censer, and the priest bearing the chalice, preceded by tapers, march in solemn pomp round the church. Short prayers are repeated during this procession till the priest and deacon reentering the holy doors, stand there uttering further invocations. They then incense the dish and the cup; and kissing them, with a fan drive away any flies which may approach. They prostrate themselves before the holy elements; a second time incense the table, repeating prayers for the living, and thanksgiving for the dead in Christ. The priest and deacon then take the holy bread and wine, eating and drinking it with great devotion. The congregation draw near, one after the other, bowing and holding their hands crossed over their breasts; and the priest presents to each the piece of bread sopped in the wine. This done many more prayers are said and minor ceremonies performed; the whole ending with the deacon eating up all the holy bread that might have been left; pouring the wine into a smaller cup, drinking it likewise to the last drop, that not a particle of the elements may be lost.

There are five orders in the Greek priesthood. Bishops, priests, deacons, subdeacons, and readers which include singers. The episcopal order has other distinctions, metropolitan, archbishop, and bishop. The two first titles are not attached to any particular see, but depend entirely upon the will of the emperor; they are merely rank, with a very little addition of power, as every bishop is independent in his own diocese. The clergy are divided into regular and secular. The former are of the monastic order, the latter are of the parochial ministers. The secular clergy are called papas (fathers), and their highest dignity is that of proto-papa; that is the first priest in a great church where there are several of the same order. They are allowed to marry once, but never a second time, under pain of being compelled to quit their holy profession.

Of the rise and progress of monkism, from its birth in the east to its maturity in the Greek church, Mosheim and the learned chaplain to the factory at St. Petersburgh give so satisfactory an account, that I need only speak their language to impress you with a pretty correct idea of how this unnatural superstition made its march round the world. The doctrine that

the highest virtue, and the perfection of human nature, consist in leading a life of solitude and contemplation, is not less absurd than the fancy that celibacy is the best proof of devotion to God." Increase and multiply!" was a primary command of the Deity; and how the reverse can be one of his allwise mandates too, requires a more experienced casuist than I pretend to be, to explain.

Paul the Hermit, whose life is written by St. Jerome, and who lived in the third century, is considered to be the first founder of monastic orders. To avoid the persecution by Decius, he fled into the lonely deserts of Thebais; where, it is said, he dwelt ninety years, even till he died, subjecting himself to all the desolations of perfect solitude. It is, however, to be observed, that though this modern Saint Paul is placed at the head of the order of hermits, yet that gloomy manner of life was very common in the east from the earliest periods. The sultry atmosphere which envelopes that part of the globe, by disposing the inhabitants to indolence, is a natural cause of that love of retirement and repose, which drove them into spots sequestered from business and from man. Not having energy to be actively good, they esteemed it sufficiently virtuous to be able to withdraw from all temptations to wickedness; from all incitements to lose themselves in the interests of their fellow creatures. To be, or not to be, seemed the question with them: and not to be with their brethren on earth was the same to them as being with the angels in heaven. Hence it is not wonderful that a people thus inclined should readily embrace the mystic theology which arose at this period. It came from the Platonic school, and that favourite doctrine of its disciples, that "the divine nature is diffused through all human souls." They maintained that silence, tranquillity and bodily mortification, were the only means by which the faculty of reason, the emanation of the Deity in man, could exert its latent principle of virtue and divine wisdom. Forgetting they were men, they aspired to be angels at once; and for this purpose, that they might neither love nor hate, tempt nor be tempted, they retired into caves and wildernesses; and there, lost in meditation, submitted themselves to all the privations

of hunger and thirst. By taking particular passages in scripture detached from the context, they found some arguments to support their cause, and thus defended solitude and celibacy with as hearty a zeal as the apostles did the truly reasonable doctrines of love to God and duty towards our neighbour. Egypt, Palestine, and Syria, were filled by lonely monks and sequestered virgins; and the enthusiastic St. Basil brought the same solitary passion into the once social land of Greece. From him most of the monks of Russia name themselves; and for the most part follow his rules.

