Perhaps it was the evening of the
twenty-eighth day of the month, and you listened to the sacred words of
Psalm cxxxvii., "By the waters of Babylon we sat down and wept, when we
remembered thee, O Sion." Then followed a bellow from a raucous throat:
"Has fur ur 'arp, we 'anged 'em hup hupon the trees that hare thurin."
And then at the end of the Lord's Prayer, after every one had finished,
the same voice came drowsily cantering in: "For hever and hever,
Haymen." Sometimes we heard, "Let us sing to the praise and glory of God
the 'undred and sixtieth Psalm--_'Ymn 'ooever."_ The numbers of the
hymns or Psalms were scored on the two sides of a slate. Sometimes the
functionary in the gallery forgot to turn the slate after the first
hymn. "Let us sing," began the clerk--(pause)--"Turn the slate, will
you, if you please, Master Scroomes?" he continued, addressing the
neglectful person.
The singing was no mechanical affair of official routine--it was a
drama. "As the moment of psalmody approached a slate appeared in front
of the gallery, advertising in bold characters the Psalm about to be
sung. The clerk gave out the Psalm, and then migrated to the gallery,
where in company with a bassoon and two key-bugles, a carpenter
understood to have an amazing power of singing 'counter,' and two lesser
musical stars, formed the choir.
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