The Station

The Station by Robert Byron is Byron's in-depth record of his travels to Mount Athos, the spiritual heart of Eastern Orthodox Monasticism. Excerpt: "Letters from foreign countries arrive in the afternoon. Each envelope advertises a break in the monotony of days; each reveals on penetration only one more facet of a standard world. But latterly another kind has come, strangely addressed, stranger still within. "We learn," runs one, "that you are safely returned to your own glorious country and are already in the midst of your dearest ones, enjoying the best of health…"