62 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SEEVICE-XI 



of Christ&quot;; and of that he gave me the Latin original 

 from which he made his translation, with a copy of the 

 translation itself. But he also told me that the next book 

 he translated was a volume of Emerson s &quot;Essays,&quot; and 

 he added that for years there had always lain open upon 

 his study table a volume of Emerson s writings. 



There is, thus clearly, a relation of his mind to the 

 literature of the Western world very foreign to his feel 

 ings regarding Western religious ideas. This can be ac 

 counted for perhaps by his own character as a man of 

 letters. That he has a distinct literary gift is certain. I 

 have in my possession sundry articles of his, and espe 

 cially a poem in manuscript, which show real poetic feel 

 ing and a marked power of expression. It is a curious 

 fact that, though so addicted to English and American 

 literature, he utterly refuses to converse in our language. 

 His medium of communication with foreigners is always 

 French. On my asking him why he would not use our 

 language in conversation, he answered that he had learned 

 it from books, and that his pronunciation of it would ex 

 pose him to ridicule. 



In various circles in St. Petersburg I heard him spoken 

 of as a hypocrite, but a simple sense of justice compels 

 me to declare this accusation unjust. He indeed retires 

 into a convent for a portion of every year to join the 

 monks in their austerities ; but this practice is, I believe, 

 the outgrowth of a deep religious feeling. On returning 

 from one of these visits, he brought to my wife a large 

 Easter egg of lacquered work, exquisitely illuminated. 

 I have examined, in various parts of Europe, beautiful 

 specimens of the best periods of mediaeval art; but in 

 no one of them have I found anything in the way of 

 illumination more perfect than this which he brought 

 from his monkish brethren. In nothing did he seem to 

 unbend more than in his unfeigned love for religious art 

 as it exists in Russia. He discussed with me one evening 

 sundry photographs of the new religious paintings in the 

 cathedral of Kieff in a spirit which revealed this feel- 



