. The boy travellers in the Russian empire: adventures of two youths in a journey in European and Asiatic Russia, with accounts of a tour across Doctor to the youths, but there is no question about thechurch being the finest in St. Petersburg. Observe its admirable propor-tions, he continued. It is in the form of a Greek cross, with its foursides of equal length, and the architect who planned it certainly had acorrect eye for his work. You observe, said the guide, that each of the four entrances is a[>proached by three flights of stone steps, leading up from the level of thesquar
. The boy travellers in the Russian empire: adventures of two youths in a journey in European and Asiatic Russia, with accounts of a tour across Doctor to the youths, but there is no question about thechurch being the finest in St. Petersburg. Observe its admirable propor-tions, he continued. It is in the form of a Greek cross, with its foursides of equal length, and the architect who planned it certainly had acorrect eye for his work. You observe, said the guide, that each of the four entrances is a[>proached by three flights of stone steps, leading up from the level of thesquare. Each of these flights of steps is cut from a single block of Fin-land granite. The youths made note of this fact as they wondered how the huge 7 98 THE BOY TRAVELLERS IN THE RUSSL\N EMPIRE. masses of stone were brought from tlieir quarries; and they also notedthat the four entrances of the church were between pillars of granite sixtyfeet high and seven feet in diameter, polished to the smoothness of a mir-ror. An immense dome forms the centre of the edifice. It is of iron,covered on the outside with copper, and this copper is heavily plated with. PRIEST OF THE CHURCH OF ST. ISAAC. pure gold. It is the dome which first caught the eyes of the travellers asthey approached the city, and forms an important landmark from everydirection. The cupola rests on thirty granite pillars, which look smallenough when seen froin below, but are really of great size. In the inside of the church are paintings by Russian artists, and thereare two columns of malachite fifty feet high, and of proportionate diame-ter—the largest columns of this costly mineral anywhere in the quantities of malachite, lapis-lazuli, and other valuable stones areused in the decoration of the church, and our friends thought that if therewas anything to criticise it was the great amount of ornamentation andgilding in the interior. But I have no doubt, wrote Fred in his note-book, that this display has its
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