A Scene of Human Degradation.
MRS. SCOTT-STEVENSON, in her "On Summer Seas," gives the following account of a Russian pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Nicholas, at Bari, in Italy:— "They were all dressed in a kind of uniform, the men in gray, barefooted, with staves slung over their shoulders, on which were tied bundles of clothes and a pair of boots; the women wore blue serge skirts, grey jackets, and red handkerchiefs round their heads, and like the men, carried bundles, with a water-bottle and tin mug, on their backs. They were all slowly crawling up the steps with bleeding knees and torn, travel-stained garments, muttering prayers and endless litanies as they toiled upward. On entering the church we saw a shocking sight, so painful that I hesitate to describe it. Four pilgrims were on their knees, with their heads bent down to the ground in the most unnatural attitude, their eyes shut, and the swollen veins standing out like cords from their crimson foreheads. A man walked by the side of each, holding the end of a handkerchief, while the wretched penitent held the other, and was thus guided along the pavement. For a few seconds we did not realize what was taking place, but as they crawled onward we noticed four marks like a dark ribbon behind them, and it dawned on us that they were actually licking the floor! And such a floor! Thousands of only half-civilized human beings had been in the church since day-break, as the tainted atmosphere but too plainly showed. For over eighty yards these wretched creatures kept their tongues on the rough pavement, over every pollution that came in their way. We were chained to our seats by horror and disgust, and in spite of ourselves stayed till they at last reached the altar steps and were permitted to rise. Their faces haunt me still; the small, cunning eyes turning stealthily toward us, and as hastily turned away; the half-shamed faces; half-ferocious look; the coarse, dirt-smeared features; the matted heads of hair, and the lolling, lacerated tongues bleeding over their chins. And these were fellow-creatures, these benighted wretches, looking like scared wild beasts! What religion can that be which permits such a frightful exhibition, such a loathsome scene of human degradation!"