatified, and she received him.

Tradition gives another incident which is related as occurring after Trifon’s death. While the Czar and the Grand-Duke Theodore (who came to the throne after his father in 1590) were carrying on a war in Esthonia against the Swedes, under Karl Horn, in 1584, the Czar had fixed his camp during the siege of the town at Rugodew, or Ivangorod, and had deposited his baggage and pitched his tent not far from the town. The crafty Esthonians, however, unperceived, directed all their cannons against the baggage and the tent. While the Czar, wearied with the fatigue of battle, was resting in his tent, a venerable monk appeared before him, and said:

‘Czar, arise and leave thy tent, that thou mayest not suffer death before thy time.’

The Czar inquired, ‘Who art thou?’

The monk answered: ‘I am Trifon, on whom thou didst confer thy mantle as an alms to set others a good example. Therefore saith the Lord my God to thee, Tarry not, arise from this place.’

The Czar got up at once and left the tent. The Esthonians immediately began firing at the baggage and tent with their well-aimed cannon, and a cannon-ball which hit the tent fell on the bed where the Czar had been reclining.

The Czar then stormed Narva, but was driven back. To save the city and to escape a fresh storming of it, Ivangorod was delivered to the Russians by Karl Horn, and Theodore made his entry into the town ‘clad in white cloth of gold, and drawn by his soldiers in a large sledge, under which a stove was arranged for warmth.’ The Czar praised God and rejoiced over his deliverance. He related the episode with the monk to his boyars, and sent messengers to the monastery at Petschenga to seek for Trifon. But the old man had already departed to the habitations of eternal life, and the monastery lay in ruin. [20]

After Trifon’s death the monastery continued to grow in numbers, wealth, and influence. A large conventual building was erected close beside the church; in it each of the monks had his own separate cell, but the refectory was common to them all. There was connected with the convent an entire suite of apartments for guests and pilgrims, who came to the monastery every returning season.

Opposite the dwellings of the monks there were workmen’s dwellings, and in these the serving-men lived. All the buildings, as well as the church, were surrounded by a strong wall of wood. The country was unsettled and poorly governed, and it was by no means impossible that some hostile bands might find their way to the monastery in search of plunder. The monks at the monastery of Solowetski had often to defend themselves against such attacks.

The church, which was built in honour of the Holy Trinity, was adorned with a tower and dome. It was decorated inside with paintings and with the gifts of pious pilgrims. It was constructed after the old Greek Church plan, which is followed throughout Russia, whether the church is large or small, or whether it is built of stone or merely of wood. Such a church has three divisions, viz.: the narthex, or outer church; the hieron, the sacred part, or church proper; and the hieraton, the sanctuary, or holy place. This division is said to be a representation of the Temple at Jerusalem. The outer church is separated from the hieron by a wall, in which are two large [21]folding doors; these are always open during Divine service. The hieraton, or sanctuary, in which the altar is placed, is in turn separated from the church, or hieron, by the iconastasis, or wall of pictures. This wall is decorated with carvings, and there are three doorways in it leading to the holy place. The middle one of these doorways is only closed with a wooden door for half of its height, but the upper half is shut off by a curtain, which can be drawn aside so that the priest as he officiates and offers incense may be seen. At other times he is hidden from the congregation. Not a pew or seat is to be found in the church. Everybody has to stand, rich and poor alike, for no distinction is made. Turning to the holy place, or towards the picture of some particular saint, the people cross themselves three times in the Greek manner, by putting three fingers, the first finger, thumb and middle finger, on the right and left shoulders, the forehead and breast, and bowing themselves very low, with their foreheads touching the ground, at the same time saying, ‘Gospodi pomilui’ (Lord, have mercy). This sentence is constantly repeated throughout the service, and it frequently happens that the more devout members of the congregation, by reason of their continual bowings to the ground, leave the church with red spots on their foreheads.

All the walls inside the church are covered as completely as possible with pictures, which are either painted on the walls themselves, or are hung in frames against them. The pictures in the narthex are taken, as a rule, from the Old Testament, and those in the hieron from the New Testament. Besides these there are pictures of men and women who are recognised as saints in the Eastern Church. The older these pictures are, the holier they are esteemed. In copying them, therefore, the chief object is to give the copy an appearance of antiquity. Many of the pictures have been painted by the monks themselves, and, as a rule, they are done in very glaring colours. The heads of the saints are always surrounded by a golden glory, on the gilding of which much money is frequently expended. They are also often hung with presents, such as handkerchiefs and other personal finery, which have been offered by pilgrims whose particular saint is represented. Sometimes one sees a wreath of blown birds’ eggs hung up by the picture, a melancholy token of hopes blighted in this world. The front wall in the church, through which access to the outer church [22]is gained, is covered with a lean-to roof, and on this wall there is depicted, in order to excite the imagination and the fear of the heathen folk, on the right hand of the door the bliss of Paradise, and on the left hand the torments of Hell. Here the heathen as they stood outside the church and listened to the singing, would have made manifest to them what would be the lot of those who did not seek the help which the Church offered them, and who refused to be baptized. One thing, however, in the pictures was strange and suggestive, and might have made the heathen doubtful about the charms of Paradise, and this was, that the saints in Paradise were delineated as so fearfully emaciated that they seemed to be nothing but skin and bone, owing to the fasting and the asceticism by which they had made themselves worthy of heaven. The other folk, moreover, who were in hell, seemed to be well-favoured, lusty, and thriving, and altogether more attractive.

In the middle of the courtyard, between the monastery buildings, there was a draw-well, and upon a beam placed over it there was the following inscription, which can be read backwards,

Νίψον ἀνομήμα μὴ μόναν ὄψιν1—

(Wash away uncleanness, not from the face alone)—a reminder that water is used in the administration of Holy Baptism.

The monks, who year by year became more numerous, obtained by degrees still further privileges from the Czar of Russia.

According to the rules of the monastery, the monks had both ‘to till the ground and to follow all such profitable employment as was practicable.’ There were people among them who had a very fair knowledge of secular affairs, and who, moreover, did not always despise the good things of the world. Accordingly, the monks summoned competent artisans and work-people from Russia, and with their help they devised boat and ship building on the river Pasvig, and also further out in the Munkfjord at the Warehouse Inlet, where the water was clear of ice even in the winter. They had their own store of timber, and they were enabled to build comparatively large ships; in these they exported [23]the produce of the country. A great number of rafts and boats were also built, and these were sold to the Russian and Norwegian fishermen. Besides boat-building, they also had salt-pans on such a large scale that they not only provided the whole fishing population with salt, but also exported salt to the interior of Russia. In their ships they brought back in return, ‘flour, wax, drapery goods, and cordage.’ The salt-pans were probably situated on Fiskerö, where the sea-water is least mixed with fresh-water from the inland rivers.

One of the most remarkable of their doings was the erection of a mill at the Kujasuga River, immediately behind the monastery. This is the only establishment which existed during the prosperous days of the monastery of which there is any trace still left. The monks must have found that it was more profitable to import corn and to grind it themselves, than to import the ground flour, as is usually done now.

They had also out-houses, and must have owned a considerable herd of cattle. They had occasion to clear out and till meadows, both on Fiskerö and along the Petschenga River. Several of the meadows where the monks used to mow their hay are now overgrown with birch-trees that are more than a century old. It may not have been exclusively for the sake of the flesh that they kept these herds of cattle, because the long fasts allow the Russians only to eat sparingly of meat. It was no doubt also for purposes of trade as well as for the sake of their skins. It is expressly stated that the monks possessed a tannery, and that they tanned leather both for their own requirements, and for supplying the people of the country.

They are also said to have worked mines. Possibly the monks were the first people to wash gold in the rivers in the interior of Lapland. Their most important means of support were, however, the fisheries, both the sea and the fresh-water fisheries, involving the exportation of fish. They understood how to make good use of the deed of gift, which they had obtained from the Czar Ivan Wasilievitsch. According to it, everything that was found in land or water belonged to the monks, and the inhabitants were compelled either to deliver up or sell to the monks what they did not themselves use, of course at the price which the monks saw fit to arrange. The fisheries were carried on by their own numerous servants or the lay-brothers of the monastery. Some of these lived at the monastery [24]itself, others at the Warehouse Inlet, at the mill, or in Kjörvaag, or West Bumand Fjord. By these fisheries the monks obtained such an immense quantity of fish, that they not only exported it to Vardö and Archangel, but also entered into mercantile connection with foreign towns, principally with Antwerp and Amsterdam. Information as to this is obtained from a Dutchman named Simon van Salingen, who for several years made business journeys in Finmark and Russian Lapland. He records that in the years (1562–1564) when Eric Munck was bailiff of Vardöhus, ‘the monks from the monastery in Munkfjord were in the habit of coming with their fish, train-oil, and other local produce, which they collected during the summer and winter, that they might sell them. In Munck’s service there was a youth named Philip Winterkonig, a Dutchman from Oltgensplaet, in Zeeland; but either voluntarily or otherwise, he left his master, and entered into partnership with John van Reide, Cornelius de Meyer Simonsen, of Malines, and in 1564 he came in a large vessel from Antwerp to Vardö, under the impression that Munck was still bailiff there.’ He must have sailed direct to Vardö without touching at Bergen, and so he had not heard that this town had recently obtained the monopoly of the trade of Finmark. ‘When he arrived at Vardö, he found that Munck was no longer bailiff there, and that a certain James Hansen held the office in his stead. Hansen made Winterkonig and his crew prisoners, seized the ship and its cargo, and maintained that Winterkonig had forfeited his life, because he had acted in opposition to the privileges of the citizens of Bergen.’

While these people were detained in custody, God vouchsafed such a rich harvest of fish that the Lapps, the Norsemen, and the monks at Munkfjord, caught so large a quantity that there were not ships, or yachts sufficient in draught, to carry the fish to Bergen.

James Hansen therefore arranged with Winterkonig that he should be let off his punishment if he would load his vessels with fish, and take them to Bergen on behalf of Norway, and would also promise never again ‘to trade contrary to the privileges of the town of Bergen.’ Winterkonig readily agreed to this, and was set at liberty. At the same time some of the monks of Petschenga, who were present at Vardö, made an arrangement with Winterkonig, that next year he should come [25]to them, and lade his ship with the things which they would have ready. According to this agreement Winterkonig came to Munkfjord in 1565 with a large ship, which he loaded with fish, and then despatched back again to the ship-owners at Antwerp. He hired, on his own account, a Russian lodje (yacht), with thirteen men in order to carry the rest of his goods from Antwerp to St. Nicholas.2

On the way, however, near the promontory of Tiriberka, on the Murman coast, he was overtaken by such a severe storm that he was obliged to seek a harbour of refuge. While he lay there another Russian lodje arrived, also having goods on board, which the captain sold to Winterkonig. But as soon as the Russians saw the valuable cargo which Winterkonig had on board his lodje, they were seized with a desire to possess it, and they fell on him at night, and cut the throats of his three servants and thirteen sailors while they were asleep. Winterkonig awoke and escaped to land severely wounded, but he was followed, and was shot through with an arrow from behind a tree. The robbers then hastily plundered the ship, and, as they saw another yacht approaching, they left the seventeen corpses unburied and escaped. However, they could not take everything with them, and among the things left behind were ‘four hogsheads of wine, and these remained on the beach.’

The firm at Antwerp, who had not heard of the murders, directly after the big ship had arrived from Munkfjord, sent two more ships to Winterkonig, and these were laden with all sorts of goods which he had ordered. Both the ships reached Munkfjord safely in the autumn, and anchored off the Warehouse Inlet. As soon as the monks heard of this, they despatched one of the ships back to Antwerp with the news that Winterkonig and his men had been murdered on his way to St. Nicholas, and that the goods had been stolen. The other ship the monks sent, with Cornelius de Meyer Simonsen, to Malmis (Kola), from which place Simonsen travelled to Moscow, in order to lay a complaint concerning the murder, and the plundering of the ship. He failed, however, to obtain an audience with the Grand-Duke, because the name of the Grand-Duke (Ivan the Cruel) was not written sufficiently large in his [26]letter of complaint, and he had to return to Kola with his object unaccomplished.

In the following year, 1566, the firm at Antwerp sent Simon van Salingen with two ships to Munkfjord, where he arrived late in the spring, and they made him fetch the ship that had been left at Malmis by Cornelius Simonsen. Salingen then loaded all the three ships—partly at Munkfjord, partly at Keervagh (Kjorvaag or Kjervan, a harbour at the western entrance of the Bumandfjord on Fiskerö)—with as much fish-oil, salmon, and other goods as were suitable for export to Antwerp. He hired on his own account two lodjer from the monks, and laded them with his goods and sailed for Malmis. Here he met Cornelius Simonsen who had just returned from Moscow. They travelled, together with their goods, through Russia during the winter as far as Moscow, and traded with the inhabitants.

