The Enchanted Wanderer and Other Stories

25. Creed … the old way: The Old Believers (see note 6 to “Lady Macbeth”) rejected the patriarch Nikon’s revision, which removed two words from the Nicene Creed.

26. the spirit of God … nostrils: Slightly altered from Job 27:3–4 (“All the while my breath is in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils, my lips will not speak wickedness, nor my tongue utter deceit”).

27. the slaughter of the innocents … comforted: The event and some of the words are from Matthew 2:16–18, which in turn quotes Jeremiah 31:15.

28. heron … forbidden to eat: In Leviticus 11:13–19, the heron is included among the fowl that the Jews are forbidden to eat.

29. the spirit bloweth where it listeth: See John 3:8 (“The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit”). The Greek word pneuma can mean wind, breath, or spirit.

30. the great prokeimenon: The prokeimenon (graduale in Latin) is composed of verses sung responsively before the reading of the Gospel, approximately midway through the “all-night vigil,” which may last from two to six hours or even longer.

31. Prepare yourself … morning: The Old Believers in this story have no priests and no sacraments apart from baptism; thus, receiving communion is a part of their reintegration into the sacramental unity of the Church.

The Enchanted Wanderer

(1873)

  1. Konovets … Valaam … Korela: Konovets, an island off the southwest shore of Lake Ladoga, in northern Russia near Finland, is the location of a monastery founded in the fourteenth century. Sixty miles north of Konovets is Valaam, a group of islands also famous for its monastery, probably founded at the same time. Korela was a fortress on the shore of Ladoga, first mentioned as early as the twelfth century.

  2. Ilya Muromets … Tolstoy: Ilya Muromets is a bogatyr (“mighty man”) in the anonymous Russian medieval epic poems known as byliny, who defeats various enemies and monsters. Vassily Petrovich Vereshchagin (1835–1909) painted his Ilya Muromets at the Banquet of Prince Vladimir in 1871, and in that same year the poet Alexei K. Tolstoy (1817–75) published his ballad “Ilya Muromets” in The Russian Messenger.

  3. the metropolitan Filaret: Filaret Drozdov (1781–1867) was one of the most influential Orthodox churchmen of his time. In 1826 he became metropolitan of Moscow (i.e., metropolitan archbishop, head bishop of a “metropolia”—a major city area, a region, or a province). Leskov was critical of his conservatism.

  4. a husband … feed my family: In perpetuation of the clerical estate, the daughter’s husband would be a seminarian eligible to replace his father-in-law at the latter’s death or retirement and to continue serving the same parish.

  5. St. Sergius: St. Sergius of Radonezh (1314?–92), one of the most highly revered saints of Russia, was the founder of the Trinity Monastery (later known as the Trinity–St. Sergius Monastery) in Zagorsk, sixty miles from Moscow. He was canonized in 1452.

  6. stratopedarchos: New Testament Greek for military leader or camp commandant.

  7. because of the “knock”: See Matthew 7:7 and Luke 11:9 (“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you”).

  8. the Trinity … the Holy Spirit: The Sunday of Pentecost, celebrating the descent of the Holy Spirit fifty days after Easter, is also known as the feast of the Trinity. The Monday following it is the day of the Holy Spirit. Traditionally, prayers for suicides were forbidden by the Orthodox Church except on the Saturday before Pentecost or in private prayer at home. This interdiction was lifted by the patriarch Kirill at a council of the Russian Orthodox Church in 2011.

  9. hieromonk … hierodeacon: A hieromonk is a monk who has been ordained a priest or a priest who has become a monk; a hierodeacon is a monk who has become a deacon.

10. a cantonist: From 1721 to 1856, the sons of conscripted soldiers in Russia were educated in “canton schools” (from “canton” or recruiting district) and were obliged to serve in the army.

11. the Englishman Rarey: John Rarey (1827–66) was in fact an American horse tamer, or “horse whisperer,” who developed a gentle technique for rehabilitating mistreated or vicious horses. He came to Europe to demonstrate his method and visited Russia in 1857.