We mused on music some while ago; and as the subject still haunts us—very much after the manner of an obstinate ghost that refuses to be laid, even by the choicest Latin—we are strongly disposed to try the effect of giving it full swing for once; and in idle mood, too idle to oppose ourselves to its tyranny, letting it carry us whither it will, in the hope that, in return for our complacence, it may in future suffer us to conduct our meditations according to our own pleasure, and give that sad and serious thought, which their merits demand, to the gravities of this life—to corn-laws and poor-laws, (of all sorts!) and the Irish question, and the debates to which all these give occasion, in reading which we have already worn out we know not how many pairs of spectacles, and one pair of excellent eyes; and last, not least, to the marchings and counter-marchings of the House of Commons, in which we are deeply interested.

With such a course of study before us, we are disposed to make the most of our holiday; and should we chance to be a little too frisky, it must be borne in mind that retribution is at hand, and that we shall speedily become as solemn as ever a fool in the land, as dull as an owl bathing its eyes in the morning sunshine, which—having overslept itself—it takes for the full moon, and dismal enough to satisfy the most ardent advocate of the religious duty of being miserable,—eschewing laughter as we would the tax-gatherer, and refreshing our oppressed spirits alone with serious jokes, and such merriment as may be presented to us under the sanction and recommendation of a college of dissenting divines!

But our harp will be a mingled one, for so is our theme; having a sympathy alike for our mirthful and sorrowful moments, which it alike spiritualizes; striking the light, gleesome chord to the one, and attuning the soul to more ethereal joy; while by its soft influence it tones down the harshness of bitter, unavailing sorrow, and woos the heart, misanthropizing under the pangs of grief or unrequited love—pent up in its own solitude, unpitied and uncared for—and filled with dark thoughts, and sad sounds, and tones of plaintive winds, sighing through the cypress and doleful yew with mournful melody around the resting-place of the loved and lost, to submissive lamentings, and slow stealing tears that assuage its aching anguish and tranquillize the spirit, leading it to the hope of a brighter future, in whose dawning beams it will, ere-long, show like "the tender grass, clear-shining after rain"—more glistening and beautiful for the invigorating dews of the cloud which had overhung it, and beneath whose gloom its beauty faded away—for very trouble!

How often have we found that hard, bitter mood into which the mind under the pressure of suffering which is irremediable, and which has to be borne alone, is so apt to decline—feeling the harder and the bitterer for the careless, galling gaiety of all around—softened, subdued, yea, utterly broken up by the sweet notes of "some old familiar strain," that steal on the willing ear, freshening and exhilarating the spirit like a breezy morning in June, when it seems a sin to be wretched; the twittering birds on dancing boughs crying shame on us, for what is not only wrong, but, as we begin to feel, needless—not to say foolish; and we return from our stroll, wondering what in the world we have done with that load on our chest with which we began our walk—ending in a regular ramble—and which it then seemed incumbent on us, nay, a sacred duty, to pant under for the term of our natural lives; relieving ourselves by such sighs and groans as appeared to us the appropriate forms of expression for all human beings under the sun—made on purpose to be unhappy; we especially, fulfilling the end of our creation. And as we mark the change that has passed upon us—the bounding circulation in place of flagging energies—full, calm breathing, instead of the slow, short respiration of sadness—with reverent heart we bless nature, and, may we say also, nature's great Architect, all-merciful, all-loving!

Such on us is frequently the effect of music; the heaviness of heart, caused by the weary rubs of this rough world, or the result of a temperament that has a constitutionally jarring string in it, is as it were drawn out, and sweetness and calm-breathing tranquillity infused in its stead; while our nerves become as the harmonious strings of a harp, that respond in sympathy with the master chords of one with which it is in unison, and whereon the fresh breeze of morning lightly plays, calling forth sounds of joy and gladness. Therefore do we love it, with a warmth of affection that may perchance appear extravagant to those whose robust, well-balanced minds, clothed with strong, healthy, unsusceptible bodies—people who are always in good spirits, unless there be a reason for the contrary—may render them independent of such external influences, for we must acknowledge, that we do at times express this our affection in somewhat unmeasured phrase, as one who stays not accurately to calculate, and weigh with cool precision, the virtues of a friend, thus laying ourselves open to the unmitigated condemnation of those who soar above, (or sink below!) such sympathies.