At a later period it would seem that the monastery entered more especially into commercial connection with Amsterdam. A treaty has been found which was concluded between a firm in that town and the monks of Petschenga. The agent of the firm was named Andrew Neich. He went every year to Munkfjord with a large ship laden with barrels of salt, in order to take on board, and bring back to Amsterdam, the fish they had caught. The convent had pledged themselves ‘for six years to sell to Neich all the red fish (salmon), and not to sell to anyone else the fish taken in draught-nets or in rivers; and in like manner not to lease or sell the fishing in the sea for sjomga (salmon), cod, or cod blubber, or whale blubber, but on the contrary they were to be held bound to bring to them (the merchants), to their storehouse (factory), the fish from Kola and the river Tulom. If the chief of the monastery, or the Brothers, kept back or sold them to others, the chief of the monastery was to pay a hundred roubles.’ In addition to this, it was also arranged what the quality of the fish contracted for was to be. ‘And the Superior and convent are not to deliver any “tinda” or “waltschak” (presumably smaller kinds of sea-fish); broken, damaged, or stale salmon; damaged, stale, raw, half-dried cod; or salmon of less than 7½ lb. weight. And if any fish is delivered under 7 lb. weight, two such fish are to be taken in place of one; but of fish from Tiriberka, whether large or small, two are to be reckoned as one, and none are to [27]be accepted of less than 4 lb. weight.’ Then several other kinds of fish are mentioned. As to the price of the fish there was a still further arrangement that they were to give ‘ten roubles for 100 salmon, or twenty good jefimker’ (Dutch silver money). The period appointed for receiving the fish was from May 10 to July 20. The merchants were bound to leave salt and barrels at Kola, so that the agent at that place would deliver these to the fishermen. ‘If the fish from lack of salt, or vat, were spoilt, the Amsterdam merchants were still bound to accept them, and to pay the same price as for good fish.’ The fish were to be paid for at two terms: ‘the first term was St. Peter’s Day, and the second term July 20; the one half in roubles, and the other half in jefimker, and one jefimke was reckoned as half a rouble.’

From the ship the Brothers of the monastery obtained all that they needed or required in the way of goods, partly for their own use, and partly for trading purposes with the inhabitants of those parts, or, indeed, for exporting again to St. Nicholas, Cholmogor, Wologda, and Jaroslav. Thus, no doubt, they obtained no inconsiderable supply of corn, since they had built a mill for themselves. In addition to the goods which the firm at Amsterdam had to send according to requisition, Neich was also bound to bring with him, as a donation and gift to the monastery, ‘1 pud [32 lb.] of incense, 2 pud of wax, 1 cask of red church wine, as well as two casks of brandy, and one firkin of Rhenish wine.’

The monastery in its time carried on no inconsiderable whale fishery. It is distinctly stated that the monastery ‘should be free of taxation for exporting whale blubber.’ The train-oil was exported to other parts of Holland as well as to Amsterdam. The Dutch people were themselves carrying on at this time a whale-fishery, both in Norwegian Finmark, where they had a special place of resort at Sörö, and along the coast of Russian Lapland. At that time the Greenland whale was found along the Norwegian and Russian coasts, or, at any rate, a kind of whale which could be somewhat easily killed with the harpoon. A loose harpoon was mostly employed. Whenever a whale was encountered, they hurled one or more harpoons at it, and these had the owner’s name marked on them. Then the whale was allowed to go its way. Sometimes it escaped and was never seen again; but generally it died, and was thrown up on [28]the shore at one point or another, but most frequently in the Mutkatfjord, where even at the present day whales are frequently stranded high and dry.

The people attached to the monastery soon got information of the reappearance of the harpooned whale, and took possession of it, for, according to their prerogatives, they alone had the right to all flotsam and jetsam.

In such ways the monastic establishment, in the course of about fifty years, developed into a very important colony, which must have had an extraordinary influence in the civilization of those parts, in a wider extension of the fisheries, and in the foundation of several towns, if it had continued to prosper, and had not, as the sequel will show, come to such a sudden and unexpected end.

In no respect does the improvement of the inhabitants appear to have been the object of the labours of the brotherhood. Certainly they christened or baptized the Lapps, so that they could no longer be called heathens, but that was all. Not a word is said as to any schemes for their education and civilizing. The priests of the Greek Church, even at the present day, take no trouble to teach the people. The Russian Lapps, therefore, as a rule, cannot even now either read or write, while among the Norwegian, Swedish, and Finnish Lapps there are but few who cannot do both.

[29]

The Chief Monk or Abbot of the Monastery of Petschenga in the most prosperous period of its existence, about the close of the sixteenth century, was named Gurij. He must have been an old man of about eighty years of age when he was elected Primicier, or President, in 1540, not very long after the founding of the monastery. There were fifty monks under him. The most prominent man among these monks was known as Ambrose. He was either dumb, or so abnormally silent that sometimes during an entire month he neither spoke to anyone, nor replied if anyone spoke to him. According to their rule the monks were required to be silent, even during meals. When they assembled, one of them was employed in reading aloud from a book, in order to help the company to keep their rule of silence. Nobody knew why Ambrose had imposed this unusual silence on himself, but it was supposed that something had happened in his earlier life which had left a deep wound in his heart, and that this had made him so reserved. He arrived at the monastery all alone one day, having travelled on foot over the mountains from Kola. He brought with him letters of commendation from a monastery in Russia, and also from Solowetski. From these letters, it appeared that he belonged to an ancient Russian boyar family. He was received as a novice, and, after a year’s probation, obtained his own cell in the monastery, but silent he was from the first, and silent he remained unto the end. He was a tall and unusually handsome man, with delicate, pale features, and with a scar on the [30]right temple, as if from a sword-cut. When he exerted himself unduly, or became unusually excited, the scar assumed the appearance of a red gash, and the monks learned by degrees that he was not a man to be trifled with, though, as a rule, his disposition was amiable and gentle. It was easy to see from his broad shoulders and his general build that he was a man of great physical strength. This was fully shown when he began to take part in the different kinds of daily manual labour. Both among the Brothers of the monastery and among the work-people, he came to be known as Ambrose the Strong. There was also something in his bearing which suggested that he must at one time have been a soldier. He took a great deal of physical exercise, and he was often present to supervise the shipbuilding that was carried on at the Warehouse Inlet, the work of the salt-pans on the Fiskerö, and also the sea-fishery. In this latter industry he showed himself both courageous and skilful.

He frequently made excursions into the country, and it was asserted that he returned with gold-dust. In these excursions he was invariably accompanied by a Finn, a diminutive creature, who was called Unnas, whose appearance corresponded to the meaning of his name. Ambrose had, on one of his wanderings over the mountains, come upon something which looked like a bundle of clothes; on closer inspection he observed that something moved within the bundle. It was the little creature Unnas, who had squeezed himself together in his coat, and had laid himself down there to die. He had broken his leg, and for two days had painfully tried to creep towards some human habitation; but at last, in pain and helplessness, he had abandoned all hope of getting help. Ambrose lifted him with ease on his strong shoulders, and carried him home to the monastery. Here he allowed him to have a berth in his own cell, set and bandaged his leg, and attended to him for some six weeks, until he had recovered. From that time forward the little creature Unnas followed Ambrose about like a faithful dog. Ambrose could not get quit of him, although he did not always want him. His efforts were of no avail, even when he endeavoured to escape from him. Unnas would track him wherever he went, and follow him at a distance, until the good-natured Ambrose would make him a sign to come closer, and allow him to accompany him. [31]

When Ambrose came to the monastery, there was a pirate who had for years made descents on the shores of the Fishers’ Isle, and his visits were the terror and temporary ruin of the inhabitants. The pirate was named Anika, and every year he came, late in the summer, with a big ship, and anchored beside a small island, which took its name, Anikief, from him. Whence he came nobody knew, nor where he went with his fish when he had laden his ship. In the winter time no one ever saw anything of him. But in the spring, when the first fleet of boats arrived for the fishing season, either from Kola or from Pomorien, Anika’s ship would be lying off Anikief. And as soon as the fishermen came in from the sea with their take of fish, they might be sure of seeing Anika walking along the shore, ready to receive them. They were then obliged, whether they liked it or not, to give him the tenth part of their catch. If they did not at once give it to him willingly, he and his men took it by main force, and the fishermen were more than likely to get a good beating into the bargain.

The pirate, however, behaved in some respects in a chivalrous manner. If, for instance, all the fleet of boats which were accustomed to lie in the harbour of Anikief had come in (and frequently there would be more than a hundred of them), he would have all the men called together, and inquire of them whether there was any one of them who would risk himself in a duel with him. He declared himself willing to fight with anyone, and with any kind of weapon. If he were beaten, they should be free from any claim to pay him tribute; but if he proved to be the strongest, they would have to pay the blackmail. Anika was bigger-framed and physically stronger than most men, and none of the fishermen were willing to take the risk of an encounter with him. They had, therefore, no choice but to pay him the blackmail. For many years this torment is said to have continued, and the name of the pirate Anika was a terror to all the fishermen at Fiskerö. He did what he liked. He recognised neither law nor justice. Nobody was in a position to punish him or to withstand his demands.

To the monks in the monastery at Petschenga there came intelligence respecting this pirate, but they had no power to help the fishermen to resist his demands. The spring after Ambrose entered the monastery, there came fresh news of the pirate, and of his violent conduct towards the fishermen. They [32]themselves, indeed, came, and complained to the monks; and the head of the monastery, Gurij, suggested, in a conference with the senior Brethren (at which Ambrose was present, and at which he sat, as usual, a silent listener), that a message should be sent to Ostrogen, in Kola, or to Solowets, for a ship with cannons and an armed crew, which could chase the pirate away.

The following day Ambrose approached the head of the monastery, and asked for leave of absence for a few days.

‘Where are you going, Brother?’ asked Gurij.

‘To Fiskerö.’

‘To Anikief?’

‘Yes.’

‘Perhaps you want to pay your respects to Anika?’

‘I want to fight him.’

‘To fight him?—you, a Brother, and a man of peace!’ exclaimed Gurij.

‘Yes; for the sake of making peace,’ replied Ambrose.

‘But can you wield a sword? You will never drive him away with spiritual weapons,’ said Gurij.

‘Yes, I know how to wield a sword. I was once a soldier, and I still know how to give a blow with a sword better than most men.’

‘Will you not take some of our men with you?’

‘No; I will go quite alone.’

‘But you have neither sword nor armour.’

‘You can let me have the sacred sword hanging in the church, and the coat of mail belonging to it,’ said Ambrose. ‘Let me have the sword and coat of mail, Father Gurij, and bless me, and let me go. I am ready for the fight—for a fight for life or death. If you hear no more of me, then I have been killed; but if I return, I shall bring you news of my victory.’

Early next morning Ambrose set off on foot, with the sword and coat of mail under a loose overcoat. From Petschenga there is a way across two isthmuses, and across Fiskerö itself, to the harbour of Anikief. Unnas was not about early enough in the morning to see Ambrose start; but when he came somewhat later to the monastery grounds, and heard that his benefactor had started for Fiskerö, he at once hurried full speed after him, and it was not long before he came upon the [33]footprints of Ambrose. However, he did not catch him up until he had reached Anikief, and there he met such a number of strange and odd-looking people that he would not venture among them, but kept at a distance, for Unnas was not stout-hearted.

So it happened that one day, according to the legend, when a fleet of Russian boats was to put out to sea in order to cast their lines, a stranger came unexpectedly to them. The stranger saluted the chief officer very politely, and said:

‘Take me with you to-day, comrades; I shall be of use to you in baiting your hooks.’

The chief officer looked at the stranger, but neither he nor any of his men could call to mind that they had ever seen him before.

‘We have men to bait our lines, men to pull the lines, and oarsmen,’ said the chief officer. ‘There are four of us as usual, and it will only cause trouble if we take more with us.’

‘Anyhow, take me just this once,’ said the stranger; ‘I particularly want to be with you, and perhaps I may bring you good luck.’

‘Very well, then; as you have such a great desire to be with us, I will let you,’ said the chief officer. ‘Cross yourself, say your prayer, and get into the boat.’

The stranger crossed himself in the Greek manner, bowed towards the east, and prayed, ‘Gospodi pomilui nas!’ ‘Lord have mercy upon us!’ Then he got into the boat with the rest, and they put off to the place where the lines were to be cast.

They were specially fortunate that day. There were fish, so to speak, on every hook, and the boat was quite laden with them. So they rowed back again to the harbour; but, as usual, the chief officer did not venture to omit taking the course by the island of Anikief, in order to deliver a portion of the fish to the pirate who lay off there with his big ship. The stranger was decidedly of opinion that there was no need to hurry; they might just as well first row back to their own place and wait for Anika to come in person and demand the fish, if he dared.

‘Dares!’ said the chief officer. ‘He will kill us if we do not voluntarily give what he demands, and take it to him on board his ship.’ [34]

‘Let’s see,’ suggested the stranger.

They then made for the island to land there, and the stranger was the first to jump on shore. While the others were still in the boat he took hold of it by the bow, and pulled it so far up on the beach that four men together could not have done it better.

‘That fellow doesn’t want for strength,’ thought the chief officer to himself.

They then threw the fish ashore to clean them. This last work was entrusted to the stranger, while they themselves disentangled and baited the lines.

The stranger did as the fishermen were in the habit of doing. He cut off the head, took out the entrails, collected the livers in a jug, and split open the fish. But he did all this so expertly and so quickly that the boatmen stood watching him with astonishment. When he had finished cleaning the fish, he took his thick fishing-gloves off his hands and told the man who rowed to clean them in the sea. He did as he was bidden, and gave them back to Ambrose again. But the stranger did not think that he had wrung the water thoroughly from them. He folded them together, therefore, and wrung them himself; but as he did this they came to pieces in his hands.

The crew, when they witnessed this fresh evidence of his extraordinary strength, began to feel some misgivings. They feared that the stranger could not be a real man, and they wondered what would happen when Anika came, whom they were expecting every minute, and who, perhaps, was not a little exasperated that they had failed to bring him their tribute.

Anika did not keep them long waiting, but came at once, striding along the beach towards them. He was a giant of a fellow, with a fierce appearance and with a long brown beard hanging down over his breast.

