ROPiT Cachet on Cover: Via Odessa and the Russian Imperial Embassy To Constantinople, to Mount Athos, 

1910, in Russian and French. Size: 11 x 14 cm. (4.3 x 5.5 inches) 

Condition: wear, stains, damaged to top  missing places, tears 

To the Abbot of the Monastery of St. John Chrysostom (Khilendar area) Handwritten: To the Abbot of the Vissarion-Dechansky Lavra Printed text below: To Hieroschemamonk Kirill and his brethren Round postmark partially: PENZA 2.2.10 Round faded cachet on reverse side in Russian: ROPiT and Afon From Postal marks: 1910 (handwritten date/registration mark) French text below: Via Odessa to Mont-Athos (Turkey) poste russe au père Kyrill confrerie. (To Athos (Turkey), via Russian mail, to Father Kirill and his brethren.) 

A modern reading of the address To the Abbot of the Monastery of St. John Chrysostom (in the Hilandar area on Mount Athos), to the Abbot of the Vissarion-Decani Lavra, to Hieroschemamonk Kirill and his brethren. The wording "Vissarion-Decani Lavra" refers to the Serbian monastic tradition associated with the Decani Monastery and the Athonite cell/monastery in the Hilandar area. 

The Russian Steam Navigation and Trading Company (Russian: Русское общество пароходства и торговли or ROPiT Russian: РОПиТ, also referred as Russian S.N.Co.) of Odessa was one of the biggest joint stock steamship companies in Imperial Russia. Mount Athos is a mountain on the Athos peninsula in northeastern Greece directly on the Aegean Sea. It is an important center of Eastern Orthodox monasticism.