Two thousand children besides spectators in a building meant for three hundred! How came it to be devised? There is a consultation among the clergy. They go from one portion to another of the well-generalled army, and each division takes up a position on the ground strewn with dry beech leaves; hassocks and mats are brought to the ladies, a desk set at the gate, and a chair for the archdeacon; the choristers are brought near, and the short out-door service is begun.
How glorious and full the responses, 'as the voice of many waters,' and the chanted Psalms, the beautiful songs of degrees of the 27th of the month, rise with new fulness and vividness of meaning among the tall trees and sunlit foliage. One lesson alone is read, in Charlecote Raymond's fine, powerful voice, and many an eye is filled with tears at the words, 'One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of us all,' as he gazes on the troops on troops of young and old, rich and poor, strangers and homeborn, all held together in that great unity, typified by the overshadowing sky, and evidenced by the burst of the Creed from every voice and every heart.
Then follow the Versicles, the Collects, the Thanksgiving, and the Blessing, and in a few warm, kind words the archdeacon calls on all to keep the bond of peace and brotherly love, and bade the strangers bear home with them the thought of the wonderful works of God. Then-
All people that on earth do dwell,
Sing to the Lord with cheerful voice,
arises from the congregation in all its simple exultant majesty, forcing, as it were, every voice to break forth into singing unless it be choked by heart-swelling.
The last note has died away, but there is a sweet hush, as though lingering still, ere breaking the sense that this is none other than the gate of heaven.
Rattle and rumble, the vehicles are coming! The children rise, and somewhere begins the indispensable cheer. The gentlemen take the lead. 'Three times three for Mr. Fulmort!' 'Three cheers for Sir John Raymond!' 'Three for the Forest show!' Shouting and waving of hats will never cease, the gentlemen are as crazy as the boys, and what will become of the train?
Tumble them in-hoist up the girls while mankind is still vociferous. What's all this, coming in at the omnibus windows? Stand back, child, you don't want to be set down in London! Your nosegay, is it? Here are the prize nosegays, prize potatoes, prize currants, prize everything showering in on the Londoners to display or feast on at home. Many a family will have a first taste of fresh country green meat to-morrow, of such freshness, that is, as it may retain after eight hours of show and five of train. But all is compared! How the little girls hug their flowers. If any nosegays reach London alive, they will be cherished to their last hour, and maybe the leaves will live in prayer-books for many a year.
Poor little things! It has been to them apparently a rather weary and oppressive pleasure, too strange for the most part to be thoroughly enjoyed; but it will live in their memories for many a day, and as time goes on, will clear itself from the bewilderment, till it become one of the precious days that make gems on the thread of life.
Mervyn! Where has he been all this time? True, he once said he would see nothing of it, and seems to have kept his word. He did not even acknowledge the cheers for Mr. Fulmort.
Is not something visible behind the broad smooth bole of yonder beech tree? Have Mervyn and Cecily been there all the time of the evening service?
It is a remarkable fact, that though nobody has told anybody, every person who is curious, and many who are not, know who is to be Mrs. Fulmort of Beauchamp.
CHAPTER XXVII
When will you marry?
Say the bells of St. Mary.
When I get rich,
Say the bells of Shoreditch.
When will that be?
Say the bells of Stepney.
I do not know,
Says the great bell of Bow.-Nursery Rhyme
There was some truth in Lucilla's view of herself and Honor as belonging to two distinct classes of development. Honor had grown up among those who fed on Scott, Wordsworth, and Fouque, took their theology from the British Critic, and their taste from Pugin; and moulded their opinions and practice on the past. Lucilla and Phoebe were essentially of the new generation, that of Kingsley, Tennyson, Ruskin, and the Saturday Review. Chivalry had given way to common sense, romance to realism, respect for antiquity to pitying patronage, the past to the future. Perhaps the present has lost in reverence and refinement as much as it has gained in clearness and confidence! Lucilla represented reaction, therefore her attitude was antagonistic; Phoebe was the child of the newer system, therefore she loved the elder one, and sought out the likenesses to, rather than the differences from, her own tone of thought. And well was it that she had never let slip her hold on that broad, unchanging thread of truth, the same through all changes, making faith and principle one, though the developments in practice and shades of thought shake off the essential wisdom on which it grew, only to adopt some more fatal aberration of their own!
Thus standing between the two, Phoebe was a great help to both in understanding each other, and they were far more at ease when she was with them. In October, all three went to Woolstone-lane for a brief stay. Honor wished that the physician should see Lucilla before the winter, and Phoebe was glad to avail herself of the opportunity of choosing furniture and hiring servants for her new establishment, free from the interference of Lady Bannerman, who was of course at Brighton.
She had been obliged to let her sisters go to Sutton without her, as the little parsonage had not room for three guests besides Lieschen, who was more indispensable to Maria than even herself, and both the others were earnestly set upon accepting the invitation. Cecily silenced her scruples by begging, as a proof of acceptance as a sister, that she might be intrusted with them, and promising that in her own quiet home, whence most of the family had been launched into life, they should meet with none of the excitements of merry Moorcroft; and Phoebe was obliged to resign her charge for these few weeks, and trust from Bertha's lively letters that all was well.
Another cause which made Honor and Lucy anxious to be in London was the possibility of Owen's arrival. He had last been heard of on the shores of Lake Superior, when he spoke of returning as soon as the survey for a new line of railway should have been completed, and it was not unlikely that he might come even before his letter. News would await him that he would regret as much as did his sister. Uncle Kit's death had enabled Charles Charteris, or rather his creditors, to advertise Castle Blanch for sale, and Lucilla, who had a more genuine affection for the place than had any of the natives, grieved extremely over the family disgrace that was causing it to pass into other hands.
She had an earnest desire to take advantage of the display of the house and grounds to pay the scenes of her youth one last visit. The vehemence of this wish was her first recurrence to her old strength of will, and Honora beheld it as a symptom of recovery, though dreading the long and fatiguing day of emotion. Yet it might be taken as another token of improvement that she had ceased from that instinctive caution of feebleness which had made her shrink from all exertion or agitation.