‘Hi! you men there!’ he shouted at once from a distance in a voice of thunder. ‘Why haven’t you brought me my tribute of fish to-day?’

The four men did not dare to utter a word. They stood silent with fear, and with their uncovered heads bowed down, and crossed themselves. Their strange companion did not take his hat off, but went a few paces towards Anika, and then demanded:

‘Who are you, and what do you want?’ [35]

‘Who am I, and what do I want?’

‘Yes, certainly.’

‘Don’t you know me?’

‘No, I don’t know you, and I have no wish to make your acquaintance. So you need not come any nearer. The best thing you can do is to take yourself off again, or you shall see——’

‘See what? Ha, ha!’ laughed Anika; ‘I can see you don’t know who I am; but look out for yourself, and be gone, or you shall feel Anika’s fists fall like blows from a hammer on your wicked skull!’

The stranger, however, did not allow himself to be disconcerted, but stood bolt upright before Anika.

‘Just so, my little friend,’ said Anika. ‘I see you are not wanting in courage.’

‘No; I am not much afraid of you.’

‘Perhaps you have even come here on purpose to fight me?’

‘You are quite right.’

‘Very well. I am glad of that,’ said Anika. ‘You shall have your wish fulfilled, and you shall choose the weapons. What will you fight with?’

‘With a sword, and in armour,’ said Ambrose; and he cast off his overcoat and stood transformed into a soldier, with a sword in his belt, and clad in a shining coat of mail.

The island was now full of life. The news flew like lightning from one boat’s crew to another that a strange soldier had arrived, who was going to fight a duel with the much-dreaded Anika. All work stopped, and the people crowded together from all parts to see the stranger. The crew of Anika’s ship also came ashore to be present at the fight. A place was chosen on Fiskerö where the fight was to take place. At last they made their way thither, each with his own company: Anika with his sailors, and Ambrose followed by the fishermen. The place was cleared and enclosed by a circle of stones, and it is still shown to visitors, even after a lapse of more than three hundred years.

The two combatants placed themselves inside the ring, while the fishermen crowded together, and in silence formed a living wall around them.

It was close upon midnight, and all was ready. The sun lay low down to the north, red as molten gold, tingeing with a [36]marvellously beautiful purple glow the clouds and sky, and glittering like diamonds and rubies over the foaming waves, which the Arctic Ocean dashed, with a sullen roar, upon the rocky coast.

The fight began. Sword clashed with sword, and the golden red of the sun shimmered on the crossing sword-blades. Ambrose soon recognised, after the first thrust had been made and parried, that he had a practised foe before him. He was obliged even to give way in parrying the furious blows which Anika showered upon him, and he had to retreat to the edge of the circle.

According to the story as it is told, the one who was driven outside the circle was accounted as conquered. As Ambrose was in the act of retreating in parrying the blows, Anika sought with one desperate blow to finish him. The blow was so tremendous that only an adept could withstand it. It was parried about an inch from the top of Ambrose’s head, but his hat, which he had on, was knocked off by it, so that the whole of his noble face and his beautiful priestly hair, which fell on his shoulders, could be seen. A shout of astonishment and of contempt broke forth from Anika’s men. ‘It’s a monk, it’s a priest, who has come here to fight our unvanquished chief!’

But now the scar in Ambrose’s forehead turned a brilliant red, and it seemed as if, all at once, his limbs had become steeled. His strokes fell so rapidly and so furiously that it was Anika’s turn to retreat nearer and nearer towards the ring, on the opposite side. The fishermen cheered on the stranger with shouts of encouragement, Anika defended himself with desperation, but it was as if a panic had seized him on the discovery that he was fighting with a monk, and without resistance he was driven backwards to the ring. ‘Pirate,’ shouted the stranger at the last, ‘you shall die!’ and at the same moment he levelled such a fearful blow at Anika in the forehead that he fell backwards, ‘three ells outside the ring,’ as the legend has it.

Anika’s men took to immediate flight. They ran straight back to the ship, weighed anchor, and made off. They were seen no more. The Russians dug a grave inside the ring. In it they laid the warrior Anika, and a stone barrow was raised over him. Then the fishermen accompanied the mysterious [37]stranger back to the shore. There he called them together before him, and said: ‘See, the sun is now rising again over the world, and is casting his glorious light over man’s path! Fall each one of you upon his knees this newborn day, and give thanks to God. Your foe is no more, and henceforth no one will hinder you in your peaceful labours. God be with you all. Farewell.’ With these words the stranger vanished, and no one knew whence he came or whither he had gone.

So the legend runs, and it is not possible to say how much of it is history and how much romance.

A few years ago, however, a traveller visited the place, and long years after Anika’s death the barrow was opened. Some mouldering human bones were found, and among them a couple of leg-bones of an unusual size. We may therefore reasonably assume that Anika once lived, that he fought, and was conquered, and found his grave at this spot; but up to this time very few persons have known anything of the legend which associates Ambrose, a monk from the monastery of Petschenga, with his conqueror.

Ambrose made his way back again over the waste swamps, and Unnas was ever at a little interval behind him. Presently he drew nearer. Ambrose heard something moving behind him, and turned round and saw him.

‘Well, are you there, my little friend? Come nearer, then,’ he said.

Unnas sprang forward to him, and fell on his knees and kissed his hand. Then he took out of his bosom some bread and dried fish.

‘You have had nothing to eat to-day, Father. Won’t you have a little? You must want some food.’

‘Thank you, my little Unnas. You are right; I do want some food. Did you see the fight?’

‘Yes, but I did not venture to go close up.’

‘No. Courageous you are not, Unnas, but you are a very faithful friend.’

‘Yes, I am to you.’

‘Not to others, aren’t you? Not even to my friend Jussi?’

‘No; he beats me.’

‘Well, but you don’t behave well to him, either. You enticed him once upon a time on to an island in the river, and left him there for a couple of days.’ [38]

‘Yes, because he struck me, but perhaps some day I shall take him in as I took in Stallo.’

‘What Stallo?’

‘Oh, indeed, you see that, little as I am, I once killed a big Stallo, a goblin, or monster, such as one sometimes encounters here in the mountains, and which is so dangerous that one must either kill it, or be killed by it.’

‘Was it here?’

‘Yes, it was just here, by this very lake where we now are.’

‘How did it happen?’

‘Well, you see that the lake here is long, and you travelled all the way round it when you were on your way to Anikief; but that was not necessary. We can slip across here, as I will show you, but you must not tell anybody. No one besides me knows about it. Promise me that you won’t tell anything.’

‘Yes, I promise you.’

‘You see this narrow strip of water here: it is not more than fifty ells broad, but it is deep. If you watch the slight current attentively as it flows through the channel, you will detect that at several points it is a little irregular. The reason of this is that some large stones lie just under the surface of the water, not half an ell below the surface. They are laid at such a distance apart that it is easy to jump from one to the other, but we must know exactly where they are laid; by this means we can get over to the other side more easily and quickly than even if we could swim like reindeer. I put the stones there myself, and built them up when the lake was almost dry. Many years ago I came, quite alone, tramping here, and suddenly I caught sight of a Stallo, seated on a stone a little in front of me. When I stood still for fear, he beckoned to me that I should go closer to him, but you may be sure I wasn’t such a fool as to go up to him. I jumped back again as quickly as I could, but as I looked I saw him coming after me. I then made various circuits between the barren ridges of ground and the birch copse as a fox would do, and hid myself at one spot, so that he sprang past me. Then I ran quickly back again, got under cover behind the hill, and made my way here without his seeing me. I leaped on the stones across the channel to this place, and then along the shore a little bit lower down, where you see the lake is much broader. There I stood and began to howl and cry so that the Stallo might find [39]where I was. This he did, and he came down to the shore on the opposite side. Then I began to abuse him as a coward, and as an old woman who wouldn’t venture to wade across where a little Finn had waded. At last he was so exasperated that he took the sword in his mouth, leaped into the water, and came swimming across to me. But I had my bow ready, and when he was close enough I shot an arrow with an iron point at the end, and hit him in the forehead, so that he threw up his hands into the air and went to the bottom.’

‘But possibly it was an ordinary man, a peaceable traveller, whom you killed, Unnas. I don’t believe in Trolls.’

‘Not a bit of it; it was a Troll—a real Stallo.’

‘How can you be so sure of that?’

‘Well, you see, he had a dog with him, a great, brown, smooth-haired dog. They always lead dogs like that with them by strings, and the Stallo had such a dog, and it swam beside him; but as it was getting near the land I gave it an arrow in the eye as well, and it turned round and sank. If the dog can lick the Stallo’s blood he comes to life again; that is why a Stallo always has a dog with him.’

There was great rejoicing in Petschenga Monastery when Ambrose returned, victorious over the pirate, and the next day a thanksgiving service was held in the church. The sword and coat of mail were hung up again in their place, and Ambrose relapsed once more into his usual silence.

But Unnas related, and was never tired of relating, to the work-people, or to anybody who would listen to him, how it all happened, and so it has been again and again repeated by others for three hundred years, just as it was told to me by Nilas the Finn that night beside Petschenga River.

[40]

There was something so attractive about the monk Ambrose that everybody liked him. The old, white-haired Superior, Gurij, loved him as if he had been his son, and the other monks had a high regard for him. His pale, handsome and manly face not only inspired feelings of confidence, but called forth even warmer feelings. The better he was known, the more certain did it appear that he was a man who might be thoroughly trusted, and would respond to trust in times of peril, when courage and energy were demanded. He very seldom smiled, but, in spite of this, he was invariably cordial, considerate, obliging, and lenient in his judgment of others. He was ever ready to defend the weak, and was generous towards his opponents.

All the work-people connected with the monastery were anxious to merit his approval, and to have him with them, whatever their work might be. There were two of the work-people who were specially attached to him: little Unnas, who has been described in the previous chapter, and a Kvaen named Jussi. Unnas Ambrose had rescued from death. With Jussi Ambrose had made acquaintance in quite a different way.

He had on a certain occasion come upon Jussi out in the country, as Jussi was in the very act of maltreating a woman. Ambrose spoke sharply to him; and when the Kvaen became insolent, he had lifted him up to throw him aside. Then the Kvaen’s blood boiled over, and he struck at Ambrose. Thereupon a struggle ensued between the two men, both of whom [41]were unusually strong. The Kvaen was one of those strongly-built men belonging to that nation who, if they are provoked, do not shun any peril, and do not give in until they have either lost their life, or have come off victorious. The same characteristic rests upon their ordinary daily work, be it manual labour, navigating or fighting. If the Kvaen has begun anything in earnest, no power on earth can restrain him until he has accomplished what he has taken in hand. In good or in evil, in friendship or in enmity, the Kvaen is persevering and constant. In that respect he is quite different from the Finn, who for a short time can be eager enough; but the energy is only a spurt, and never lasts long. The Kvaen, on the other hand, is tough and true as steel, and can even be cold-blooded and cruel, and as heartlessly ferocious as a wolf.

The monk and the Kvaen fought in earnest; but if the Kvaen was as physically strong as Ambrose, the latter was his superior in the expertness with which he administered his blows with the closed fists, and on this occasion no other weapons were employed. Unnas was not present; had he been, he would assuredly have fixed his teeth firmly in the Kvaen’s leg, even at the risk of being kicked to death. A fearful blow on the forehead caused the Kvaen to stumble, and then Ambrose felled him to the ground and knelt upon his chest.

‘Do you give in?’

‘No, never.’

Ambrose took him roughly by the throat, and almost strangled him.

‘Well, will you give in, and ask for grace?’

‘No,’ the Kvaen hissed out, and struggled to get free.

‘Very well, get up again,’ said Ambrose who was now beginning to get angry himself, as the scar in his forehead got red, ‘and I will let you know that I am master.’

The Kvaen jumped up, and the fight was continued; but at last he received a stunning blow, and fell backwards on the ground, with Ambrose on top of him.

‘Will you now give in, and sue for peace?’

The Kvaen made no reply.

‘You are a wild creature, Jussi; but I believe that you have good in you, after all, and that you won’t make a bad companion. Now let us two from to-day be friends—friends in life and death—enemies no longer. Will you?’ [42]

‘Yes,’ groaned the Kvaen softly. He was conquered, and tears fell from his eyes.

‘Get up again, then, and shake hands,’ said Ambrose.

From that day forward, Jussi was the monk’s friend, and this intercourse gradually produced an ennobling effect upon him, so that he, too, began to realize what it is to be chivalrous. By this means, also, the behaviour of Unnas and Jussi towards each other became better than it had been. Jussi might still strike Unnas for some trick or other which Unnas had played upon him, but it was now with more or less of good-nature and laughter that he treated the little dwarf.

The following story will afford a good insight into Jussi’s character, and give some idea of the coarseness and roughness of a Kvaen. I am very reluctant to relate it, for the reader of it will not think the better of Jussi, but rather the worse. Still, I must tell the truth, and show both the good and the bad sides of his nature.

Jussi had his own house, and a little bit of land just opposite the monastery. One spring it happened that a wild goose settled on the field close to the houses. It was one of a flock of geese which were making their way to the north, but it had injured one of its wings, and could not fly any further. Jussi’s children, a boy and a girl, caught the goose, and shut it up in a hay-loft. There they gave it food and water to drink, and took such good care of it that in a short time it became quite tame, so that they let it out into the field, where it followed them wherever they went, and would even walk straight into the kitchen to get a few delicacies. It let the children stroke it on the neck and back, and of course they became very fond of it, treating it almost as if it had been their own sister. They even decorated it with a red ribbon, and called it Hanhi or Hanhiseni. It stayed with them the whole winter, and roosted at night on some hay in the loft.

