EVERYTHING in the Lithuanian garden is rosy, for the present at least.

It's not rosy-red, of course, and that is part of the reason for the

joyous celebratory atmosphere which existed in Vilnius this weekend.

On Tuesday the last of Russia's combat troops, one of the final

reminders of the old Soviet days, left for home; at least those few of

them who had homes to go to did -- many had lived here for decades.

All that remain now are some members of the medical corps, sick

soldiers in army hospitals, and a contingent left behind to guard

munitions which are to be transported to Russia at a later date.

It was a quiet, peaceful evacuation with just one note of defiance. A

Russian soldier wrote with his finger on the dusty rear window of a jeep

a misspelled and ungrammatical sentence meant to convey the meaning ''We

will be back''.

But the momentous event has already been overshadowed in Lithuanian

minds, for hot on the heels of the departing soldiers a plane arrived at

Vilnius airport with the green, white and red livery of Alitalia -- it

bore Pope John Paul II on his first visit to territory once part of the

Soviet Union.

There were still some old Soviet emblems around in the form of the

Ilyushins and Tupolevs formerly of Aeroflot but now of the new

Lithuanian airline, but the signs of change were far more striking.

The president of the republic Algirdas Brazauskas, once first

secretary of the Lithuanian Communist Party, made the sign of the cross

on the welcoming platform and stood to attention as the rarely performed

and seemingly endless full version of Gounod's Papal Anthem was played

by a band from the country's young army. And the president was quick to

highlight the other great event.

''I would like to draw attention,'' he said, ''to the fact that, on

the eve of your holiness's visit, the last remaining foreign military

units were withdrawn from Lithuania. After 54 years our country has

become absolutely free. This is a very significant coincidence.''

The occasions have indeed been historic. In the space of a single

week, a country which has traditionally looked westward saw the most

important reminder of its dependence on Moscow dissolve and a country of

intense Catholicism returned to Rome but not, perhaps, to the Rome of

today.

One of the most repeated comments from Lithuanians in the streets over

the weekend has been the expression of joy at being visited by the Pope,

tempered by suggestions that John Paul II was too reformist, too much of

a liberal.

As in all post-communist countries there is a certain uneasiness at a

new freedom which so far has brought far more headaches than benefits.

There has been high inflation, the beginnings of unemployment, a

decrease in the standard of living for most people, and a rise in crime.

There is no going back to communism, of course, but there exists a

hankering for a return to the pre-communist womb. A yearning to return

to the days of reasonable prosperity the memories of which have been

passed on by those older Lithuanians who were alive before the Red Army

arrived.

But those were the days before Vatican II, the days of the Latin mass,

the days when the Church played a major role. There were echoes of those

times in Vilnius Cathedral, the first place visited by the Pope on his

arrival on Saturday. From 1956 to 1988 it had been a museum under the

Soviet authorities. Now its baroque interior houses, once again, the

remains of St Casimir, and yesterday it resounded to hymns in Latin and

Lithuanian.

Since early on Saturday morning there were crowds passing through the

square in front of my hotel. Family groups, little knots of teenagers,

crocodiles of schoolchildren led by teacher, all moved towards Cathedral

Square where they joined in the singing of the hymns of vespers relayed

from inside.

The crowd was quiet and respectful rather than in celebratory mood,

conveying the impression, in the president's words, of a ''new civilised

nation with a tradition and culture of its own''. The president and the

government had left little to chance. From Saturday and for five days,

there has been a ban on the sale of alcohol in central Vilnius. Some

visitors from the provinces had a last fling in the restaurant of the

Lietuva Hotel which overlooks the city. The hangover, in the form of a

return to the hard world of market economics, will make itself felt on

Tuesday when the Pope leaves for Latvia for a two-day visit followed by

a day in solidly Lutheran Estonia before returning to Rome.

* Seamus Martin is Moscow Correspondent for the Irish Times.