defend even that curious person, whose proud and pedantic bearing so
strongly contrasted with the modest appearance and kind affability of
Maese Perez.

At last the looked-for moment arrived, when the priest, after bowing low
and murmuring the sacred words, took the host in his hands. The bells gave
forth a peal, like a rain of crystal notes; the transparent waves of
incense rose, and the organ sounded.

But its first chord was drowned by a horrible clamor which filled the
whole church. Bagpipes, horns, timbrels, drums, every instrument known to
the populace, lifted up their discordant voices all at once.

The confusion and clangor lasted but a few seconds. As the noises began,
so they ended, all together.

The second chord, full, bold, magnificent, sustained itself, pouring from
the organ's metal tubes like a cascade of inexhaustible and sonorous
harmony.

Celestial songs like those that caress the ear in moments of ecstasy;
songs which the soul perceives, but which the lip cannot repeat; single
notes of a distant melody, which sound at intervals, borne on the breeze;
the rustle of leaves kissing each other on the trees with a murmur like
rain; trills of larks which rise with quivering songs from among the
flowers like a flight of arrows to the sky; nameless sounds, overwhelming
as the roar of a tempest; fluttering hymns, which seemed to be mounting to
the throne of the Lord like a mixture of light and sound--all were
expressed by the organ's hundred voices, with more vigor, more subtle
poetry, more weird coloring, than had ever been known before.