The following spring a flight of wild geese again passed over the houses. Hanhi, or the tame goose, was in the yard with the children at the time, and it called out to the other geese. One of them called back again, and the whole flight swooped round the enclosure. Then they came hovering over the houses, and were evidently enticing the tame goose to join them. It responded by trying its wings, which had been unused for so long a time. The trial was successful: the wings carried it, and away [43]it flew with the other geese, to the dismay and grief of both the children, who kept standing there, and shouting in vain, ‘Hanhiseni! Hanhiseni!’ They saw no more of it during the whole of that summer. But late in the autumn, when numbers of migratory birds began to return southwards again, a flight of geese one day passed over the place. They swooped round over the houses, and suddenly, before the children were aware of it, the entire flock settled on a field not far from them. There were eleven of them, and they came walking together towards the enclosures. At the head walked a large goose, with a red band round its neck. It cackled, ‘Kah! kah! kah!’ as if to say, ‘How do you do? Here I am again, and all my children with me;’ and so it waddled with the others following it, straight into the enclosure, and into the little barn. The children rushed in and told Jussi that their beloved Hanhi had at last come back, that it had gone into the barn, and that it had a whole flock with it.

‘Leave them alone, leave them alone,’ said Jussi; ‘don’t frighten them.’

The goose had told her family, on their way from the North Pole or somewhere in that region, that she knew of a spot on their way where they would do well to alight and rest awhile. They had no reason to be in the least afraid. She knew all the people very well, they were all kind, particularly the children. They would do them no harm, but, on the contrary, give them food, and they would have plenty to eat, and could rest for a night in a barn, where she herself had been sheltered and made comfortable for a whole winter. For the matter of that, any of them who did not care to go over to Africa could remain at that place. None of the young geese had ever seen human beings before, and were not afraid of them, but went on confidently, following their mother.

As soon as the last goose had got inside the door, Jussi jumped up and fastened the door, remaining inside himself.

And what did he do? Did he fondle them, or stroke the old goose who stood so fearlessly in the centre of the flock, looking up at Jussi as if she expected him to pet her? Instead of that he did something so shameful, so unmercifully brutal, so cruel, that one would rather not tell the story.

He set to work to wring their necks, one after the other, and killed all of them, even the old goose with the red band round [44]its neck—Hanhi, the children’s pet. The children, who were standing outside, began to suspect mischief. There was such a screaming inside that they themselves began to scream and cry, and to stamp on the ground, and to shout through a chink in the door, ‘Father, father, don’t kill them! don’t kill Hanhi! Let us have her, let her live! Hanhi is our sister, father!’

Presently, with bloody hands, Jussi came out; he had killed every one of them, and the next day he sold them to the monks in the monastery. He would not tell them how he had obtained them, for he was afraid of what Ambrose would say concerning his cruelty.

Unnas would not have done such a thing as this. He would, at least, have spared the life of the old goose, either from compassion, or from calculation, hoping that it might at some other time bring him another haul of the same kind.

But if Jussi was cruel to helpless animals, he was no coward in front of a bear. He showed his bravery when these three men, Ambrose, Jussi, and Unnas—men as different in appearance and in character as three men could be—were out on an expedition in snow-shoes, and this story I must now narrate:

Jussi had a large scar, evidently left from the blow of an axe, on his right hand, between the thumb and forefinger. This was a souvenir of Ambrose. On one of their excursions they suddenly came upon a bear. On seeing them, it raised itself on its hind-legs, and made straight for Ambrose, who had no weapon with him except an axe. Jussi sprang behind the bear, and seized it with his powerful arms by the neck, and squeezed it with all his might against himself, and then, being half throttled, it struck out violently with its fore-paws. Ambrose raised the axe, and endeavoured to hit the bear on the forehead; but either the axe was blunt, or he missed the middle of the forehead, for the axe slid off on to Jussi’s right hand, with which he was squeezing the bear’s neck. Still, Jussi did not let go. He was not a man who in a struggle for life and death would give in readily. Even if his hand itself had been cut off, he would have held fast with the stump. ‘Lyö kirveen tallala!’ (Hit him with the blunt end!), he cried; and he hugged the bear against himself still tighter, shielding his own head behind the bear’s shaggy neck.

A heavy blow with the blunt end of the axe from Ambrose’s strong arm stunned the bear, and it sank to the ground; at [45]the same moment Unnas rushed in with his long Finn’s knife, and plunged it in the bear’s side up to the hilt. Another blow on the top of its head finished it; but Jussi ever after bore the frightful scar on his right hand as the result of the first blow of the axe.

This encounter united these three men more than ever to one another.

As affording a little insight into the character of a Finn, the following incident may be of service. According to the legend, it took place precisely as it is here related:

Unnas was an only son. His mother died young, and his father, Andrew, was exceedingly fond of his only son. There was nothing in the world for which he cared except his son. But when Unnas was twenty years old, he had a very serious illness, and it was not thought possible that he could recover from it.

Unnas had been baptized by one of the priests of Petschenga Monastery, but his father, Andrew, was still a heathen. He would not consent to be baptized; he declared that he would live and die believing in his old gods. He was not a mere heathen, but was an active sorcerer (a ‘Noide’) or wiseman. He had, therefore, his sorcerer’s or magician’s drum, which he consulted whenever anything of particular importance was to be taken in hand, or to be prevented.

When Unnas was taken ill, his father sought at once, by means of sacrifice, to come to terms with one of his chief gods, who, in the form of a weather-worn stone, was standing a long way up by the side of the Kujasuga River, in a birch-wood, and was surrounded by a fence made of reindeer horns. But it was of no avail. His son grew worse and worse. The old man fretted terribly, and began to be afraid that the illness had no natural origin. According to the opinion of the old Finns, dangerous illnesses often proceeded from the fact that one or other of the sick person’s deceased relatives wanted to have his or her help and companionship in the other world. In that world the Finns, according to their notion, lived with their herds of reindeer, much in the same way as they had done upon earth, only, of course, they were free from their worst enemies, the wolves and the husbandmen.

Whenever, therefore, anybody was stricken by a serious illness, which had no very distinctive symptoms, it became an [46]urgent question whether by sacrifice a person might reconcile, or come to terms with, the deceased relative, or at least obtain some postponement of the death of the sick person.

Andrew consulted the sorcerer’s drum, and tried different sacrifices in order to excite the compassion of the deceased relative, but in vain. His son lay writhing with pain, and wandering in his talk. Then Andrew sent for his brother-in-law, who was a still greater sorcerer than he was himself, so that he might also consult the magic drum, and perhaps discover a conciliatory sacrifice.

The brother-in-law came, and different sacrifices were tried, until at last a whole reindeer was offered up; but even that did not succeed. A black cat was purchased—for offerings of black animals were considered the most acceptable—and the cat, too, was sacrificed, but all in vain. The father knelt down beside his son’s bed terrified and in despair, while the brother-in-law lay upon his knees, and beat the sorcerer’s drum; but the movable ring on it insisted on moving to the place which pointed to the Kingdom of Death, and stopped there, however much he struck, and knocked, and made promises of sacrifices. Nothing seemed to be of any avail; neither prayer nor payment sufficed.

At last the brother-in-law was compelled to have recourse to the last and most desperate remedy. He must himself cross over to the Kingdom of the Dead, in order to converse with the deceased relative. After a variety of ceremonies and charms, as well as taking some stupefying drink, he fell into a trance, and lay as if dead for half an hour, during which time his spirit was supposed to visit the other world.

Andrew watched him with anxiety, and when he again recovered consciousness, he asked him in great fear:

‘What does Jabmek, the dead one, demand?’

‘He demands either the immediate sacrifice of a horse on this spot, or the surrender of some other man’s life,’ answered the brother-in-law.

These were hard terms. To procure a horse at once was impossible; and who was likely to volunteer to give his own life in order to save that of the boy?

Then the legend says that the old father determined, out of love for his son, to offer his own life, and to die himself, that his son might live. [47]

‘If my son dies,’ he said, ‘then the fire on my hearth goes out. I should have no more pleasure in anything in this world. I am old, and have not many years to live. Therefore let me die, so that these years may be given to my only begotten son, and his life may be long and happy in this world.’

When he had taken this resolution, he kissed his son’s forehead, and, with the firm resolution of sacrificing his life, the old man went out in the darkness of the night to the idol, and fell on his face at its feet.

And the legend says that, wonderful to relate, the son was better in the morning, and regained his health, but the father lay dead before the altar of the idol. The firm belief in the truth of the brother-in-law’s message, and his own self-sacrificing resolution, had broken his old heart, and probably the message about it caused a change for the better in the son’s illness, and practically saved his life.

Unnas sacrificed, as was the custom at that time, a full-grown draught reindeer (a ‘Kjöre-ren’) at his father’s grave. For the Finns, who belong to the Greek Church, have a beautiful belief that every person, man or woman, young or old, even the greatest malefactor, is shown such mercy from our Lord that his soul, after death, is allowed to drive about for seven days with the reindeer which have been sacrificed at his burial. He is thus enabled once again to revisit all the places to which he had travelled during his life. He thus lives again, for a short time, the whole of his previous life. He is reminded of everything (that has happened) from the earliest days of his childhood. He recalls all the sorrows and joys which he has ever known, the love and hatred which he may have nourished, the friendship and enmity and the good and evil (which have made up the experiences of his past life). As a dragon-fly over a pool, his soul flutters from place to place, even to the most distant and hidden by-places, and lingers at each for a moment, so that he can have an opportunity for sorrowing, forgiving, conciliating, making good again, or begging forgiveness for what he has done; and then, when all has been revisited and briefly lived over again, he is set before the judgment-seat of the Most High, and receives his unalterable sentence—guilty or not guilty. [48]

In the year 1589 the number of monks in the monastery of Petschenga reached sixty, and there were more than two hundred lay-brothers. On account of the secular business in which the members of the monastery were engaged, some of them were always away, either attending to the mill, the shipbuilding, or the fisheries, or else they were travelling on business to Vardö or Kola. But on the great festivals they were all assembled in the monastery, and the services were conducted with full and impressive solemnity.

The forms of worship in the Eastern Church, which the monks were bound to observe, are strictly observed at the great feasts, and also during the forty days of Advent and Lent. The daily offices of the Church are six, and sometimes seven, in number, according to Psa. cxix. 164: ‘Seven times a day do I praise Thee, O Lord.’ These offices are said partly during the night, and the following is the appointed order: At midnight what is called Mesonyktikon is said; this lasts for three hours. Then there come Matins, and then the lesser Hours. At seven in the morning the Liturgy itself is celebrated. This is the service in which the Eucharist is hallowed and administered. The Brethren usually receive the Sacrament four times a year. In the afternoon Vespers are said, and finally, at the close of the day, Compline. On fasts and great festivals ‘Apogrypnia’ is said after ten o’clock at night, and this is an office which requires that the night shall be passed in the church and spent in prayer. When ‘Apogrypnia’ is said, it [49]is usual to celebrate the Liturgy rather earlier, and then the monks go to rest till Vespers. There is never any sermon at these services, but on the festivals a portion of the lives of saints and martyrs is read.

Ambrose was not as yet a full monk, but he had completed his novitiate, and it was decided that he should take the vow on Christmas Eve, 1589. The venerable and aged Superior, Gurij, had frequently discoursed with him, and had earnestly explained to him the unalterable nature of the vow which he was to take, and which would, for all his future life, bind him to the monastic life. Ambrose had declared that he was ready to take the vow, and with it to bid farewell to everything in the world which was not consistent with the strict, secluded life of a monastery.

Nevertheless, old Gurij, who had attached himself more to this young man than to any of the other monks, had observed at times that there was an indication of something like suppressed anxiety in his pale face as the day approached nearer and nearer on which the solemn vow was to be taken. He fancied that at times there was in Ambrose’s features an expression as of a profound and unendurable anguish. Ambrose, who was usually very silent, had never told him much about his earlier career. It was not improbable, therefore, that in some deep recess of the man’s heart there lay hidden away memories of occurrences of which nobody had any knowledge.

The old Superior made up his mind that he would once more speak to him privately, before he took the irrevocable vow, and he decided to do so after the first office for the day before Christmas Eve had been said. When therefore, Mesonyktikon, or the midnight office, was over—that is, about two o’clock in the morning on Christmas Eve—Gurij summoned Ambrose to his cell.

‘To-day,’ he said, ‘you are to take the final vow and be one of us, and become a monk for the rest of your life.’

‘Yes, Father.’

‘You have no doubt as to your decision?’

‘No.’

‘There is nothing about which you wish to consult me?’

‘No.’

‘There is nothing you wish to confess to me or confide to [50]me?—you know that I am not only your brother, but an old friend too.’

‘I have no confession to make.’

‘Have you never done wrong? Is there nothing in your earlier career for which you need to obtain forgiveness or the intercession of the Church?’

‘Indeed, Father, I have done wrong; but others have done more wrong to me than I have done to them.’

‘You have no longer any ill feeling; you have forgiven them?’

‘No,’ said Ambrose, after a moment’s reflection.

‘But you must forgive; you will obtain no peace until you do, and you cannot take the vow while you bear malice in your heart. Before you bid the world farewell you must realize the calm peace of reconciliation.’

‘I cannot.’

‘Who is it that has wronged you so cruelly?’

‘My father.’

