The Russians are so zealous in the outward practices of their religion, that they must have a piece of the church in every corner. In every room of their many-roomed houses hangs a picture of some saint with a lamp constantly burning before it. Such a picture is called an Obross. A Russian, on entering a house, first salutes the Obross, and then turns to salute the master of the house, to make known h»s business, or his request ; to abuse the host or take his life, according as the object may be. Even the houses of ill repute are no exceptions ; they also are half chapels. It may be doubted whether robbers would venture to enter their dens, to divide their booty, if an Obross was not suspended there. It is as if the Russians would have a manual proof of the omnipresence of God.
Even the Germans and other foreigners in the interior of the empire are obliged to give in to this Russian craving, so far at least as to suspend a picture in their anterooms. A physician woul have Ht^^le practice if he did not do this.
Generally it is " Bogotez" (God the Father), or " Bog Sun" (God the Son), who are represented on these pictures ; or the Holy Trinity, in which the Holy Ghost takes the form of a dove. The Virgin is seldom seen, except in Russian costume, as the Kasan or Iberian Mother of God ; still more rarely is it a John, a Peter, a Paul, or a James. On the other hand, St. Michaels and St. Nicholases are abundant. The latter in particular may be found every where ; he is decidedly the greatest saint in Russia. To him the greatest number of churches are dedicated, and he has, what no other saint can boast, two holidays in the year, one in winter and one in summer. As a Russian once said to me, he is to the common people, in the world of spirits, what the heir to the throne is in the pohtical world.
These pictures are usually only third-lengths ; full-lengths, as the Catholics have them, are hardly ever seen. They are in general horribly illpainted; and it is therefore very fortunate that they are also so grimy, old, and faded, that nothing can be very distinctly made out of them.
The Russian does not want a beautiful picture like the Italian ; and one might perhaps hence draw the consolatory hope that his image-worship was less deeply rooted than it is with many Catholic nations, where they require a positive recognition of the picture to which they pray, and do not find the indistinctly-marked canvass sufficient to realize the di^ane presence ; but it is more probably only a part of his barbarism that the Russian has not yet got so far as to see thus clearly into the depths of his own soul, and the Godhead may be as dim before it as those dai-k pictures are to his eye.
The accumulation of sacred pictures is often astoundingly large in those families of consequence who make more than ordinary claim to piety and the fear of God. In the storeroom of such a family there is always at least one great chest with pictures in oil, on porcelain, and metal crosses, which have been bought at different times or obtained as presents ; glittering amulets, inherited perhaps, and golden cases in which the priests have sealed up a fragment of bone, the relic of some martyr. All tho5e are kept for house use, for presents to the serv'ants, for a journey, to furnish a new house, or for presents to a church which may be building on one of
the estates ; or to provide for growing-up children, of whom each has, even in his sixth year, his own Obross hanging at the head of his couch. A wealthy Russian told me that he had a stock of such things to the amount of fifty thousand rubles, and was therefore provided for any possible contingency,
If any one ask a Russian who may already have dined, to eat again, he will often answer, " Am I a priest, that I should dine twice over ?" This almost proverbial way of expressing themselves refers to the running about of the popes from one funeral feast, or one christening banquet, to another, at which they enjoy themselves more than any one else. A Russian driving out, and meeting a pope, holds it for so bad an omen, that he will rather turn back, if he have not by immediate spitting warded off the evil influence.
" Kiel ! on ne iss nashikh ! No ! our priest is good for nothing ; he Is not one of us ; he won't drink with us, he won't sing with us ; he does as if he did not know us ; if he is so proud we will not know him either, and make our gifts and presents to another priest."