Page:Notes upon Russia (volume 1, 1851).djvu/280

 If at any time the prince receives a metropolitan at an entertainment, he usually gives him the first seat at table, when his own brethren are not present. At a funeral ceremony, when he invites the metropolitan and the bishops, he himself hands them both their meat and drink at the commencement of the dinner; afterwards he appoints his brother, or some person of princely rank, to supply his place till the end of the dinner.

I succeeded, indeed, in witnessing their ceremonies in the churches on one solemn occasion; and in each of my embassies, I went on the 15th of August, which is the feast of the assumption of the Blessed Virgin, into the great church in the citadel, which was strewed with boughs of trees, and saw the prince standing against the wall to the right of the door at which he had entered, with his head covered, leaning on his staff, called posoch, and one holding before him in his right hand a kalpak; his ministers were standing against the pillars of the church, whither I also was conducted. In the middle of the church, upon a platform, stood the metropolitan in the sacred dress, wearing a round mitre adorned with images of saints on the upper part, and on the lower with ermine. He leaned on a posoch in the same manner as the prince did, and while some were chanting he prayed, accompanied by the priests who attended him. Afterwards, advancing towards the choir, he turned to the left, after our own fashion, and went out by a smaller door, preceded by the choristers, priests, and deacons, one of whom carried on his head in a patera the bread already prepared for the sacrifice; another carried the chalice uncovered; the rest followed promiscuously, bearing images of St. Paul, St. Peter, St. Nicolas, and the Archangel, the people around making great acclamations with obeisances. Some of the bystanders cried, "Lord, have mercy upon us!" others,