‘Your own father?’

‘Yes, and my relations and friends.’

‘There are also many things connected with the world with which your heart is still occupied, and on which your thoughts dwell, instead of being engaged in prayer and fasting.’

‘No; there is nothing in the world in which I have lived that I look for. All is hidden, forgotten, buried and lost.’

‘But it has left behind bitterness in your feelings. Have you never loved—loved some woman?’

‘Certainly,’ exclaimed Ambrose, and he thereupon turned paler than ever. There suddenly arose from the innermost recess of his soul a form so lifelike, as it stood before him, that he covered his face with his hands and fell on his knees, and laid his head on the old man’s lap, while he slowly muttered the name ‘Annita, Annita.’

The old man allowed him to remain thus for a while, as he perceived that this strong man was weeping like a child. There must, then, as he had suspected, be events which had taken place in his earlier career which were now revived with painful vividness.

‘Brother,’ he said, ‘will you here, in the quiet of the night, open your heart to me, and tell me all about your previous career? I do not ask you from inquisitiveness, but tell me if you can; I will listen to you. You know that I am your friend. [51]Moreover, I have loved you, and will understand you, and sympathize with you.’

‘Yes, Father,’ said Ambrose, ‘if you will listen to me, I will tell you everything. My name is not really Ambrose, but I bear the same name as our orthodox Czar, whose father conferred on this monastery its charter. My name is really, like his, Theodore Ivanovitsch, and I come of an old Russian boyar family. A pious mother taught me in my early youth to read the lives of the saints and martyrs, and to go to church. But as I am of noble birth, and at some period would have to serve the Czar, I also learned to ride and fence and hunt and shoot. I have been an officer. You see this scar which I have on my forehead? I received it in battle. There has, as you know, been variance for many years between the monastery of Solowetski and the Swedish Finns in heretical Finland. This variance still continues, and none the less now that there is war between the Czar and John III. of Sweden. The monastery of Solowetski was, as you know, founded in 1429, and obtained at length even greater privileges than our own monastery has done. But it was also bound to protect Karelstrand and the towns in that neighbourhood against attacks from Finnish pirates. For the protection of the monastery the Czar has now, as you also know, built a stone wall which is to have eight towers, and is to surround the churches and all the buildings. Meanwhile the Swedish Finns, out of their old hatred of the Russians, had been making piratical incursions into Karelen, attacking our orthodox people, and the Solowetski people did not hesitate to retaliate. In this way, about twelve years ago, I was sent as a young officer to Karelen with a troop of Cossacks to protect the inhabitants against these Swedish Finns. I must admit that the Cossacks whom I had to command were wild and cruel men. Young, and unused to the horrors of war, I often tried to restrain them from needlessly killing men and women, while they were plundering their dwellings. At times I was, fortunately, able to save the innocent; but on one occasion, when we had chased a crowd of Swedish Finns back out of Karelen, into which they had made a piratical incursion, and had pursued them right into the district of Kajana, it so happened that some of my men, who were in the van, had reached the farmstead of Kuolaniemi in Sotkamo before I came up. They had attacked [52]the farm people, and, as usual, had killed and plundered them. After this they had fired the houses. I saw the fire, and pressed on with my men. The farm was beautifully situated on a projecting promontory by the side of a large lake. The houses and tall spruce firs down by the lake were so clearly reflected in it, that it looked as if the smooth depths of the lake below, as well as the clouds in the sky above, were ablaze. As, in a state of indignation, I rode inside the burning farmstead, determined more strongly than before to remonstrate with the more bloodthirsty of my men, I caught sight of a woman, struggling desperately with a Cossack at the doorway and on the steps of the burning house. The master of the house they had already killed, but the mother was clinging, though mortally wounded, to the leg of a Cossack to save a child—a little girl—whom he was trying to drag away with him. Before I could reach him, I saw him lift a spear and plunge it into the mother’s breast, so that she swooned away and let go her hold of his leg, while at the same moment the child tore herself away and ran off towards the courtyard. Enraged, the monster threw his blood-stained spear after the child, and sprang aside to catch her. Fortunately, he only touched her flowing hair, and at that moment I and my men reached him.

‘ “Monster!” I shouted. “Would you kill an innocent child?” and I placed my spear on the man’s breast so that he stopped.

‘The child clung to my leg, and cried to me in mortal fear and with tears in its little eyes, “Save me! save me!” I took her in my arms and lifted her on to my horse. Poor child! she clung in her terror close to me, and hid herself under my large riding-coat.

‘The farm continued to burn. No one seemed to think of putting out the fire, and the people belonging to the farm who had not been able to escape at once were lying dead in all directions in the burning house. I gave orders for a retreat within the boundary of Karelen; but what was I to do with the child whom I had beside me on my horse, a little girl some six or seven years old? She looked terrified at my men if any of them came near me, and with her little arms took tight hold of me.

‘ “Hold me fast!” she cried; “don’t let go of me, dear, dear man! don’t let them kill me!”’ [53]

‘ “No, my child, no one shall touch you,” I said, to pacify her.

‘The district was a lonely one, and the people all about had taken to flight. I could not, therefore, leave the child at the farm which had been burnt down. She would have perished of cold and hunger, as most likely people would not venture there again for some time. I took the child with me, therefore, to the camp. She was a pretty little girl. When we dismounted from our horses at the camp, she would not on any account let go my hand, which she grasped with both her own.

‘ “What is your name?” I asked her, when we had entered my tent and her terror had somewhat subsided.

‘ “Nita,” she replied, crying.

‘ “Your parents are dead, my poor child,” I said. “Have you brothers and sisters?”

‘ “No; father and mother had only me.”

‘ “Have you any relations?”

‘ “No; I don’t know of any.”

‘ “I really don’t know what to do with you, my poor little Nita, or where to send you.”

‘ “Don’t send me away!” she cried. “Can’t I stop with you? I am so frightened at all the men here. Can I keep with you? I will be a good girl, and I am called Annita, too. Annita is my proper name.”

‘We talked for some time together, but I could not make out anything respecting her relatives. This much only was evident, that her parents had been ordinary farm-people, but apparently well-to-do folk, for the child was well dressed, well brought up, and, moreover, intelligent for her age.

‘She slept in my tent at night, and could not be prevailed upon to leave me, so afraid was she of my rough men. So I came to the conclusion to take the little orphan home with me to my parents in Russia. I explained, therefore, on the next day to my men that for the future I should consider Annita as my child, and threatened with death the man who should do her any harm.

‘As there was now not much probability that the Swedish Finns would soon make a fresh attack on Karelen, I returned to my home on the border of Lake Ladoga, close to Olonet, not far from Finland, where my father owned an estate and [54]several hundreds of serfs. My parents were very much surprised at my bringing home, as a trophy from the battlefield, a little girl, but when they heard further particulars they considered that I had done right, and they received the child kindly. Annita was both a pretty and an amiable child, and she soon became a favourite.

‘At the end of a year she had learnt to speak Russian, only with me she preferred to speak Karelsk, her mother tongue, which I could also speak fairly fluently. It was natural that the child clung to me, and was not quite satisfied unless I was somewhere near. I had rescued her. She looked on me as another father. She could be merry, and happy, and boisterous, like other children, when we went about together, but if I were from home she used to be silent and quiet. Other people might praise her, pet her, or scold her, but she did not seem to care much about it. Only when the praise or blame came from me was she pleased or sorry. She was educated at my home, and in every respect brought up like a daughter of the house. Sometimes I used to teach her myself, and she then was always most diligent.

‘In this way several years passed by. Annita grew up, and by degrees she began to look upon me as an elder brother. I was, moreover, ten years her senior. When she was fifteen years old she was sent to a convent, where she remained for two years. At the same time I was stationed at Moscow, in Ivan Wasilievitsch’s service, and came to know personally both him and his son, the pious Theodore, as well as many other persons who were great and powerful at Ivan’s Court.

‘I remember well that Annita had no wish whatever to go to the convent. I had to start first, and the day before my departure, when it was bedtime, I laid my hand on her little head, and said:

‘ “Good-bye, Annita; God bless you!”

‘But she only clung to me, and exclaimed:

‘ “Take me with you! Can’t you take me with you?”

‘She was simple enough to think that she could travel to Moscow with me, and that she could there keep house for me.

‘ “I cannot take you with me, Annita,” I said; and I tried to take one hand out of hers.

‘ “I won’t go to the convent,” she said with indignation, and she would not loosen her hold on my hand. [55]

‘ “You must go,” I said. “It cannot be otherwise, Annita. I will come and see you, and look after you. Say good-bye, and be a reasonable little girl,” I replied, bending down to her.

‘She threw her arms around my neck, sobbed bitterly, and again exclaimed:

‘ “But why can’t you take me with you?”

‘I gently disengaged her arms, kissed her on the forehead, and she went with my mother into her room.

‘I said good-bye to my parents overnight, as I was to start very early in the morning. It was still quite dark when I got up and went down to the sitting-room. When I entered it, I saw Annita standing by a small table, where the cloth was laid for me.

‘ “Annita;” I exclaimed, as she approached me; “are you here, child?”

‘ “Yes,” she said; “I wanted to see you before you left.”

‘ “But how did you manage to wake up so early?”

‘ “I first tried to remain awake in my room, but I couldn’t. Then I went quietly to the maid’s room, and slept with her so as to be sure to wake up, and so contrive that you would not leave without my seeing you off. Are you angry with me?”

‘ “No, my child; I am not angry with you. God bless you! Good-bye again, and be a good girl, and go and lie down again!”

‘She went back again to her room in tears. She had to the very last, perhaps, entertained a slight hope that I would be prevailed upon to take her with me. I was sincerely sorry for the child, but it was altogether out of the question for me to think of taking her to Moscow.

‘On Christmas Eve in 1584 we were both to be at home again. Theodore had come to the throne, and I obtained leave to go home and visit my parents. Annita arrived before me, and received me in company with my father and mother, as I came driving into the courtyard. Annita was in her nineteenth year, and had so grown that she was almost as tall as my mother. She was a delicately-made, slender girl, with glossy, fair hair, which curled slightly over her temples. She still wore her convent dress, and had during the three years she had been away become beautiful like a Madonna. But there were two things in particular which marked Annita out as [56]distinct from any other woman whom I had ever seen—her beautiful eyes and an engaging smile. When Annita smiled no mortal man or woman could resist her. I often observed that when she came into a room, where there were many people, it was as if a ray of sunshine had suddenly shone into the room. Even if it so happened that the company had been sitting in silence, Annita’s appearance seemed to cast a ray of friendliness and harmony over the faces of the company, and they soon became gay and lively.

‘When I came home on this occasion Annita did not, as usual, spring wildly to me, and cling fast to my hand with both of hers; but she stood quite still, and only shook hands with me.

‘ “Well, Annita,” I exclaimed, “aren’t you glad I’ve come home again?”

‘ “Indeed I am,” she said; “I am very glad;” and she smiled as she looked at me. To look at those eyes was like looking into the clearest crystal well. There was no secret hidden at the bottom. No passion had as yet dimmed the lustre of that depth. Her look was childlike, pure, innocent, and decorous. And when she slowly opened her large eyes and gazed at me, it seemed as if I was folded in a wonderfully warm and enchanting light.

‘I was much taller than she was, and a big, strong man. I had often, in earlier days, taken Annita in my arms and run off with her over the fields. She would then, in her wild joy, pull my hair, and call out, “Gallop, my horse! Gallop, quicker, quicker!”

‘I thought of doing something of this kind again, and half made a sign of taking her up in my arms, but Annita laughed and jumped aside.

‘“No, thank you,” she said; “I am too big now. You can’t lift me.”

‘ “I can try,” I suggested.

‘ “No, I won’t let you.”

‘ “Am I never more to be allowed to lift you?”

‘ “Perhaps, some other time.”

‘The next day I had to go and visit one of our neighbours, a distant relative, who owned the adjoining estate. The only daughter of the house, a big, strong girl, was about my own age, and we had played together as children. It had also, [57]long before, been settled between our parents that we were to marry one another, so that the two properties might be united. She and I had quite accepted this arrangement, and it had never occurred to us to think of raising objections to our parents’ plans.

‘You well know, Father Gurij, that a Russian master is a patriarch, and is despotic in his house and family. No person has any right to question his orders, not even the noblest in the town, not even the Czar. The house-father is above all written law. His house is not merely a castle, but a church as well, and whatever he does is sacred and holy. “Two wills in one house,” says the Russian proverb, “would be impossible; and would never do.” My father Ivan was a very strong man, and often he was cruelly severe with his serfs, whom he looked upon and treated as mere slaves. His will was the one thing which must be followed and obeyed. Not unfrequently they have felt the cat-o’-nine-tails, and he was dreaded both by his own servants and by the serfs in the village. He commanded, and nobody dared to offer the slightest opposition, whatever the matter might be. If it was his will that a young man and a girl should marry, then they must marry, and if any persons wanted to marry, my father had to be consulted, and his decision accepted.

‘My mother was as weak as a reed, and she would not venture in the least degree to oppose my father’s will. If he were provoked, it might happen that he would beat his wife, like an ordinary Russian, who, as you are aware, does this pretty often—so frequently, indeed, that it once happened on our estate that the wife of one of our serfs came to my mother with tears in her eyes, bewailing the fact that her husband no longer thrashed her as before. She was afraid that it was a sign that he no longer cared for her.

‘I believe that my mother was fond of Annita. It was impossible not to be. The servants also were all of them very much attached to her. On the other hand, my father seemed to be rather hard on her, and I noticed that at times there was a glance in his eye when he saw her which seemed to forbode no good. And she, on her part, was afraid of him.

