"I don't want her to go to heaven yet," said Peter in a plaintive tone
(for he regarded her as much the best possession he had), and, raising
his voice, he complained to her as to one threatening to injure him,
"Grandmother, you don't want to go to heaven just yet, do you?"

"Lor bless the child!" exclaimed old Madam Melcombe, a good deal
startled.

"No, don't," continued Peter in a persuasive tone; "stop here, but let
me clean the picture, because I want to see that lobster."

"Now I tell you what," answered his great-grandmother rather sharply,
"if you was to go and play in the gallery, it would be a deal better
than arguing with me." So Peter departed to his play, and forgot the
lobster for a little while.

But Peter was not destined that evening to please his great-grandmother,
for he had no sooner got well into the spirit of his play in the gallery
than he began to sing. "I'm a coward at songs," she would sometimes say;
"and if it wasn't for the dear birds; I could wish there was no music in
the world."

Her feeling was the same which has been beautifully described by
Gassendi, who, writing in Latin, expresses himself thus:--

"He preferred also the music of birds to the human voice or to musical
instruments, not because he derived no pleasure from these last, but
because, after hearing music from the human voice, there remained a
certain sustained agitation, disturbing attention and sleep; while the