[Footnote 74: _Ibid._, p. 23.]
In these days of reverent worship it seems hardly possible that the
beautiful expressions in the psalms of praise to Almighty God should
ever have been prostituted to the baser purposes of private gain or
municipal elections.
Sleepy times and sleepy clerks--and yet these were not always sleepy; in
fact, far too lively, riotous, and unruly. At least, so the poor rector
of Hayes found them in the middle of the eighteenth century. Such
conduct in church is scarcely credible as that which was witnessed in
this not very remote parish church in not very remote times. The
registers of the parish of Hayes tell the story in plain language. On 18
March, 1749, "the clerk gave out the 100th Psalm, and the singers
immediately opposed him, and sung the 15th, and bred a disturbance. _The
clerk then ceased_." Poor man, what else could he have done, with a
company of brawling, bawling singers shouting at him from the gallery!
On another occasion affairs were worse, the ringers and others
disturbing the service, from the beginning of the service to the end of
the sermon, by ringing the bells and going into the gallery to spit
below. On another occasion a fellow came into church with a pot of beer
and a pipe, and remained smoking in his pew until the end of the
sermon[75].
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