The principal of a monastery is called either the Archimandrite or the Hegumen; the one is equivalent to abbot or father, the other to prior. The nunneries are upon the same establishment; the principal being called Hegumena; and the other ordinances are on a similar foundation. The only essential difference is, that men may profess themselves monks at thirty years of age; women may not become nuns till they are fifty. You will agree with me in approving the latter rule. If a woman be not married before she have arrived at those very mature years, she may well plead that nature has taken the vows for her; and so without wrong or robbery to the future generation may take on her the veil that is to exclude her from this for ever. A convent is then a peaceful asylum. Childless, unmated, cheerless is the existence of most aged females who are in that situation. Few but mercenaries attend the old age of her who is what the world calls an old maid: and cold is that service which is only purchased. In my mind the refuge of a monastery for these "unappropriated sweets" of creation, is a most desirable establishment; and therefore I applaud that of Russia with my whole heart. But to shut up within the eternal bonds of vows and impassable walls, the young, the fair, and the tender, is sacrilege against the first laws of heaven. It takes from man the mate that was made for him; it deprives the world of many thousand human beings, who might have sprung from bosoms now condemned to the barren pillow of a monastic cell./

These devotees are distinguished into three degrees; the probationers (or novices), the proficients, and the perfect.

The dress of a probationer is a black cassoc called rhæsa; and a hood, also black, called kamelauch, from being made of camel's hair. Proficients wear an upper cloak called the mandyas or lesser habit, to distinguish it from the great habit, or angelic image, as it is called. Monastics of this third and perfect degree always wear the hood or veil down; and never, after they have assumed it, suffer their faces to be seen. The same usages hold, both with the men and women in the Russian monasteries. I send you drawings of the monks and nuns in the habits of their favourite saint, Basil; and leaving you to contemplate them, shall quit the sacred pall with this oft repeated vow, how truly I am your faithful friend!

LETTER XI.

St. Petersburgh, October, 1805.

HOW changed is the face of nature since last I addressed you! all is frozen; and covered with the chilling snows of winter. If the city astonished me when under the glowing tints of an autumnal atmosphere, how much more striking does its present pale silvery light make it appear!

Now indeed this is Russia! every sensation, every perception, confirms the conviction. The natives have suddenly changed their woollen kaftans, for the greasy and unseemly skins of sheep. The freezing power which has turned every inanimate object into ice, seems to have thawed their hearts and their faculties: they sing, they laugh, they wrestle; tumbling about like great bears amongst the furrows of the surrounding snow. In fact, this season, so prolonged with them, seems more congenial with their natures than their short but vivid summer.

This year the bosom of the Neva was encrusted with ice at an unusually early period: it took place on the 14th of the present month: but in the September of 1715 it was shut up by a frost so intense as to become in a few hours safe for carriages

of the heaviest burthen. Soon after the commencement of the present winter the bridge of boats (which communicates with that part of the city built on an island called Vassilly Ostroff), was allowed to swing to the opposite side of the river, in order to permit vast sheets of congealed water to pass forward into the gulf. After an early frost followed by a temporary thaw, these masses find their way down the Neva; they come from the interior, the lake Ladoga, &c. and proceed with frightful velocity. Sometimes a quick frost arrests these accumulations, and renders them in one night safe for conveyances of every description. Frequently the ice thus collected does not finally dissolve till the expiration of the ensuing May. In that charming month, I am told, summer reappears with the suddenness of enchantment; and every thing around seems rather like the instantaneous mechanism of an English pantomine, than the regular action of the season.

Far different is the scene at present! Where are now the expanded waters of the Neva? The gay gondolas and painted yachts? The myriads of vessels and boats continually passing and repassing? All have disappeared: one bleak extended snowy plain generalizes the views: and scarcely a trace is left to convey an idea that a river ever glided through the heart of this imperial city. The roofs of the palaces, public buildings, and private houses, are shrouded in the same pale garb. But no objects are so strangely beautiful as the trees which grow in several divisions of this metropolis; when divested of their leaves, the repeated coats of snow thickening on their branches, form them into the appearance of white coral encrusted with a brilliant diamond dust. Even the beards of men and horses are white and glittering with this northern ornament.

Cold to the Russians, seems to be what heat is to the torpid animal; for Petersburgh at this moment presents a prospect of much greater bustle and activity than during the warmer months. The additional multitudes, spread in busy swarms throughout every quarter, are inconceivable: sledges, carriages, and other traineau vehicles, cross and pass each other with incredible velocity. The sensation excited in the eye by the swift, transitory movement of so many objects upon the unbroken M