Still the young priest did valuable service in the field assigned to him. Through his indomitable will be corrected many of the abuses which existed in his district, and raised the parish clergy to a higher standard of efficiency and morality.
So the years passed. The friendship between Mikail and General Drentell grew stronger as the nobleman learned to value the brilliant intellect of his protégé. His occasional visits to Lubny continued, and the General usually profited by the clear, good sense of the young man, who displayed as thorough a knowledge of agriculture as he did of theology. Mikail and Loris, on the other hand, could never agree. The priest had no patience with the hare-brained, pampered young aristocrat, and occasional differences were the result. For the sake of the General's friendship, however, as well as for the preservation of his own dignity, Mikail restrained his feelings. At the age of twenty, Loris entered the army, and for a while the growing animosity of the two was happily checked.
The Bishop, greatly admiring his assistant's ability, offered him an important position in his consistorium. This Mikail firmly refused. He assigned as his reason that he found congenial work among the parishioners; but in reality the priest felt in his heart that his veneration for the Catholic creed was growing daily less, and that vexing doubts and difficulties had gradually crowded out the faith he had once possessed. It was at this time that General Drentell's influence obtained for him a desirable position with General Melikoff, the Minister of War. The priest gladly accepted the honor, happy to escape from the continual hypocrisy of his clerical duties.
FOOTNOTES:
[17] A blagotchinny is a parish priest who is in direct relations with the consistorium of the province, and who is supposed to exercise a strict supervision over all the parish priests of his district.
[18] Mr. Melnikof, in a secret report to Grand Duke Constantine. Wallace's "Russia," p. 58.
CHAPTER XXVI.
A DAUGHTER OF ISRAEL.
Rabbi Mendel Winenki sat in his study, reading. Before him and within easy reach stood a massive table covered with books and papers. There were strewn upon it in motley confusion ancient folios and modern volumes. It was a comprehensive library which the Rabbi had collected. There were works on comparative theology, on medicine, on jurisprudence and philosophy. The Shulkan-aruch and a treatise on Buddhistic Occultism stood side by side. The Talmud and Kant's "Kritik der reinen Vernunft" were placed upon the same shelf, and Josephus and Renan's "Life of Jesus" were near neighbors.