I was so excited that I nearly
dropped the camera.
The procession moves only about one hundred feet--a crimson carpet
being laid from the entrance of the Winter Palace, across the street,
and up into a pavilion which is built out over the Neva.
First came the metropolitans and the priests; then the Emperor's
celebrated choir of about fifty voices; then a detachment of picked
officers bearing the most important battle-flags from the time of
Peter the Great, which showed the marks of sharp conflict; then the
Emperor's suite, and then--the Emperor himself. They all marched with
bared heads, even the soldiers.
My companion had the opera-glasses, I had the camera. "Tell me when,"
I gasped. They passed before me in a sort of haze. I heard the band in
the Winter Palace and the singing of the choir. I heard the splash of
the cross which the Archbishop plunged into the opening that had been
cut in the ice. I heard the priests intone, and the booming of the
guns firing the imperial salute. I saw that the wind was blowing the
candles out. Then came a breathless pause, and then she said, "Now!" A
little click.
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