A WHOLESALE CONFESSION.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume II, Issue 56, 24 July 1862, Page 6 (Supplement)

A WHOLESALE CONFESSION.

Tiieuk is a manufactory near St. Petersburg, at winch about 2,000 hands used to be employed. On a week previous to a certain Easter Sunday, while confession was going on, in order to take as little time from Mammon as possible, the machinery was stopped in sections, and (he people were permitted to go in batches, according to the nature of the work at which they were employed. Weavers confessed together at one lime, spinners at another, and so on. Connected with and adjoining these works was the church where confession took place, and a private passage led from the works to the church, by which the penitents passed into the church; 'having confessed they went into the street by the main church entrance to go home. Now, in Russia, all workpeople arc strictly searched by male and female searchers as they pass out from their place of employment; but in confessing season, when these particular workpeople went direct to the church by the private way to confess a year’s sins in the lump, the right of search had never been enforced. But on a certain day the director of this factory received a hint concerning this omission, and' took his measures accordingly. 11 o’clock, a large batch (100 in all) of woman, young and married girls, and old wives, left their various posts, and took their way across the yard, with demure and penitent looks, to the private entrance where they were admitted as usual, filling the stairs anil passages. When all were inside, the bottom door was bolted and guarded. Means of escape being thus cut off, the front rank, on approaching the door of communication with the church, found half a dozen searchers, backed by as many policemen. The first two women searched were stripped of a large quantity of valuable material secreted under their clothes, in their boots,—in fact wherever they could stow it. Each had as great a weight of plunder as she could possibly carry. The work of searching went on, but the mass of women on the stairs and passages got scent of the presence of the searchers. The word was passed, a peculiar sound was hoard as of many persons dressing and undressing, and in a few minutes the women were all standing as innocent as lambs, and as harmless as doves, up to their knees in material, valued according to an after computation at five hundred pounds sterling. This had been going on for years. But let it bo remembered that the people are not taught morality and honesty as part of their religion. —All the Year Hound.