Be it so! We are not about to enter into any vindication of ourselves; we shall not even attempt to convince these dull souls, that it is possible for elevated feeling, and repose and tenderness of mind, to be indebted for their origin to such insignificant and material sources as catgut and brass wire—and that they are not therefore to be undervalued; though by way of illustration of the influence of matter over spirit, we would remind them of their own humane and charitable feelings after dinner, compared with the fierce, nay, atrocious sentiments, which their consciences convict them of having entertained, before the pangs of their raging hunger had been appeased by that inestimable mollifier of men's hearts and tempers. For the cause of their insensibility to such impressions—a natural incapacity for receiving them—it is vain to seek a remedy, however willing we might be to apply one; but where cure is impracticable, palliatives are frequently admissible, and we would suggest that one may be found in this case, in the patients' treating the unhappy privation under which they labour with greater tenderness than has been their wont, throwing over it that veil of oblivion and charity with which they so gracefully conceal their other defects, instead of obtruding it on public observation, under the singular misconception of its being an admirable feature in their character, a something of which a man ought to be proud. Conduct like this, they may rest assured, will not fail of being appreciated and rewarded by the corresponding delicacy with which all, who are not utterly barbarous, invariably treat him who, by the deprecating humility with which he seeks to conceal his deficiencies, betrays his painful cognisance of their existence.

We are aware that this is a turning of the tables upon them which they may not be disposed to admire—to be placed at the bar, when they expected a seat on the Bench, and were just smoothing down their ermine, and adjusting their wigs, in order to enter on their duties with the greater impressiveness and dignity; but they must believe us when we tell them, that we, too, have an opinion on this subject, to which we must be permitted to attribute as high authority as they possibly can to their own; and that, tried by this standard, they, being found wanting, would inevitably have been brought up for judgment, but for a merciful leaning, (sanctioned by legal precedent,) which prompts us rather to try the salutary effect of admonition and good counsel, than to proceed at once to inflict extreme penalties on the offenders—in short, that we are not in a hanging humour, or they should swing for it!

Grim, rough Luther, laying about him with his ponderous mace, and making giant Pope tremble in the deepest recesses of his stronghold, lest he should grow utterly savage with his perpetual warfare—albeit a "Holy war"—humanized and spiritualized himself with his lute—(who does not sympathize with his unfailing "Deus noster refugium," that divine stay of his stout heart that trembled not at men or devils!) Ken, undaunted opponent of the tyranny of a king—meek sufferer for that monarch's lawful rights, rose at day-dawn, or so soon as the first brief slumber had recruited his exhausted frame, to give thanks unto the King of kings in strains that, handed down to us, yet thrill the heart by their fervent piety, and plain, vigorous verse, and animate it to a stricter more manly rectitude. Herbert—saintliest of men and priests—after his sacred toils, refreshed his spirit with "divine music;" the more melodious to his ear, that his heart was teeming with the harmony of that "good-will towards man," which seeks and finds its due expression in active exertions on their behalf—disdaining not the lowliest occasion of serving with hearty zeal the lowliest of his neighbours. Rest assured, then, O reader! whosoever thou art, that it is not for thee to pretend to despise it!

Ponder the rather on the power of that art, that could soothe the perturbed soul of Israel's wrath-sent king—mad and moody—and even expel the evil spirit that goaded him; and on its dignity—for prophets of old, when the Divine inspiration came upon them, revealing to their purified eyes the "vision of the Almighty," uttered their "dark sayings upon the harp."

