He pulled at his beard, looked at me searchingly and said: "Can you pay the initiation fee?" "I have about a hundred rubles with me." "Give them to me. Now go into the guest room. To-morrow, after the noonday service, I will speak to you." The care of strangers fell to the lot of Father Nifont, and him, too, I liked. "Everything is very simple in our monastery," he said. "It is democratic. We all work equally in serving God, not as in other places. True, we have a gentleman here, but he does not mix with any one or bother us in any way. You can find peace and rest for your soul here and attain blessedness." By the following day I had examined the monastery well. In former times it must have stood in the center of the wood, but now everything around it was hewn down. Only here and there in front of the gates a few tree trunks stood out from the ground. Toward the side the wood reached up to the very walls of the monastery and embraced, as with two black wings, the blue-domed church and the monastery. Nearby lay Blue Lake under its ice cover, formed like a half moon. It was nine versts from end to end and four versts wide. Behind it one could see the land on the other side, and the three churches of Kudejaroff, and the golden cupola of St. Nicholas of Tolokontzeff. On our side of the lake, not far from the monastery, was the hamlet of Kudejaroff, with its three and twenty little huts, and around it lay the mighty forests. All was beautiful, and a quiet peace filled my soul. Here I would hold communion with the Lord; would unfold before Him my innermost soul, and would ask Him with humble insistence to show me the way to the knowledge of His holy laws. In the evening I attended vespers. The mass was said severely and according to rule, and with ardor. But the singing did not please me; good voices were lacking. "O Lord, forgive me if my thoughts about Thee were too bold," I prayed. "I did not do it out of lack of faith, but because of love and passion for the truth, as you know, O Omniscient One!" Suddenly the monk who stood near me turned and smiled at me. Evidently I had spoken my repentant words too loud. As he smiled I looked at him. Such a handsome face! I let my head sink and closed my eyes. Never, either before or since, have I seen so handsome a face. I stepped lightly forward, placed myself next to him and looked into his wonderful countenance. It was as white as milk and framed in a black beard sprinkled here and there with gray. His eyes were large, and they had a soft mellow light and a bright expression. His figure was well built and tall; his nose a little bent like an eagle's, and his whole bearing was distinguished and noble. He made so deep an impression on me that even at night he stood before me in my dreams. Early in the morning Father Nifont woke me.