‘I was again absent at Novgorod for about a year. Some little time before I was to return I got a letter from my mother, and inside it was a short note from Annita. [58]

‘ “Dear Brother,” she wrote, “come home soon. I am so terrified and frightened when you are not here. I have never before felt that you were so long away as this time. Your father has been kind to me, and has made me a present of a bracelet; but, all the same, I am afraid of him, as I always have been. How happy I shall be when you are here once more! I need not see you, but only know that you are here. I am so safe when I know that you are near me; then I can fly to you, and cling to you, as I did the first time, when you brought me here. I shall have no rest or peace until you return to your little sister,

‘ “Nita.”

‘This letter thoroughly opened my eyes. I clearly saw and realized what I had expected would come about.

‘Father Gurij,’ said Ambrose, ‘you understand that I loved this young girl whom I had saved, and to whom I had been as a father and a brother. Now I could no longer think of her merely as a sister. The spark in my heart had caught fire, and was blazing forth into a strong flame. But you cannot well understand the depth of my feelings. I was, indeed, at this time a man of years, yet never before had I been in love with a woman. It was with a feeling of fear that I realized how strong my passion was, and how violent it would become, and how wretchedly unhappy I should be, if anyone deprived me of Annita, or did any harm to her. I was of a noble family, and a rich man’s only heir, and I was on intimate terms with many families of quality at Moscow. I had seen many women, and many women had smiled on me, but their smile was cold and cheerless, and nothing to that which, in my own home, beamed on me from Annita. I decided, therefore, at once to return home, and openly tell my parents that I loved Annita, and that I wished to have her for my wife, and nobody else.

‘ “But what will Annita say?” I thought while I was on the way. “She has never heard any man whisper a word of love. Perhaps she will be frightened. Perhaps she will be as much afraid of me as of my father.”

‘I returned home, and I was welcomed by these three on the stairs of the house. My father was reserved and undemonstrative, my mother was weeping when embracing me, and Annita looked very pale, as she reached out her hand to me. I took both her hands in mine, and looked into her pretty eyes, [59]but she cast them down directly. There must have been something in my look which she had not seen before, something of a lover’s look, which caused her to cast her beautiful eyes down to the ground, while a slight blush tinged her cheeks.

‘The next day I said to Annita, “Come and let us go for a walk;” and we went together out into the park to her favourite place under a large oak, where there is a view over Lake Ladoga, which spreads out like an ocean. On previous occasions, when we had walked about together alone, she had always been full of fun, and asking questions, and like a child dragging me hither and thither. But this time she was silent and quiet.

‘ “Annita,” I said, when we had seated ourselves under the oak, “can you remember twelve years ago?”

‘ “Yes; I remember everything—my poor parents!”

‘ “Can you remember when we came here—how frightened you were? how you clung to me?”

‘ “Yes, I remember it distinctly. I remember the first night I would not sleep in the servant’s room, but that I cried so, and that I insisted on having my little bed moved into your room.”

‘ “But can you remember what you once said, when we were walking about here together?”

‘ “No; I don’t know what you refer to. I have no recollection of anything.”

‘ “But I remember it very well myself.”

‘ “What was it, then? Was it some very silly thing?”

‘ “No, it was not silly; but listen: while you held my hand, and skipped along by my side, you suddenly said to me, ‘Do you know what I am going to be?’

‘ “ ‘No,’ I answered; ‘I don’t in the least know what.’

‘ “ ‘Very well,’ you said very earnestly, ‘I mean to be your wife. You and I shall be man and wife.’

‘ “ ‘Oh, of course,’ I said; ‘you shall be Madame Theodora.’ ”

‘ “Yes; but I was a simple child then,” Annita said, “a child that played with dolls. I did not know what I was saying; besides that, my dolls were husband and wife, don’t you know.”

‘ “No, you did not know what you said, that is certain enough; but now you are a grown-up young woman, Annita, you are no longer a child.”

‘ “No, I am nearly twenty.”

‘ “And sensible.”

‘ “No, not particularly.” [60]

‘ “And pretty.”

‘ “Am I?”

‘ “Yes, you certainly are; yes, so pretty that I cannot any longer be your brother.”

‘ “Are you angry with me?”

‘ “No, I am not angry with you; but there is something I want to tell you.”

‘ “What is it?”

‘ “A secret.”

‘ “A secret! It will be nice to have a secret. I haven’t any.”

‘ “I am not so sure that it is always nice.”

‘ “What is the secret? Will you tell me?”

‘ “Yes, I will tell you; but you must not be frightened. It is the greatest secret of my life, Annita, and the secret is this: that I love you, Annita, seriously and deeply. I am in love with you, and with no one else, for the rest of my life. Annita, I ask you now, will you be my wife? Look at me, Annita; what do you say? You care a little bit for me, Annita, don’t you?”

‘Annita stooped to me in trepidation.

‘ “Is it true, Theodore,” she whispered, “that you love me, and will have me for your wife? Say it once more.”

‘ “Yes, Annita, I love you, and you alone, and no one but you in the whole world,” I said, pressing her to me, and kissing her pale face till the rosy colour came back in her cheeks.

‘ “Theodore,” she whispered, “I have always loved you. I have always thought of nobody but you. All I have is yours, and has been yours for many years—heart, soul, and thought.”

‘ “God bless you, Annita!” I exclaimed. “At the last minute I began to doubt. If you had not cared for me, Annita, I should have been very wretched; in fact, a miserable man, bad, morose, and full of hatred. But not now: you know what the saying is of catching a sunbeam.”

‘ “Can one catch sunbeams?”

‘ “Yes, the sunbeam is the smile on your lips, Annita; if I can catch that smile all my life, then I am saved, and will be a good man and a happy one.”

‘ “You shall have it, Theodore; it shall be yours, and yours only.”

‘The sun was just then setting. The evening was calm; there [61]came gentle breezes over us from the wind, which was going down. Never had it seemed to me that the sun set so brilliantly, or that Lake Ladoga ever looked so beautiful, as on that evening when Annita confessed her love. As the sun disappeared behind the waves of the lake, and darkness spread over the sky, I felt that even were the earthly sun to depart, yet an everlasting dawn of light and joy had arisen in my soul. We wandered back through the flower-garden to the house.

‘ “But what will father and Theodora say?” exclaimed Annita as we approached the house.

‘ “To-morrow I shall talk to my parents and Theodora’s parents,” I said calmly.

‘The next day I went to my father, and told him that Annita and I were in love with each other.

‘ “Just so,” said my father, “just as you like, as far as I am concerned.”

‘ “Will you consent, then, to our marrying?”

‘ “You marry Annita!” he exclaimed.

‘ “Yes; I want no one else for my wife.”

‘ “You have really thought of marrying the beggar-girl, Annita. Ha, ha, ha!” laughed my father in derision, and was on the point of breaking out in an uncontrollable passion, but I saw that he restrained himself; he very well knew that his beloved son was stubborn, too, and he considered that at the outset it would be best to proceed cautiously.

‘ “Annita is poor,” I said quite quietly; “but she is no beggar, and she is prettier than any rich girl I have seen; and she has been, moreover, as well brought up as any Russian lady of rank.”

‘ “Her bringing up I have nothing to do with, but you intend, do you? to break your promise to Theodora, and to set yourself against both my plans and those of Theodora’s parents.”

‘ “I have never proposed to Theodora, neither have I made her any promise. It has all been arranged between you and her parents, without our being consulted or having given our consent to it.”

‘ “Yes, just so, and just so is it to be. I will in no manner give my consent to your marriage with a beggar-girl. Your marriage with Theodora has been put off long enough; and on that account it will be best that it should take place as soon as possible. I will provide for Annita myself. There is no hurry [62]as regards her. I will provide a suitable husband for her in good time from among my serfs or servants—for example, Anthony Kudsk, or some other suitable youth.”

‘ “Father,” I exclaimed in horror, “don’t do it! I ask you dutifully, and humbly, let me have Annita for my wife! I assure you, solemnly and truly, that I will marry no other girl.”

‘ “Stuff and nonsense!” exclaimed my father; “when you are married to Theodora, and Annita has married Anthony, your romantic ideas will soon disperse, and later on you will be grateful to me.”

‘ “Father, don’t joke, or rather make fun of us. Annita would die rather than marry Anthony, or any other serf. She has been brought up too well for that; and besides that, she admitted yesterday that she had always loved me since she was ten years old.”

‘ “Leave that to me; I am master here.”

‘ “Not over Annita,” I ventured to remark.

‘ “Don’t you think so?”

‘ “She is not your daughter, and neither a slave nor a serf.”

‘ “Who has brought her up for the last twelve years?”

‘ “You and my mother have.”

‘ “Then I suppose we have something to say as to her future?”

‘ “No; when Annita’s future has to be provided for, I have something to say. It was I who saved her life.”

‘ “Ah, well! I have heard that story before now.”

‘ “Father, have you anything to reproach Annita for?”

‘ “No; but I will not have my son mix Finnish peasant blood with ours. I will have you marry a girl who is your equal in station and position, and that Theodora Petrovna is.”

‘ “But if I won’t?” I made bold to say once more.

‘ “You won’t! You can’t! you shall, though!” exclaimed my father in a rage.

‘ “Will I, though?”

‘ “Yes, you shall. I am master in my own house, and in my family. You are to marry Theodora, even if I have to lead you bound, and cudgelled, to the altar. In any case, I will never consent to your marriage with Annita. Now you know my answer, and we have no need to say anything more about it.”

‘ “Just one word,” I said respectfully; “I am your only child [63]and your heir, and I may presume that you have some little affection for me. Why can’t you grant me my heart’s fondest wish? Annita would make me a more faithful and affectionate wife than any other woman I know. Why should we, who are both in a sense your children, be compelled to curse, instead of to bless you?”

‘ “I see what is for your future good, better than you do yourself. The whole thing is nothing more than a passing romantic fancy, and it won’t be long before you yourself will give it up as a piece of folly.”

‘ “No,” I exclaimed, “not before Annita or I am dead.” And with these words I left my father.

‘In bad spirits I went to my mother, and related the whole story to her; and although she as well would have preferred that I should marry Theodora, I believe that she would have forgiven Annita and me, and have given us her blessing. A mother is always ready to pardon her only son, and I am pretty sure that my mother would have taken my part, even if I had turned into a brigand or murderer. But her opinion was not of the slightest weight, against that of my father.

‘I told Annita that my father would not consent to our marrying, but I assured her, over and over again, that she, and nobody but she, should be my wife.

‘ “And, Annita,” I asked, “what do you say?”

‘ “I!” said Annita; “why, he may take my life before I consent to be married to any of his serfs. You may implicitly rely on me. Neither persuasion nor threat will ever influence me. I am yours, and never in this world will I belong to any other man.”

‘In this way time slipped by. Annita and I were happy in the consciousness of our mutual affection for each other, but we were unhappy because our parents took no share with us in it. My father was gloomy, and severe with everybody, and I seldom spoke to him. Annita had a good voice, and sang our national Russian songs beautifully; but her singing seemed to give my father pain, and to jar on his ears, for he left the room as soon as he heard her voice.

‘A short time afterwards, a letter came from a mercantile house at Novgorod, to say that I must go there to take part in arranging some complicated money matters connected with a patrimony which had come to me through the death of an [64]uncle. Annita was in despair at my having to leave her, but I endeavoured to console her with the thought that it would not be for long, and that I would hurry as much as possible, and return as soon as I could. I also tried to comfort her with the reflection that I had now come in for property of my own, so that we could marry as soon as we wished, independently of my father, and go where we liked, and even, perhaps, make a trip to the country of her own childhood.

‘The business, however, took longer than I had expected, and six months elapsed before all was settled and I was able to return home. The nearer I approached my home, the more I hurried on, and at last I drove from station to station like a madman.

‘Do you believe in omens, Father Gurij? I expected some mishap, and I was terribly apprehensive; the nearer I approached my home, the more my fears increased. I reached home in the afternoon. My father and mother came to receive me. I saluted them, but I saw nothing of Annita.

‘ “Where is Annita?” I asked.

‘ “She is not at home,” answered my father.

‘ “Isn’t she at home? Didn’t she know that I was to be back to-day?”

‘ “I don’t know. Perhaps she may come soon.”

‘ “Has she gone out?”

‘ “Probably.”

‘ “Where has she gone?”

‘ “I really don’t know; perhaps she has gone across to Theodora’s.”

‘I went over there, but Annita had not been there. I ran back, and rushed in despair to my mother, and implored her to tell me where Annita was.

‘ “I hope no misfortune has happened to her,” I exclaimed.

‘ “I don’t know,” said my mother; “ask your father.”

‘I went to my father, and I must have had a strange look, there must have been something alarming in my countenance, for he turned pale.

‘ “Where is Annita? What have you done with her?”

‘ “I don’t know. I have already told you so,” he replied evasively.

‘ “You don’t know—‘don’t know,’ you all say. Who, then, does know where she is?” [65]

‘ “Well, that is just what nobody does know.”

‘ “If she is dead you may as well tell me at once.”

‘ “No, so far as I know, she is not dead.”

‘ “But where has she gone, then? In God’s name tell me what you know, and what has happened.”

‘ “She has disappeared.”

‘ “Disappeared! Why, in what way?”

‘ “About a month ago she was missed, and since that time we have neither seen nor heard anything of her.”