What a plague it sometimes is to be hag-ridden by a tune, racing through one's head, with a never-ending always-beginningness, as though a thousand imps were singing it in one's ears. Wherever you may be, whomsoever with, whatsoever doing, still ring on those incessant tones of perchance the merriest of all jigs, till—it is Sunday morning, and you are preparing for church—you leave your house with the entire and miserable conviction, that, seated in your pew in the very face of the congregation-genteel sinners in silks, and satins, and feathers—you will betray your long-concealed suffering by giving vent to that interminable "Rory O'More," the moment you open your lips for the emission of "All people that on earth do dwell;" so ensuring your rapid transfer to the street, under the escort of the man with the parti-coloured coat and black wand, whose Sabbath duties of jerking the Sunday scholars, and rapping their heads with that authoritative cane, are unceremoniously interfered with on your behalf. Misery and disgrace stare you in the face, and all through an undue titillation of that part of your sensorium that takes cognisance of musical sounds; a titillation not to be subdued by endeavouring to direct your attention from it to the very gravest of all subjects; nor propitiated even by audibly chanting the offending strain, previously retiring into the furthest corner of your coal-cellar, to prevent your unwilling profanity on shocking the strictly conscientious ears of your household. This is bad—and yet it is but a mild form of this morbid affection, which, in its most intense degree, torments the sufferer from fever, (or one stunned by some sudden and violent grief,) when certain sounds, words, or tunes, accidentally determined, thrill through the head with the steadiness and vehement action of the piston of a steam-engine—beat, beat, beat!—every note seeming to fall on the excited brain like the blow of a hammer; while, as the fever and pain increase, the more rapidly and heavily do those torturing notes pursue their furious chase. We well remember, under an attack of disorder in the neighbourhood of the brain, causing severe suffering, lying—we know not how long, it might be a thousand years for any thing we knew—singing over and over again in our mind, for we were speechless with pain, the 148th psalm, which we had just chanced to hear sung, in Brady and Tate's version, to a new and somewhat peculiar tune. Oh, how those "dreadful whales" and "glittering scales" did quaver and quiver in our poor head! Lying like a log—for pain neither permitted us to stir nor groan—still rattled on, hard and quick, the rumbling bass and shrill tenor of that most inappropriately jubilant composition—"cherubim and seraphim," "fire, hail, and snow," succeeding each other with a railway velocity that there was no resisting; no sooner had we got to "stands ever fast," than round again we went to the "boundless realms of joy," and so on, on, on, through each dreary minute of those dreary hours, an infinity, or perchance but twenty-four, according as time is computed by clocks or by agonised human beings. It made a capital Purgatory; one which we have even deemed every way adequate to those slight delinquencies of which we may have been guilty, and which are appointed, as it is understood, to be expiated in this way.

At times some simple air, or even a single chord of unusual, but apparently obvious harmony, will haunt us with a peculiar sweetness, producing a soothing, gentle sadness, as though we listened to distant bells, whose music is borne in surges on the breeze that sways the golden corn on a sunny Sabbath, when our pathway lies through the undulating fields, already "white unto the harvest;" where the pleasant rustling of the ripened grain, as it is stirred by the soft wind, is sweet and soothing; and the gay poppy, and other less obtrusive, though not less beautiful wild-flowers, bloom at our loitering feet. In the power of exciting such feeling, what can equal our old English ballads? There is an inexpressible charm in these, and we would almost give our fingers to be able to describe that indescribable something, which constitutes their peculiar fascination and power over the imagination. Most plain, most artless, does their composition appear; like the natural out-breathing of the heart in its sunny moments; and yet—as with all earthly brightness—with a trace of cloud on that sunshine. They are redolent of the "olden time;" and as they fall softly on the ear, the antique hall, with its groined roof, and mullioned window, glowing with rich heraldic devices, through which the many-tinted lights fall tenderly on arch and pillar, and elaborately fretted walls, studded with ancestral armour, rises up before us; and with the melting tones of the lute, mingles the low, clear voice of a gentle maiden, whose small foot and brocaded train are just seen from behind yonder deeply sculptured oaken screen. What innocence is in that voice! and how expressive are the chords that accompany it—less elaborate and fantastic, perchance, than might win favour in our vitiated ears; but natural, harmonious, full, and in exquisite subordination to the air, which they fill up and enrich, instead of overpowering with misplaced beauty.

And now a movement of the singer reveals still more of the quaint, beautiful costume, with its heavy, yet graceful folds, while—aha! what else do we see?—a plumed hat thrown carelessly on the ground; the armed heel, glittering rapier, and slashed sleeve, just visible, betokening that its owner is not far off, and that the lady fair has not, as we had thought, been wasting her sweetness, either of voice or countenance, on that comfortable-looking pet dog or caged linnet. Sing on, pretty one! for well do gallant knights love to hear their stern deeds sung by innocent lips; and right well, to listen to the strain that tells how the heart of "lady-bright" is won by noble daring. But what means that sudden break in the song, and the confused sweep of the strings, as though the lute had slipped from its owner's grasp; while the masculine paraphernalia which we had just discovered disappears altogether behind that most impervious and curiosity-mocking screen? No great harm done, or that light laugh had not escaped the lips so suddenly silenced; and the offending cavalier is doubtless forgiven on the spot, as they amicably retreat to that deep oriel, framed apparently for the express purpose of excluding intrusionists like ourselves, who would fain follow, where, it is evident, we are marvellously little wanted! Well, well!—maidens will be maidens, we trow, and lovemaking in the olden time is, we suppose, after all, vastly like the same performance by more modern actors. Leave we them to their light-heartedness:—and yet we could linger long in this ancient chamber,

