Page:Leskov - The Sentry and other Stories.djvu/14

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.


xiv
The Sentry

manner in which the Bishop is floored by the arguments and by the devotion of his heathen driver, is conclusive. The poor Bishop, at the close of the story, is almost as confused in mind as the Christianized savage, who ate the Holy Elements, the chrism, the sponge, carried off the pyx, and left Father Kiriak to freeze to death! But the Bishop at least is honest with us and frank with himself. He possessed that gift of the Russian nature—intellectual sincerity.

Edward Garnett

May, 1922