‘I was on the point of falling, but I collected myself, and went close up to my father, as pale as death, and with frenzied threatening gestures, so that he drew back.

‘ “Surely you are not going to strike your father,” he exclaimed.

‘ “No,” I said; “but I will know the truth. Where is Annita? What have you done with her? Have you murdered her?”

‘ “As I tell you, she disappeared a month ago; nobody knows any more.”

‘ “Father, that is not true. You are lying to your son. You hide things from me, but I will know the truth, even if I have to squeeze it from you like drops of blood.”

‘ “You can do what you like.”

‘ “Did you look for her?”

‘ “Yes; your mother and the servants searched for her.”

‘ “And found no trace?”

‘ “No; none that I know of.”

‘I rushed again to my mother, but she called heaven to witness that she knew nothing. I ran round to the servants, and asked them all the same question, but I got the same answer, that she had disappeared, and that no one knew anything as to how it had happened. I rushed to her room, but all the things were untouched, and the room was as if she had only just left it. Could she have gone out for a walk, and have been killed by some wild beast, or robbed and murdered?

‘I couldn’t sleep that night. Overwhelming sorrow kept me wide awake. Half mad, I went the next day into the village, and made inquiries of everybody, but nobody had anything to relate except that she had disappeared. I again went to the house, and asked for Anthony, the coachman, whom I had not yet seen. I got the same answer from him, that she had [66]disappeared. Quite infuriated, I made for my father, and had forgotten myself so far as to grip him by the throat and dash him on the floor in order to get the real truth out of him.

‘ “Lay a hand on your father!” he exclaimed; “you are a fine sort of son.”

‘I was at once disarmed.

‘ “If you have done some unworthy act, father,” I exclaimed, “then own to it, and make a clean breast of it. I don’t know what I shan’t do to you or to myself, but I will know the truth.”

‘ “I have tried to spare you,” my father said; “but when you go on in this fashion with violence and threats, then there is nothing to be done but to tell you exactly what has really happened. The matter is simply this, that Annita and Anthony Kudst disappeared on the same night. It pains me to tell you this; but the girl was originally of low birth, and Anthony has been making good use of the time while you were away to gain her affection. He was, too, a good-looking fellow, and from the same country as the girl, and I suppose the beggar-girl persuaded him to run away with her back to their dear old heretical fatherland.”

‘ “That is not true,” I said; “it is a base, abominable lie, and I don’t believe it. If it were true I would go after them and murder them both; but it is not true.”

‘I went down to the village again and threatened both grown-up people and children, but I could get hold of nothing from anybody. The only person who knew anything, they declared, must be my father himself. I never for a single moment yielded to the thought that Annita had gone off of her own accord with Anthony. I was so fully persuaded of the impossibility of her doing such a thing that it did not strike me that she would, in such a case, have taken various things with her, which I knew remained untouched in her room. If she had gone on account of her fear of my father, she would also have taken several things with her, and she could then have been traced, or something would have been heard of her. But had she been stolen, carried off by force, or kidnapped? If that were so I could surely find some trace of her. I did not at first think that she was dead, and this hope kept me going.

‘I noticed that a dog which was very much attached to her, and which was called Karo, followed me about wherever I went, [67]and was evidently also trying to find her. This was a further sign to me that she had not voluntarily disappeared. The dog would have accompanied her. I took the dog with me, in the hope that it might possibly scent out her footprints, and we hunted through the house, the park, the village, and the neighbourhood, but all in vain. I could not find the slightest trace of her.

‘ “Do you still refuse to tell me the truth?” I asked my father when I returned home. “Can you tell me if Annita is dead? because if I know that, then I know what to do.”

‘ “I can’t tell you more than I know.”

‘ “You are lying, father!” I exclaimed in anger; “but it is all the same; I will find her, or get to know about her. I will not rest, either day or night, till I find her, living or dead. But may God punish you with everlasting remorse if I find that you have driven her with blows to the altar to marry Anthony.”

‘ “Unnatural son! go and ask the priest.”

‘I went to the pope in the village. Like one demented, I rushed into his room and asked:

‘ “Have you married Annita and Anthony?” As he hesitated with his answer I caught him by the throat, threw him on the ground and knelt on his chest.

‘ “Out with the truth, you wretch!” I cried; “have you married Annita and Anthony?”

‘He assured me, by all that was holy, that he had not married them, and that he knew nothing about it. I could not but believe him. If I had felt any doubt as to the truth of his word I believe that, in the desperate and frenzied state in which I was, I should have held my hand so long on his throat that I should have choked him.

‘The next day I also disappeared and was away for a whole year. I wandered about from house to house, village to village, and inquired of everybody, and promised rewards if anyone would procure me tidings of Annita. But all in vain. I could find no trace of her. I went to Finland, to Annita’s homestead, and through Kuolaniemi, where I had rescued her. The farm-house had been rebuilt, and had a new proprietor, but nobody had heard anything of Annita.

‘I returned home as ragged as a beggar, sick, haggard, hollow-eyed, and in despair. I was no longer as angry as [68]before, but dreadfully out of spirits and broken-hearted. I again begged my father to tell me the truth, or let me know for certain whether Annita was alive.

‘ “I don’t know,” he replied as before. I went off again without even saying good-bye to my parents. I visited all the convents, but no nun bore her name, and no one had heard anything of her. I went to Moscow, to the Czar, to the pious Theodore, in whose service I had been, and I laid a charge against my father by telling him what I have now told you. He sent a judge to Olonets and had my father examined, but he denied, as before, that he knew anything about Annita; perhaps bribed the judge as well—he was rich enough to do it. After an absence of two years I returned to my saddened home.

‘ “You have been complaining of me to the Czar,” said my father.

‘ “Yes,” I replied.

‘ “You wanted to have your own father punished as a criminal.”

‘ “Yes; because you would not tell me the truth.”

‘ “Well, then, I have now just one word to say to you, and that will be the last word spoken between us.”

‘ “Say it, then.”

‘ “If you don’t marry Theodora, I shall order my servants to remove you by force from the house, and then I disinherit you.”

‘ “I will not marry Theodora.”

‘ “Very well, then, you are no longer my son.”

‘ “Be it so,” I said. “Nothing more can wound or grieve me. I am deaf and dead to all the feelings of a son towards his father, and to all his father’s threats. I, too, have made my decision.”

‘ “And I should like to know what that may be?”

‘ “I am going to be a monk, and shall enter a monastery. I renounce the estates and the property, and everything else in this world.”

‘ “And all for the sake of a beggar-girl.”

‘ “Yes, for the sake of a poor, harmless, forlorn girl—for the sake of the one woman whom I have loved, and whom I have lost, and of whom my own father has deprived me.”

‘ “As you will,” said my father, but he hardly believed that I was in earnest. I made one more desperate journey to seek [69]for some trace of Annita. At a place in Karelen I was informed that one Sunday a young couple, who were travelling, had been at church there, and as they were driving off again, the young woman, when they were crossing a bridge, either threw herself, or fell into the river and was drowned. But who they were nobody knew. I called on the priest of the parish, and asked him, but he could not remember that he had heard the names of Annita or Anthony, and he had never married persons so named.

‘I returned home, but I could not bring myself to live there. Wherever I went I was reminded of Annita. I went out in the park, where she used to play as a child, and where, as a grown-up woman, she had assured me of her love. I threw myself down on the ground with my face to the earth, and lay there a long time. I did not give way to tears, but I had a sense of vacuity about me and around me. A blow had fallen upon me from a cruel hand, and my life was cut in twain. So I bid farewell to my parents, and to my home, and I went to Solowetski to be a monk. But there was too much bustle and secular excitement in that huge monastery, and I did not find sufficient solitude there. I longed for solitude, and for a scenery as bare, bleak, and desolate as my own inner feelings. So I journeyed on foot to this dreary spot. Here, I will remain, and to-morrow I will take the vows. Annita must be dead, or, what is still worse, living as dead to me, for not a trace of her has been found, and it is now three years since anything has been heard of her. I also will die, therefore, from henceforth to the pleasures and sorrows of the world. I am weary of life, weary unto death, and I renounce everything.’

‘Perhaps all this has been for your good, and for the saving of your soul,’ said old Gurij.

‘No, no!’ Ambrose exclaimed passionately, and springing up from the place where he was reclining. ‘I could have been so happy in Annita’s love. You don’t know, nobody knows, what that child was to me. I have watched at night by her sick-bed, and have felt that were she to die, I should lose that which nothing could replace. I have carried her in my arms, and she was more precious to me than my own flesh and blood. I lived wholly and solely in her love. She was my all—my future was centred in her. She was my hope, my sanctuary, and my home.’ [70]

‘But, perhaps, in the course of time you might fall in love with some other woman, and be happy in her company?’

‘Never! never! I was no mere lad, who, in the unruly passion of the passing moment, gave vent to vows, the meaning of which he had never reflected on. I was a full-grown man who, with my whole understanding, had pledged myself to that woman.’

‘I can understand how hard it must have been to give up that earthly hope.’

‘Yes, and you must not suppose either that I have patiently submitted to my hard fate. No, indeed; there were times when my heart rebelled at the thought that I was unloved by any human being. Shall I tell it to you—how I have murmured against Providence, how I have indulged rebellious thoughts against Providence, and how I dared to reproach the Divine decrees? But that state of rebellion within me is at an end, and so are all my hopes. I look for nothing more. I hope for nothing more. I have now only before my eyes a quiet resignation to my lot and a humble self-renunciation.’

‘And as regards your father?’

‘Yes, yes, my father.’

‘Do you forgive him?’

‘Yes; may God pardon him for the wrong he did to Annita and to me.’

‘That is right, my son,’ said the old man. ‘Such should be your state of mind when you take the vows this night, and may it be that you will find peace within the Church’s fold; for the holy Church alone can offer balm to your wounded heart here on earth, and give to your soul everlasting bliss hereafter.’

[71]

There was war between John III. of Sweden and the Czar, Theodore Ivanovitsch, and though an amnesty had been agreed upon for four years—from 1585 to 1590—there were during that time slight skirmishes between the people who lived along the coast of Karelen, and the Finns, of Swedish Finland. Early in 1589 the Karelens had, in this irregular manner, made an incursion into Finland, in the direction of Kajana. In revenge for this attack, the Swedish Finns, not long afterwards, made an incursion into Karelen. It is recorded that ‘they came in boats over the river Kovda, seven hundred strong, and invaded and burnt the Karelen towns of Kovda, Umba, Keret, and other places along the coast. After this they made their way southwards in Kemste Volost, and plundered all the habitations. Thence they retraced their steps across the river Kem.’

The inhabitants of Solowetski retaliated, and with a troop of thirteen hundred men made another incursion into Finland, plundering several towns within the Finnish territory.

The Finns, on their part, revenged themselves ‘about Christmastide’ by making another invasion; not, however, this time eastwards towards Karelen, but northwards to the less defended coast of Russian Lapland, to Enare, Peisen, [72]Petschenga, Orafjord, and Kola. The troops, whose numbers have not been recorded, marched from the district of Kajana, and it is probable that they first reached Enare, or, as it is called in the old documents, ‘Innier.’ Here they slew, among others, ‘Tykum Thudesen, who yielded tribute to Denmark, Sweden, and Russia,’ and who, from his name, we judge must have been a Norwegian. From Enare they probably went along the Pasvig river, or through its valley to Pasvig, or Klosterfjord, where Boris and Glebs Chapel had been built by the monks of Petschenga. Here they put to death ‘four men, three boys, and one woman.’ Among the boys Mikel Ottesen is mentioned, who was probably a Norwegian, and the woman, who was named Oditte Andrisdatter, was also in all probability a Norwegian woman. It is noteworthy that in this case they spared the chapel, as it is still in existence, but usually they burnt both the churches and the houses. From Peisen they went by sea to Bomeni, or Bumandsfjord, on Fiskerö. They easily obtained boats at Pasvigfjord, where the monks had a shipyard. The number of those who were killed at Bomeni, and the property belonging to the monks which they destroyed, is not known. ‘There was nobody there,’ the letter from Vardö states, ‘when the magistrate arrived’ after Christmas to collect the usual tax, or, as it was called, the ‘Nordfjeldskat.’ From Bomeni they went to Petschengafjord. At the mouth of the fjord, at Warehouse Bay, or, as the Vardö letter calls it, ‘at Wickits,’ was the monks’ shipyard. Here they set fire to the houses, and burnt all the boats which they did not require. At the head of the bay was St. Mary’s Church. This they also set on fire, after having plundered the treasures which they found in it. From thence they crossed the river to the monastery itself.

They reached it on the day before Christmas, 1589, during the night, and while the office of Nocturns was being recited in the church, and at the very time when Ambrose was about to take the vows. Most of the monks were assembled in the church. A great many of the work-people also were there, for everyone wanted to be present when a man who was so highly esteemed by them all was to take his final vows. Fifteen of the monks appear to have been absent from the monastery when it was attacked, and thus they escaped death. Probably the monks who were at the monastery had received intelligence [73]of the ravages of the hostile troops, and had done what was possible by way of defending themselves, but evidently they had not anticipated an attack quite so soon.