"With quaint oak-carving lined and ceiled;"

so calm, so cool, so repose-breathing,—the shrill twitter of the swallow the only sound now heard amid its silence; the fleecy clouds, throwing that rich interior into alternate light and shade, as they sail lazily along the deep blue sky—the only moving objects, save the long wreaths of ivy, that, green as the tender buds of spring, tap lightly against the casement, as they are swayed by the impulses of the summer breeze. Beyond, is an old-fashioned garden—a pleasance, as it would be called—and truly is it one; with its trim walks, its terraces, and moss-grown urns, around which luxuriant creepers are entwined—its impervious hedges—its close-shorn lawn, decked with appropriate statues, and its yew-trees, clipped into fantastic shapes; while the ivy-covered walls that bound it, afford a shelter from the blasts that too often allay the sunshine of our northern climate, and render it a spot where 'tis sweet to saunter, in idle or quiet contemplative mood, at glowing sunset; or chaster beauty of summer evening, when the pure, cold moon mingles her passionless lustre with the gorgeous hues that still linger around the portals of the west—bright train of the departing monarch that has passed to the sway of a new hemisphere!

Here could we linger in genial meditation, while from the dark pannelled walls look down upon us lovely countenances of those who, centuries ago, have called this home—portraits whose calm, meek dignity so far transcends the more active style in which it too often pleases us moderns to glare from our gilt frames, "looking delightfully with all our might, and staring violently at nothing;" costume and truth being utterly outraged,—the roturier's wife mapped in the ermine of the duchess, and perchance dandling on her maternal lap what appears to be a dancing dog in its professional finery, but which, on closer inspection, turns out to be an imp of a child, made a fool of by its mother and milliner; and my lady—in inadequate garments, and a pair of wings, flourishing as some heathen divinity or abstract virtue! Look at those girlish features, just mantling into fairest womanhood, with their sweet serious look, exhibiting all the self-possession of simplicity; the drapery and other accessories natural, and in perfect keeping with the unpretending character of the whole; and then turn to some recent "portrait of a lady," with what toleration you may. Contrast for one moment that fine ancestral face, dignified and unmoved as the mighty ocean slumbering in his strength, with the eager visage of one of the latest "batch," (cooked, without much regard to the materials, for some ministerial exigency,) who would appear to be standing in rampant defence of his own brand-new coronet, emulative of the well-gilt lion which supports that miracle of ingenuity rather than research, his brightly emblazoned coat-of-arms; whose infinitude of charges and quarterings do honour to the inventive genius of the Herald's Office, and are enough to make the Rouge Dragon of three centuries ago claw out the eyes of the modern functionary.

But, oh dear, dear! where are our ballads all this while? Drifted sadly to leeward, we fear, according to a bad habit of ours, of letting any breeze, from whatever point of the compass it may chance to blow, fill our sails, and float us away before it, utterly unmindful of our original purpose and destination. Thus have we, to the tune of an old Hall and its garniture, sailed away from that which we were aiming—trying to find out, and describe the peculiar fascination of our loved old ballads; flattering ourselves, perhaps, that we were escaping a difficulty which we feared to meet.

There is a quaint cheerfulness in them, toned down with a shade—the shadow of a shade—of the most touching melancholy, effected, we can scarcely tell how, by an exquisitely felicitous, though but slight introduction of the minor key, perchance but a single note or chord. But that suffices, and it is as a sudden vision of our home, far off among the mountains, or in the "happy valley" of our fathers, passing before us in the gay crowded city, bringing plaintive thoughts of remembered joys, and quietude, and childish innocence. Old ballads are like April skies, all smiles and tears, sunshine and swift-flitting clouds, that serve but to heighten the loveliness they concealed for a while. They are like,—nay, we despair; none but our own Shakspeare can express what we should vainly puzzle ourselves to describe, the essence of the "old and antique song."

