Note 10 — Chapter XX · FROM KRASNOIARSK TO ALEXANDREFFSKY.

A lady on the Obi told me that all were bound to confess and receive the Communion once a year. If any special reason required it, they might receive oftener, always confessing, however, beforehand, in a standing posture at the side of the priest, and then kneeling at the absolution. The priest said that 200 times in the year, at Kansk, children were participants in the sacred rite; and in connection with this remark he made a curious statement, to the effect that, there being few doctors in the district, it was common for mothers, when their babies were ill, to bring them to receive the Sacrament, under the impression that it did them physical as well as spiritual good. He said, too, that mothers thought it their duty to bring their children frequently to Communion till they were seven years of age, after which period they came with them once a year for confession, communion, and instruction.