They were also the first to have done the work, and so artistically that everyone admired it even more than the miller’s altar.
It was indeed finer. In front of the porch there stood a sort of little chapel, made of interwoven birch-boughs, covered with pieces of woollen cloth, striped in many a hue; whilst inside, on a platform, rose an altar with white napery and fine linen, embellished with tapers and flowers in pots, to which Yuzka had stuck various patterns in gilt paper to adorn them.
There hung above the altar a large-sized painting of our Lady, and several smaller ones on either side. To enhance the effect of the whole, they had suspended over the altar a cage containing a blackbird that Nastka had brought.
From the very gate a lane had been made of fir-branches, alternating with birch-boughs, planted and neatly tumped with yellow sand; and the sanded path had been sprinkled over with sedges.
Yuzka had brought whole armfuls of cornflowers, larkspurs and field vetches, with which she wreathed images, candlesticks, and whatever else could be wreathed, even strewing flowers all over the ground before the altar. The cabin too came in for its share: walls and windows were drowned in verdure, and waving sedges stuck all along the top of the roof.
Everybody was hard at work, except Yagna alone, who early in the morning had slipped out of the hut, and was not seen any more that day.
So they were the first to be ready, but not before the sun shone well over the village, and the clatter of the carts coming in from the other hamlets began to increase.
Very hurriedly they made ready for church.
Vitek alone was to remain in the enclosure; for swarms of children came pressing in to admire the altar and whistle to the blackbird. He tried to keep them at a distance with a bough, but it would not do. So he loosed his stork, that came on stealthily, prodding and thrusting at their bare legs with its sharp beak, and made them disperse with screams.
They started all together, just as the Mass-bell began to tinkle. Yuzka went in front, dressed all in white, book in hand, and with bows of bright red to her shoes.
“What do you think of this, Vitek?” she had asked, spinning on her heel before him.
“You’re as fair to see as the whitest goose!” he answered in admiration.
“Your boot knows as much about it as you do! But Hanka says no one in all the village is clad so well,” she said, stamping and pulling down her short skirt.
“Your red knees can be seen through the skirt, as the flesh of a goose through the feathers!”
“Silly lad!—But,” she added, in a warning whisper, “hide your stork away! The priest will come with the procession, and might see and know it again.”
“Oh, but how fine the mistress looks! For all the world like a turkey-cock!” he murmured in ecstasy, gazing after them down the road; and then, mindful of Yuzka’s warning, he shut the stork up in the potato-pit, and let out Lapa to watch before the altar: after which he betook himself to Matthias, lying as usual in the orchard.
The village was deserted. In the church, the service had commenced. The priest came out for Mass, the organ pealed; and, the sermon ended, all the bells were set ringing till they frightened the doves off the roofs. Then the people poured out, streaming through the great door, with banners dipping forward, tapers flaming, holy pictures borne by white-clad maidens, and, at last, the red canopy over the priest, who bore the golden Monstrance.
They formed in procession, with a long lane, edged with flickering lights, cut through the dense throng; and his Reverence intoned:
“Lo, at Thy gate I stand, O Lord!”
to which all the multitude answered, thundering in unison—one great Heaven-reaching voice!—
“My soul hath waited on Thy word.”
Singing, they moved forward, with a great crush about the narrow lich-gate; for the concourse was immense, consisting of the whole parish. All the folk of all the Manors were present: several Squires supported the priest on either side, or walked close by, taper in hand. The canopy was borne aloft by husbandmen of the parish: only (perhaps on account of the recent disgrace) none of them men of Lipka.
From the churchyard shadows to the open space beyond, white, dazzling, broiling hot, where the burning sun made the eyes to blink with its living fires, on they walked to the sound of the whole tolling belfry. The chants rose up, the incense-smoke soared forth along with clouds of dust; lights scintillated, and bright showers of flowery petals fell continually, scattered at the feet of his Reverence.
The crowd surged along, heavy-footed, chanting mightily, like to a noisy many-coloured stream; and in its midst—a boat in the rapid current, as it were—floated the crimson canopy. And the holy banners waved and tossed beside the pictures and statues of saints, veiled in gauze and gay with flowers.
Onwards they moved, dense, serried, squeezed, heads close to heads, and each one singing for all he was worth—each as if the whole world sang with him the glory of the Lord—as if those tall lime-trees, those dark alders, those waters sparkling in light, those tapering birches, those lowly orchards and green fields and vague distances beyond human ken—all and everything—were adding to the hymn their hearty and joyful accompaniment; and the notes rolled and flew through the heat-laden air, up to the radiant sky, up to the sun!
That choral song stirred the very leaves upon the trees, and brought the last blossom-petals floating down!
The priest read the first Gospel at Boryna’s altar,
