Holy Martyr, Patriarch Hermogen, is covered with fragments of stone and rubbish.

This is the church built by Fioraventi of Bologna, in which the Tsars were crowned and in which the earlier Patriarchs were laid to rest. It is the precious reliquary of Russia's rich inheritance of the treasure of the ancient Eastern Church.

THE MARVELOUS EASTER SERVICE

In the days before the suppression of the Patriarchate by Peter the Great (see page 390), on Good Friday-or, as the Russians say, Great Friday-the Patriarch, in humble imitation of our Lord's entry into Jerusalem, rode on an ass from the Church of Blessed Basil, across the mosaic of fluttering doves, through the Gate of the Saviour, up to the Kremlin, but this year the new Patriarch, Tikhon, was forbidden entrance in the ancient way. Indeed, it was late on Easter Eve before His Holiness knew with certainty that he should be allowed to celebrate in his own Cathedral on the morrow.

In spite of the desecration, amid the ikon-clouds of steadfast witnesses to the faith, the Patriarch officiated at Easter.

There, on Easter Eve, for two hours before midnight, one hears the Acts of the Holy Apostles read. Meanwhile the lamps and candles, lighted one by one, swim like planets into our ken. The church swings in the shadows like a huge

censer.

Then the gates of the sanctuary open and, in the vestments of royal purple, Patriarch, bishops, and priests, with silver and crystal crosses, like a torrent, flood the church with song: "Christ is risen!" they exclaim. "He is risen, indeed!" the people make answer.

The jeweled Gospels are thundered in different languages from the four corners of the church to all the earth. In the orchestra of voices the festival bell of the tower of John the Great companions the mighty voice of the archdeacon, Rosov, the Chaliapine of the Russian Church.

A HOLY MONASTERY OUTRAGED

It is all a vision of the forms and color of the Imperial Byzantine Court, in which

the Church on earth pays her most splendid homage to Heaven.

A dreadful impression is produced by the present appearance of the Chudov Monastery, the "Wonder-working Monastery." The façade of the south side has been pierced by six heavy shells. In the rose-red walls are deep breaks and cracks and holes from 5 to 7 feet in diameter (see page 384).

Two shells broke through the wall of the Metropolitan's apartments, in which a member of the Council, Benjamin, Metropolitan of Petrograd, was staying. Inside the rooms there is complete destruction. Fragments of furniture are mingled with heaps of stone and rubbish. In one room a shell pierced the immense, thick wall near a window and destroyed it as far as an ikon of the Mother of God which stood near, but the ikon and the glass over it and the lamp hanging before it were uninjured. The church in the monastery, where the relics of St. Alexis rest, did not suffer; only the windows were broken. The relics of St. Alexis had been carried to the catacombs church at the beginning of the firing.

There, beneath the low vaults, the Metropolitan, Benjamin; Archbishop Michael, of Grodno; the Prior, of the Chudov Monastery; Bishop Arsenius, the Elder Alexis, of the Zosimov Hermitage, and all the brethren offered their prayers day and night, under the unceasing rattle of the guns which shook the walls of the church.

GERMAN INVECTIVES MAR CHURCH WALLS In the Church of St. Nicholas, in the belfry of the tower of Ivan the Great, a shell crashed through a window and destroyed the east wall of the interior of the Sanctuary. The large, magnificent old Book of the Gospels, which was placed against the ruined wall, was thrown to the floor near the Altar.

The

front cover was torn off, and the precious ikons of the Resurrection of Christ and of the Evangelists adorning the book were broken and thrown about; many leaves were torn and crushed.

The Altar of Oblation was broken and the service books torn. All over the Sanctuary bricks were scattered about, with splinters of shells and various eccle

КОННО-КНИЖНАЯ ДОВА МОНАСТЫРЯ

ЛАВКА

SHATTERED EXTERIOR OF THE CHUDOV MONASTERY, COMMEMORATING A MIRACLE OF THE ARCHANGEL MICHAEL (SEE PAGE 383) This is one of the most celebrated monasteries in all Russia. It occupies the land which was given to the Metropolitan Alexis in 1358 by a grateInside there is complete destruction. Fragments of furniture are mingled everywhere with heaps of stor

ful Tatar Khan.

siastical objects, heaped up between the Altar and the Royal Gates, but the Altar itself, in spite of its nearness to the ruin, was uninjured.

