72 SAVAGE SVANETIA. 



CHAPTER X. 



AT THE EECTORY, USHKUL. 



It was not only because he was a priest's son 

 that our wily interpreter, Platon, always made 

 straight for the house of the holy man in 

 every village that he entered. Though in 

 the wilds of Svanetia the officers of the 

 church are not so well cared for as they are 

 elsewhere, still even here a very marked dif- 

 ference exists between the utter barbarism of 

 the flock and the comparative comfort of its 

 pastors. 



The priest of Mookmer was a very fine 

 fellow, and he must have been a man of 

 considerable nerve and self-control to have 



