Page:On the Desert - Recent Events in Egypt.djvu/191

 is, I rose at four, and retired at five — one hour instead of six! But what a strange, unearthly, ghostly hour it was! The idea of such a service had taken hold of my imagination. At first nothing could seem more akin to the highest spirit of devotion. To pray in the hours of darkness and of night! So Jesus prayed while men slept. And when I came out on the balcony, and felt at once all the holy stillness of the night, through which the waning moon was shining, and the stars were looking down from that pure sky of Arabia, "so wildly, spiritually bright," it seemed indeed as if this were an hour to forget the world, and draw nigh to God; to think how soon our little day of life would be past, and we "should be no more seen." I descended the stairs, crossed the court, and went down the stone steps (the pavement of the church is below the level of the court), and entered the church. It was dimly lighted. All the monks were there. One, who had been looking for me, conducted me to one of the stalls reserved for the brethren, where I was in the centre of the line. Opposite me a priest was standing at a desk, with his book open before him, on which fell the light from a shaded lamp suspended over it, and out of which he was reading, or rather chanting, in a dreary monotone, to which a younger priest beside me occasionally responded. The service was in Greek, and contained many things which would be approved by Christians of all communions. They read the Epistles and the Gospels, the Lord's Prayer and the Apostles' Creed; they chanted the Psalms of David and the Te Deum of Ambrose. All this was excellent, nor could anything be more impressive (were it accompanied by a little of the appearance of devotion) than the prayers of Chrysostom and Basil, mingled with the old majestic strains of John of Damascus.

Suddenly there came a change in the scene: all the