"Mark it, Cesario; it is old and plain;
The spinsters and the knitters in the sun
And the free maids that weave their thread with bones,
Do use to chaunt it; it is silly sooth,
And dallies with the innocence of love,
Like the old age."

Ay! like gray eld fondling sunny childhood, gazing on the wavy hair, and pure brow, and calm yet kindling eye, with a fond sad pleasure; for in that young exulting spirit he sees the sure inheritor of his own fading honours, the usurper of his strength, and influence, and worship, rapidly passing away from his feeble grasp; and as he gazes, though his lips pour willing benedictions on the unconscious supplanter, there lingers in his heart the sorrowful, "He shall increase, but I shall decrease."

Something akin in their sad soothing effect, are the waits, (dear reader, you do not need to be told what these are? Wordsworth has immortalized them;) simple, rude, and inharmonious as they would be in the clear, truth-telling daylight, but strange, witching, and half unearthly, when heard between the pauses of some fantastic dream in the deep midnight; when,

"All around,
The stars are watching with their thousand eyes;"

those same stars that peered down on this earth, in "earnest gaze," on the first act of that most awful drama, when, in "the winter wild, the heaven-born child"—Him in whom all nations of the world were blessed—was placed in his rude cradle at Bethlehem: in commemoration of whose advent—and this is one secret of their pathos, waking high thoughts in the soul, too long brooding over and degrading itself with the mean cares and hopes of this life—the humble musicians make night tuneful, "scraping the chords with strenuous hand."

A blessing on them as they go, softening our hard, unloving hearts! In our childhood it was one of our most cherished pleasures to lie—half-sleeping, half-waking—listening to them, as the sounds, at times discordant enough, though of that we recked not, rose and fell in pleasing cadence, as the winter wind rose and fell, wafting the notes that, faint and fainter still, at last died away in the distance.

We and our room-companion were under a solemn engagement, each to other, to waken the little sleepy thing beside him, when the more watchful became aware of the approach of the itinerant minstrels; and woe to the one who had forgotten this duty! It would have required no little "music" to soothe the "savage breast" of the aggrieved one; for—as we are pathetically reminded by the old song—"Christmas comes but once a-year," and so often, but no more, did we know that our chance of hearing this seductive harmony occurred. Hence our wrath, if through the neglect, the "breach of promise" of another, so solemnly pledged, we missed it. And even now, dear as is the oblivion of night and dreamless sleep to the spirit, harassed and world-worn, that in outgrowing its child-like feelings and happiness, has, alas! also out-grown what its increase of worldly wisdom can hardly make amends for—the child-like purity, and intense enjoyment of simple pleasures, which marked its earlier years—even now, weary and dull-hearted as we are become, we would not willingly lose this delight of our happier days, although it fall on the still darkness like wail for a departed friend, unsealing the fount of mournful memories, whose bitter waters gush from their stricken rock; sad as are its associations, they are of that sadness whereby the "heart is made better."

What think ye of the drum as a musical instrument? Is there not something magnificent in it, albeit suggestive of a distant wheelbarrow on rough paving-stones, or heavily laden cart in the distance? This latter, by the way,—we appeal with confidence to any musical soul present for confirmation of our assertion—being decidedly its equal, in effect, any day; as in our happy infancy we found out to our sorrow, from being frequently deceived by its dull booming, which our vivid imagination at once pronounced to be its parchment representative; as we writhed and wriggled with agony on our unhonoured bench (selected, and adhered to, for constancy was our forte, chiefly on account of its being out of the reach of the cane, and commanding a good view of the street) in a perfect fever, poor little soul, to squirl away books and slates, and scamper after the soldiers. Scarlet has been said to be like the sound of a trumpet; surely then a drum must be taken as the exponent of that ferocious mixture yclept thunder and lightning, erst dear to country bumpkins, and rendered classical by Master Moses Primrose's coat. It can scarcely be described as music, but rather as sound with an idea in it—the connecting link between mere noise and musical expression. Kettle-drums,

