Then Father Cyril stretched out his arms in the attitude of blessing. The Orthodox people knelt down, and the women in the carts bent their heads, whilst he said in a tremulous voice— "'The peace of God, which passeth all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.' . . . 'The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all. Amen.'" At last the sorrowful cavalcade set off. The banished women stood up in the carts, and stretched out their arms towards their lost homes, the hearths where they had rocked their babies, and the roofs that had sheltered their happy families. The villagers tried to set up a shout, but they broke down. Now the heretics were going, old animosities and jealousies were forgotten. These sorrow-laden women and sad boys and girls were never to return. As they passed slowly out of sight, a low wailing came back on the wind, and was echoed by the sobs and moans of the crowd. Father Cyril went home, and passed the long day in solitary meditation and prayer before the altar in his church. He was greatly distressed in spirit. These exiled men and women were accepted of God; for did they not fear, ay, and love Him, and work righteousness? Yet they were despised and rejected of men, oppressed and afflicted, and acquainted with grief. They were fellow-Christians, disciples of the same Lord, and yet they persecuted them in His name, and thought that even when they hounded them to death, they were doing God service. CHAPTER XVI IN KOVYLSK IN the meantime Michael and Paraska, who had set off at daybreak, were far on their way across the steppe toward Kovylsk. Until they were quite safe from recognition, Clava lay at the bottom of the telega, her sweet little face peeping up from time to time and smiling merrily at them. She was a small, delicate child, and was easily intimidated, for she had been tenderly guarded from all unkindness and hardship. After a while, Paraska took her on her lap, kissing her often, with a mother's yearning after her own lost children. Her deepest sorrow had befallen her some years ago. She was accustomed to grief. But Michael was not yet benumbed by sorrow. He was troubled, sorely troubled at leaving his home again; and above all at leaving Velia behind. True, she could not be better off than in Father Cyril's house; and though he knew but little of the perils and hardships of the journey which lay before the exiles, he knew enough to make him thankful that his young sister was not to share them. But should he ever see her again? They would be separated by thousands of miles; and he did not know for how many years his father's term of banishment would run. He never realised as he did now how much he loved her.