In the Church of St. Nicholas lies a part of the holy relics of the Prelate Nicholas, a saint honored by all Christians and even by the heathen. The walls of the entrance to this church are written over with the most filthy and sacrilegious inscriptions and invectives, not only in Russian, but (more significant of the leadership in all this despoliation) in German. The entrance of the church where the relics lie was used as an outhouse.

MADMEN DIRECT A RAIN OF DESTRUCTIVE SHELLS

When raining destructive shells on the Kremlin, the madmen evidently decided beforehand not to spare one of the churches; and, in fact, traces of the crime are left on all.

The famous porch of Lodgetti, of the Church of the Annunciation, from which Ivan the Terrible admired the comet, is destroyed by shot and shell. Miraculously, the age-dimmed interior of this. remarkable little church is unharmed. The jasper floor which the Shah of Persia gave to the Tsar Alexis, the floor of many-colored jasper, like an Apocalyptic sea, binding the door-posts and lintels, set with precious stones, remains like a ponderous Byzantine cope-clasp.

The Church of the Archangel is scarred with the marks of shells. The Churches of the Resurrection and of the Deposition of the Robe, the oratories of the ikon of the Mother of God of Pechersk, and the Church of the Forerunner, in the Borovitsk Tower, domes like a garden of Hafiz, or Omar Khayyam, all fell beneath sacrilegious fury. The last-named church came in for severe usage, and some shots struck the ikons of the sainted Prelates of Moscow and of the Mother of God of Kazan.

DIAMONDS AND PEARLS IN RUBBISH HEAP

The Patriarchal Sacristy, containing treasures of incalculable value, has been turned into a heap of rubbish, where, among sand, rubble, fragments of the walls, and broken glass, the unholy hand digs for diamonds and pearls (see p. 387).

The worst devastation has occurred in Room No. 4, which was pierced by a bursting shell. Here several glass cases and cupboards with precious ancient covers, or palls, ornamented with gold and precious stones, were torn to shreds. Some memorial palls were pierced and completely ruined.

A book of the Holy Gospels of the twelfth century (1115), of the Grand Duke Mstislav, of Novgorod, was injured. by a splinter. Various precious objects and ornaments of the Patriarchs, such as mitres, gauntlets, church utensils, vessels, and crosses, are all thrown out of the cases onto the floor and broken to pieces.

Another shell, in Room No. 6, destroyed a case containing Patriarchal vestments. The historical Russian ecclesiastical treasury, the noble monument of the past Patriarchal life of a great nation, is shattered.

Subsequently, after the Bolsheviks had assumed protection of the treasury and locked themselves into the Kremlin, these rooms were broken open and ruthlessly looted by some of their own company.

GEMS GOUGED FROM ORNAMENTS In their haste to rifle the cases and in their indifference to the national significance of the treasury, these robbers wantonly ruined ecclesiastical ornaments by brutally gouging out the gems or ripping off their golden mountings, and by cutting out the jewel-studded medallions from the vestments made of ancient stuffs, in which weaver and goldsmith wrought with a mutual hand. Some of the treasure has been recovered, but most of it is either destroyed or irrevocably lost.

What hope is there for the safety of the Hermitage treasure brought from Petrograd in wooden boxes now lying in the Kremlin?

The Church of the Twelve Apostles is riddled with shot. Furrowed by shells and broken, its east end lighted by holes and cracks, it gives the impression of being held together by some miracle.

One shell pierced the wall from the south side, below the window, and burst in the church, causing much destruction; the standard candle-holders were broken and many ikons on the walls injured by splinters.

On a large crucifix, standing by the north wall, the outstretched hands of our Saviour were broken off. The figure was gashed with sharp bits of brick, and oil from the hanging lamps had poured over the whole. Red spots made a startling likeness of a living body covered with blood.

Some pilgrims who had succeeded in getting into the Kremlin, on approaching this sacred object, were unable to look at it and gave way to their grief, passionately embracing the feet of Christ crucified afresh (see page 388).

The little Nicholas Palace, which formerly belonged to the Chudov Monastery, suffered severely from the attack. From the outside, one peers into great holes in the walls. Inside all is complete devastation. The great mirrors and other furnishings of the palace have been barbarously demolished, cupboards broken into, and their books, deeds, and papers scattered through all the rooms.

The Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul in the palace was pierced by shell and laid waste. The ikonostasis was broken, the Royal Gates forced open by