When Israel walks the way
Up to the temple's door.
The time we tell
When there to come
By beat of drum
Or sounding shell."

The drum, as highly suitable for such a military people, was often used as
a signal for gathering for public worship, and was plainly the favorite
means of notification. In 1678 Robert Stuard, of Norwalk, "ingages yt his
son James shall beate the Drumb, on the Sabbath and other ocations," and in
Norwalk the "drumb," the "drumne," the "drumme," and at last the drum was
beaten until 1704, when the Church got a bell. And the "Drumber" was paid,
and well paid too for his "Cervices," fourteen shillings a year of the
town's money, and he was furnished a "new strong drumme;" and the town
supplied to him also the flax for the drum-cords which he wore out in the
service of God. Johnson, in his "Wonder Working Providence," tells of the
Cambridge Church: "Hearing the sound of a drum he was directed toward it by
a broade beaten way; following this rode he demands of the next man he met
what the signall of the drum ment; the reply was made they had as yet no
Bell to call men to meeting and therefore made use of the drum." In 1638
a platform was made upon the top of the Windsor meeting-house "from the
Lanthornc to the ridge to walk conveniently to sound a trumpet or a drum to
give warning to meeting."

Sometimes three guns were fired as a signal for "church-time." The signal
for religious gathering, and the signal for battle were always markedly
different, in order to avoid unnecessary fright.

In 1647 Robert Basset was appointed in New Haven to drum "twice upon Lordes