roof of a despised tenement, inhabited by an old woman who never sees
them. The corn was green and tall, the hops looked well, the foxglove was
stirring, the delicious atmosphere of summer, sun-laden and scented,
filled the deep valleys; a morning of the richest beauty and deepest
repose. All things reposed but man, and man is so busy with his vulgar
aims that it quite dawns upon many people as a wonderful surprise how
still nature is on a Sunday morning. Nature is absolutely still every day
of the week, and proceeds with the most absolute indifference to days and
dates.

The sharp metallic clangour of a bell went bang, bang, bang, from one
roof; not far distant a harsher and deeper note--some Tartar-like bell of
universal uproar--hammered away. At intervals came the distant chimes of
three distinct village churches--ding dong, dong ding, pango, frango,
jango--very much jango--bang, clatter, clash--a humming vibration and
dreadful stir. The country world was up in arms, I was about to say--I
mean in chimney-pot hat and pomade, _en route_ to its various creeds,
some to one bell, some to another, some to ding dong, and some to dong
ding; but the most of them directed their steps towards a silent chapel.
This great building, plain beyond plainness, stood beside a fir copse,
from which in the summer morning there floated an exquisite fragrance of
pine. If all the angles of the architects could have been put together,
nothing could have been designed more utterly opposite to the graceful
curve of the fir tree than this red-bricked crass building. Bethel Chapel
combined everything that could be imagined contrary to the spirit of
nature, which undulates. The largest erection of the kind, it was
evidently meant for a large congregation.

Of all the people in this country there are none so devout as the
cottagers in the lanes and hamlets. They are as uncompromising as the