Dan Meinertzhagen's Diary. 33 



Sunday, April 2^th. — On skinning the Pine 

 Grosbeak, which was a green bird tinged with 

 golden yellow and some mauve on the feathers 

 round the gape, 1 found, to my astonishment, 

 that it was a male bird. 



We went to church to-day. The church is 

 a large wooden building on the highest ground 

 in the town, and can be seen some distance 

 away. The whole service, which is in Finnish, 

 was performed by a lusty parson, who screamed 

 enough to deafen most people, but fortunately 

 he was occasionally checked by a doleful hymn, 

 which would have done admirably for Good 

 Friday instead of the first Sunday after Easter, 

 as to-day is. The women, as in the Roman 

 church, sat on the left side, with handkerchiefs 

 and towels tied about their heads, and the men 

 sat opposite. Though the church is enormous 

 for the village — I suppose it would hold 1,000 

 people — there were only 17 women and 33 

 men present, most of whom were boys com- 

 prising the choir, but they did not, as far as we 

 could hear, sing ; but it is not astonishing we 

 didn't hear them, considering the loudness of 

 the voice of the postmaster, who accompanies 

 on a bad harmonium. At moments, when the 

 postmaster could not reach the high notes, 

 there seemed to be quite a slump in the noises. 



