er! What can we do to stop it? Let it go!" set themselves
to work to see if they couldn't stop it. They tested the question
whether a certain number of men might please their taste or their
religious fancy at the risk of disturbing and annoying others; and they
succeeded. It is to be hoped that the lesson will not be lost in regard
not only to the specific annoyance which was the cause of complaint,
but all other selfish indulgences by which some men interfere with the
rights of others. The law of common sense and justice in such matters
is that every man may enjoy himself as he pleases so long as he does
not interfere with the enjoyment of their natural rights by others. A
man may give his days and nights to ringing chimes so long as they are
not heard outside of his own house; but if they are so heard, and they
deprive a single person of rest, or even of a quiet enjoyment of life,
he has passed the limit of right. A dozen men may like a strong
perfume; but they have no right to load the common air with it to the
annoyance even of a thirteenth. This matter of ringing church chimes
has become somewhat of a religious and sentimental affectation. Chimes
have a very pretty effect in literature; and at a distance in the
country they are charming. But when they clang daily in the tower of a
city church within a few hundred yards of you, they become a great
nuisance. Nor is the annoyance they give diminished when the chimer,
instead of ringing such changes as are suited to bells, will insist
upon playing _affettuoso_. In fact, all church bells are an annoyance
in cities, and a needless one. They were first used to call people to
church when there were no clocks, and before watches were heard of.
Now, when the humblest apartment has a clock that strikes the hour,
"the church-going bell" is entirely superfluous for the object for
which it is rung, and is really a great annoyance not only to the sick,
but to those who are in health. It is a noisy anachronism which clamors
with iron tongue and brazen throat for its own suppression.

* * * * *

--AND so at last the marriage of Adelina Patti to the Marquis of Caux
has come to its natural end. What could the Marquis or the lady
expect? He married her for the money that she earned, and that he
might own so charming a celebrity; she accepted him as a husband for
his title. Years have passed, and nothing has occurred to bind them
more closely.