rom the vicarage pew with a voice like a bird--away went the choir,
which, in spite of surplices, could not be cured of waiting half a beat
for her--and away went the congregation--young men and maidens, old men
and children--in one broad tide of somewhat irregular harmony. Isaac did
not know the words as well as I did, so I lent him my hymn-book; one
result of which was, that the print being small, and the sense of a hymn
being in his view a far more important matter than the sound of it, he
preached rather than sang--in an unequal cadence which was perturbing to
my more musical ear--the familiar lines,

"Still let each awful truth our thoughts engage,
That shines revealed on inspiration's page;
Nor those blest hours in vain amusement waste
Which all who lavish shall lament at last."

During the next verse my devotions were a little distracted by the
gradual approach of a churchwarden for my threepenny-bit, which was hot
with three verses of expectant fingering. Then, to my relief, he took
it, and the bee-master's contribution, and I felt calmer, and listened
to the little prelude which it was always the custom for the organist to
play before the final verse of a hymn. It was also the custom to sing
the last verse as loudly as possible, though this is by no means
invariably appropriate. It fitted the present occasion fairly enough.
From where I stood I could see the bellows-blower (the magnetic current
of enthusiasm flowed even to the back of the organ) nerve himself to
prodigious pumping--Charlie's sister drew out all the stops--the vicar
passed from the prayer-desk to the pulpit with the rapt look of a man
who walks in a prophetic dream--we pulled ourselves together, Master
Isaac brought the hymn book close to his glasses, and when the
tantalizing prelude was past we burst forth with a volume which merged
all discrepancies. As far as I am able to judge of my own performance,
I fear I _bawled_ (I'm sure the boy behind me did),

"Father of Heaven, in Whom our hopes confide,
Whose power defends us, and Whose precepts guide,
In life our Guardian, and in death our Friend,
Glory supreme be Thine till time shall end!"

The sermon was short, and when the service was over Master Isaac and I
spent a delightful afternoon with his bees among the heather. The
"evening star" had come out when we had some tea in the village inn, and
we walked home by moonlight. There was neither win