Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family: or, A Residence in Belgrade and Travels in the Highlands and Woodlands of the Interior, during the years 1843 and 1844.Paton, A. A. (Andrew Archibald)
History
Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family: or, A Residence in Belgrade and Travels in the Highlands and Woodlands of the Interior, during the years 1843 and 1844.
Paton, A. A. (Andrew Archibald)
Serbia -- Description and travel
The tolling of the cathedral bell announced the approach of the
procession, which was preceded by a long train of rustic cavaliers,
noble, vigorous-looking men. Standing at the balcony, we missed the
sight of the heroes of the day, who had gone round by other streets.
We, therefore, went to the cathedral, where all the principal persons
in Servia were assembled. One old man, with grey, filmy, lack-lustre
eyes, pendant jaws, and white beard, was pointed out to me as a
centenarian witness of this national manifestation.
The grand screen, which in the Greek churches veils the sanctuary from
the vulgar gaze, was hung with rich silks, and on a raised platform,
covered with carpets, stood the archbishop, a dignified
high-priest-looking figure, with crosier in hand, surrounded by his
deacons in superbly embroidered robes. The huzzas of the populace grew
louder as the procession approached the cathedral, a loud and
prolonged buzz of excited attention accompanied the opening of the
grand central portal, and Wucics and Petronievitch, grey with the dust
with which the immense cavalcade had besprinkled them, came forward,
kissed the cross and gospels, which the archbishop presented to them,
and, kneeling down, returned thanks for their safe restoration. On
regaining their legs, the archbishop advanced to the edge of the
platform, and began a discourse describing the grief the nation had
experienced at their departure, the universal joy for their return,
and the hope that they would ever keep peace and union in view in all
matters of state, and that in their duties to the state they must
never forget their responsibility to the Most High.
Wucics, dressed in the coarse frieze jacket and boots of a Servian
peasant, heard with a reverential inclination of the head the
elegantly polished discourse of the gold-bedizened prelate, but nought
relaxed one single muscle of that adamantine visage; the finer but
more luminous features of Petronievitch were evidently under the
control of a less powerful will. At certain passages of the discourse,
his intelligent eye was moistened with tears. Two deacons then prayed
successively for the Sultan, the Emperor of Russia, and the prince.
And now uprose from every tongue, and every heart, a hymn for the
longevity of Wucics and Petronievitch. "The solemn song for many days"
is the expressive title of this sublime chant. This hymn is so old
that its origin is lost in the obscure dawn of Christianity in the
East, and so massive, so nobly simple, as to be beyond the ravages of
time, and the caprices of convention.
The procession then returned, the band playing the Wucics march, to
the houses of the two heroes of the day.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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