The solemn consecration had begun, and at ten o’clock at night Ambrose entered the outer church. There he took off the ordinary clothes which he had been wearing, and stood with only his hair-shirt on him, without stockings, shoes, girdle, and with his head uncovered. This was an indication that he had now completely renounced everything in the world. Then the assembled brothers approached him, each one bearing a lighted taper in his hand as a symbol of the Gospel approaching the penitent soul. He then joined in with their voices, and sang the hymn:

At the entrance of the chancel the president of the monastery met him ‘as a father at the threshold of his house,’ and delivered a charge to him, in which he adjured him ‘to open his heart, and to give heed to the voice of the Lord, which now was calling on him to take His easy yoke upon him. He must not forget that while with joy and trembling he made his vows, the Saviour Himself, and the Mother of God, and all the host of heaven, would hear each word he spoke, and that those words would resound again before him, at the resurrection at the last day.’

Having entered the chancel, Ambrose knelt down, turning towards the Superior and the Brothers, who stood in a semi-circle before him.

The Superior then inquired of him, ‘Wherefore art thou come hither, my brother, and art kneeling before this sanctuary, and before the sacred Brotherhood?’

He responded: ‘From the desire to lead a holy life of self-renunciation.’

‘Dost thou desire to be reckoned worthy of being received as a monk, and a partner of the Brethren’s sacred company?’

‘I do, by the help of God, Reverend Father,’ responded the novice.

The Superior commended his good intention, and said:

‘Yea, verily, it is a beautiful and laudable service to which thou art now consecrating thy life. Mayest thou also fulfil thy vows! But so grave an undertaking cannot be faithfully borne without toil, and self-denial, and prayer.’ [74]

Then the Superior again demanded: ‘Is it of thine own free will that thou hast come hither before the Lord?’

‘Yea, Reverend Father.’

‘Not by necessity, nor by force?’

‘No, Reverend Father.’

‘Wilt thou abide here in the monastery, and submit thyself wholly to a monk’s life of self-denial and austerity, until the day of thy decease? Wilt thou all the days of thy life be obedient to thy Prior, and to this Brotherhood in Christ? Wilt thou keep thyself in temperance and chastity? Dost thou forsake all thy possessions, and all that is in the world?’

To all these demands the novice responded with lowly voice, in consciousness of his own frailty, but in hope of help from on high, ‘Yea, Reverend Father.’

After this public confession, which is intended to remove every fear that force may have been used in securing the devotion of the novice, the Superior addressed to Ambrose some further words of admonition, in which he clearly explained to him the significance and the claims of the monastic life. He again pointed out to him its principal rules, which demand chastity, humility, obedience, and self-denial. He warned him against the temptations with which the chief enemy of mankind would assail him, more especially by bringing before him, awake and asleep, visions of his former life in the world, its joys, its hopes, and its sorrows. He made mention of the martyrs as examples to be followed, and even spoke of the Lord Himself, Who, for our sake, ‘denied Himself, so that He became obedient unto death,’ and then demanded of him once more, ‘All this thou dost pledge thyself to observe, in reliance on God’s might, and dost promise to keep thy vow unbroken, all the days of thy life, through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ?’

‘I do, with the help of the Lord, Reverend Father,’ responded once more the new champion of the Lord.

The Superior then said a prayer, in which he called to mind God’s mercy when He spake to the children of Israel, ‘Even though a mother forget her child, yet will I not forget thee;’ and he sought to confirm the soul of the new brother with the promise of Divine strength and comfort from the Holy Ghost in the spiritual struggles which were to come upon him.

Then the Superior pointed to the Book of the Gospels, which [75]lay upon a table, as a symbol of Christ’s presence, and again put him in remembrance that he had, of his own free will, made request to enter the order of monks.

Then, one of the Brothers, who had been appointed to do so, took a pair of scissors, which were lying on the Gospels, and delivered them to the novice. Then the novice handed them back. This was done thrice. When on the third occasion the monk received the scissors from the hand of the novice, he cut off a small portion of the hair over the novice’s forehead, in the name of the Holy Trinity, as a token that therewith all carnal lusts are abolished, saying as he did so: ‘Never forget Whom it is that thou art now espousing, to Whom it is that thou art going, and what it is that thou art forsaking.’

While the assembled monks were softly singing ‘Gospodi pomilui,’ ‘God have mercy,’ the Superior invested the new Brother with the monastic habit, of which each separate article, habit, girdle, hood, and sandals, has its own symbolical meaning. Each time that the Superior placed on him a fresh portion of the habit, he turned to the brothers and said: ‘Let us pray for him. Lord have mercy.’ As soon as he had completely invested him, he repeated a prayer, in which he implored the Lord that He would ‘Lead this Thy servant into Thy spiritual house, receive him into Thy flock, and purify his soul from all carnal affections, and ever put him in remembrance of the blessing and heavenly joy which awaits the elect of God, and all them who, in the life of the monastery, have crucified the flesh for the Kingdom of Heaven’s sake.’

Then the Superior and the assembled Brothers and the novice together sang a beautiful old Russian hymn:

Portions were next read from the Epistle to the Ephesians (vi. 10–17) and from the Gospel according to St. Matthew [76](x. 37, 38; and xi. 28–30). Then, during the recital of a prayer, the Prior laid a cross on the novice’s chest and shoulders, and called upon him to bear in mind the words of Christ (St. Matt. x. 38). He handed him a lighted taper, and with this in his hand he was to stand before the picture of Christ, until the administration of the Holy Communion. When he handed him this taper, he said, ‘Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven’ (St. Matt. v. 16).

The only thing which now remained was for Ambrose, with the Superior and Brothers, to receive the Blessed Sacrament, and they had all to give him the kiss of peace, in token that he was received as a Brother in their community.

But at eleven o’clock the solemn function was suddenly interrupted. Some of the work-people rushed into the church and shouted: ‘The enemy is at our gates!’ And a banging of axes on the wooden walls was at the same moment heard within the church. In place of the most solemn silence, there now reigned a most uproarious alarm. The servants of the monastery rushed from the church, and ran to their different dwellings to arm themselves with what weapons they possessed, while the soldiers battered away at the gate of the wooden wall which surrounded the church and other buildings. It was not long before they burst it open and rushed into the courtyard. Being better armed with swords and guns, they speedily overpowered the servants of the monastery, and drove some of them back into the church, and others into their own dwellings, or into those of the monks. Some of the ruffians pursued them from room to room, and murdered the defenceless people, and then plundered whatever seemed to be of any value, and set fire to the buildings.

In the meantime, the monks, with some of the work-people, were collected in the church. The leader of the troop, with a portion of his band, broke through the slender walls and entered the outer church; but the doors into the chancel were stronger, and withstood their attack for a while. They well knew that the money and other treasures would be found in the church, and particularly in the Sanctuary, or Holy Place. They therefore surrounded the church, so that nobody should escape through any secret door, while they continued to batter at the door leading to the chancel. [77]

In the meanwhile, the monks’ and servants’ dwellings were burning, and the smoke came down over the church and enveloped both besieged and besiegers in a thick white mist.

The doors, of course, did not long withstand the blows of the axes. The soldiers smashed them and stormed into the chancel, where the helpless monks stood assembled in their priestly attire, with the Superior, the aged Gurij, at their head. He, venerable old man, knelt down and held out a gilt cross to the enemy, and at the same time asked for mercy for himself and his helpless brothers. But he was at once ruthlessly struck down by the leader, and the cross snatched from his hands. Then they set to work upon the others, and struck them down man by man. There was only one who offered anything like resistance. Ambrose had rushed into the Sanctuary and put on the coat of armour and seized the sword. Thus armed, he thrust himself forward, and restrained some of the enemy who were on the point of killing the rest of the monks. He struck out all round, and defended himself with great spirit, his back being against the Sanctuary, while the bodies of his dead and dying brethren lay in a heap at his feet, and the whole of the floor of the church flowed with their blood.

All of a sudden, as if shot from a cannon, a man sprang out of the Sanctuary to his assistance. It was the huge, powerful Jussi, his trusty friend. Jussi had entered by a secret door, and had armed himself with a long, heavy iron crowbar. Armed with this, he sprang forward in front of Ambrose and wielded it with his giant-like strength, and dealt blows with such violence on all sides that he mowed down like grass a number of the soldiers, and drove the others back. But like a swarm of bees they surrounded him again from all sides, so that at last, mortally wounded, he turned towards Ambrose, and, falling over him, gasped:

‘Fly for it—Unnas is waiting—secret door.’

More he could not utter, before he was stabbed through and through a dozen times. Ambrose leaped over the half-door of the Sanctuary, slammed firmly back the upper half of it, and so gained a moment’s respite. A secret door opened out of the Sanctuary into the back of the monastic enclosure, and through that door peeped the terror-stricken face of Unnas.

‘Come, come,’ he whispered. [78]

The Sanctuary door crashed and burst in just as Ambrose disappeared through the secret door, which was so placed that the soldiers had not detected it, and so had not guarded it. But, in escaping through the wooden fencing which surrounded the whole of the monastery, Unnas and Ambrose had to jump across the burning remains of a part of the servants’ dwellings. Unnas jumped over them first, and his Finn’s dress and thick cap protected him from the flames, but Ambrose, with nothing on his head, had his face badly scorched, although he had held his hands over it.

They escaped through a small gate in the fence, and then made off through the smoke and darkness down to the river, while the soldiers were engaged in plundering the Sanctuary. When they reached the river, Unnas jumped on to a block of ice and threw a rope to Ambrose. He leaped from one block of ice to another, and in that way got across to a small island in the middle of the river. Ambrose, who was heavier, and not so nimble as the Finn, fell straight down, exhausted, wounded, and almost blinded; but he had the rope round his waist, and, partly dragged by Unnas, and partly crawling himself along the beach, the Finn at last helped him up and enabled him to reach a gamme,2 or hut built of earth, which was on the island. There were two islands in the river opposite the monastery, and no doubt they still exist, unless the river has changed its course, or swept them away. On these two small islands, it is expressly mentioned in the letter from Vardö, ‘there were two “gammer,” which remained untouched, as the Swedes could not reach them.’

Unnas and Ambrose were thus, for a time at least, in security. They could see from their place of refuge how the church was burning. The invaders had set fire to it, after they had plundered whatever they could find of any value. The church and the various monastery buildings made together a huge conflagration, round which they could see black figures moving about on the snow.

The next morning, Christmas Day, nothing remained but the smouldering ruins of the church, the buildings, the barns, and the mill. All that the invaders could carry with them, that was of any value, they had pillaged, and the rest they had burnt.

In the letter from Vardö forty-one of the murdered monks [79]are mentioned by name. ‘The following,’ it states, ‘the Swedes slew belonging to the monastery that was called Pesantz: The chief monk, Archimandrite Gurij. Three priests, by name Packum, N. Foser, and Jonno N., together with the following monks.’ (Here follows a list of their names.)

Similarly the names of fifty-one of the servants, or lay-brothers, are recorded as having been killed. (Here follows another list of names.)

According to some authorities a total of fifty-one monks and sixty-five servants were slain, and according to others even a larger number. The majority of the names are Russian, only one or two are Finnish or Norwegian. In the barn they killed two women, Kyllinna and Fefemj by name. In all probability they were milkmaids, who attended to the cows. With this the invaders ended their errand, and made their way down to the fjord again. From thence they went across to ‘Urze,’ by which most likely Orafjord is meant, and there they put to death five men, three lads, five women, and four girls. Among the men are mentioned by name, Jorgen Iffersen, Iver Ottesen, and Thimofe Mickelsen, who were probably Norwegians. Among the women, Marin Iffuansdatter is mentioned; she was also, most probably, a Norwegian woman. The names of the rest seem to have been those of Russians. These marauders spared neither man nor woman, but put to death everybody they could.

From Orafjord they made for the town of Kola, which was pretty well fortified. ‘They reached it two days after Christmas. But the besieged inhabitants made a sally, and the marauders were completely routed. Sixty of them were slain, and the rest escaped by boat across the river Tulom.’ This river has its source in the Nuotjavre Lake, and from it the remnant probably made their way southwards again to the region of Kajana, whence they had come. Nothing more, however, is recorded of their exploits.

Unnas and Ambrose were not the only persons who escaped from being killed by fire and the enemy’s sword. It is not unlikely that a few others of the monks also escaped by flight, but nothing is said in the documents on this point. Ambrose lay ill on a plank bed, with a bandage over his eyes. His hair was almost entirely burnt off, and his hands and face were so scorched that he was scarcely to be recognised. [80]

The following day Unnas went over to the ruins. It had frozen during the night, so that the ice on the river was strong enough to bear him. There he found nothing left of the entire monastery but smouldering embers, and charred corpses among the ruins. A number of clothes and other things had been fetched from the monks’ chambers on to the snow, and had served the ruffians for beds. Perhaps at one time they had thought of taking some of these things with them, but had afterwards abandoned the idea. Unnas took some of the things with him across to the island, so that both he and Ambrose might have something to rest upon. The barn was, as has been already observed, also burnt down, and the cattle had been killed. Part of the slaughtered cattle the brigands had taken with them, the remainder they had thrown into the fire.

Ambrose and Unnas, however, were not on that account obliged to starve. They found in a shed on the island a large amount of salt fish. The monks had speared salmon on the islands during the summer, and it sometimes happened that one or more of them, together with some of the servants, would remain in the gamme for several days. Pots and cooking utensils were to be found there, and neither Ambrose nor Unnas had any need to fear either cold or hunger for awhile; they could wait for Ambrose to recover his strength, and for the people who were spared to return.

After a few days had passed, most of the fifteen absent monks did return, and found to their horror the monastery destroyed, and their brothers’ half-burnt corpses lying among the ruins. They had to live for the present in a ‘bathing chamber, situated a little way from the monastery,’ which had been spared, or perhaps had not been noticed by the marauders. At first they had enough to do in burying their murdered brethren and the servants.

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