"Whose sullen dub,
Is like the hooping of a tub,"

we hate; and never see them in a concert-room without heartily wishing they and their tatooer might tumble, helter-skelter, from their topmost perch into the very lowest depth, if there be one lower than another, of the orchestra; and thereby sustain such a compound fracture, attended by loss of substance, as should put it out of their power, for that night at least, to torture our fastidious ears. Being of a melancholy temperament, we are unfortunately, at times, subject to most ludicrous fancies; and as these ungainly instruments loom on our disgusted eye, we cannot, for the life of us, help imagining them moulds for a couple of enormous gooseberry puddings; and we verily pant at the idea of the sea of melted butter, or yellow cream, requisite to mollify their acidity—and then we laugh like a hyena at the nightmareish vision, and so are disgraced, for it is at a "serious opera:" therefore, we repeat it, do we hate them, cordially and perseveringly. They are horrid things, and ought to be excommunicated. And when employed in military bands—why, a horse looks a complete fool between a couple of these gigantic basins, each with its long tag-rag of unmeaning velvet, beplastered and bedizened with lace and gold, streaming from it; and the unlucky performer perched between them, exactly like an old market-woman, bolstered up between a brace of paniers or milk-pails;—any thing but a fierce dragoon, or most chivalrous hussar. But peace be to the kettle-drums,—ay, peace be to them, say we! and may our ears never again be subjected to the torture of hearing Handel's massive chorus, or Beethoven's fearfully dramatic harmony, disfigured by their most abominable bangs, or villanous rumble-grumble.

Now all this is rank nonsense—we are fully aware of it; and it is a most foolish, unjust prejudice of ours against drums—kettle or otherwise, as it may please Apollo—which are most respectable members of musical society, and good—very good—in their way; were it only as a foil to the enchanting, inspiriting, maddening strains of the horn, the shrill pipe, the regal trumpet, and the various other instruments of our military music, of which we are more passionate admirers, almost ready to follow the drum ourselves. Oh, the supreme delight of having one's arms and legs shot off to such soul-elevating sounds, to the tune of Rule Britannia, and somebody or other's march! "Britons strike home" thrills through the air, and you scarcely feel that you are spitted by a Polish lancer; a flourish of trumpets, and enter a troop of horse, that trot briskly over you as you lie smashed by a round-shot, but heedless of the exhibition of their unceremonious heels to your injuries, for are you not sustained by that "point of war"—mercilessly beaten at your elbow, without the slightest regard to the effect it may have on your cracked head, for which you are indebted to the last trooper who spurred his charger over you: who would care for his vulgar limbs under such excitement? But if this part of our military economy be intended to inspire cowards with courage, and string them up to a disregard of all the chances of warfare, in the way of bullet and sabre, why—why is not so valuable an idea carried out to the full extent of its requirement, and a military band instituted for the comfort and encouragement of the patients (every whit as nervous as if they were under arms) of Guy's Hospital? Why should not the case of poor bedfast wretches in cap and gown, and pale faces, meet with as much consideration as that of your clodpole in scarlet and an 'Albert hat?' (Heaven forgive the prince for making such simpletons of our handsome Englishmen!) Look to it, ye governors of such institutions, and look to it, ye charitable and humane, who empty your purses into the blandly presented plate to buy shoes and stockings for the kangaroos. Consider the case of your afflicted countrymen, and relieve the plethora of your coffers by providing them music, every way equal to that enjoyed by troops going into action; music so entrancing that an arm or leg whipped off shall, under its influence, be no object to them; and let them drink down their odious physic to such masterly compositions of the first artists as shall sweeten the bitterest potion, and elicit a chorus of blessings on the taste and liberality of their munificent benefactors. But we fear that our pleading will be vain—Englishmen, poor, sick, and suffering, are intolerably uninteresting; not to be named on the same day with the happy possessors of woolly locks, flat noses, and copper-coloured skins; these being personal qualifications calculated to excite the intense sympathies of the many whose charity neither begins nor ends "at home." Yet, in the spirit of the little girl, who, on the denial of her request that she might be married, substituted the more modest one of a piece of bread and butter; if unsuccessful in this particular, we will be content to lower our tone, and, in place of the luxury we have recommended, simply require all whom it may concern to give the poor—their own!—honest wages for their honest labour.

We may perhaps be accused of having a Turkish taste in music (after the pattern of that Sultan's, who was chiefly fascinated with the jarring process of tuning the instruments, a thing abhorred by "gods and men") if we venture to own the strange, thrilling effect once produced on us by the discordant, yet withal imposing clangour of some half dozen regimental bands (all of them, mark you, playing different tunes!) which struck up simultaneously as my Lord ——, the then commander-in-chief, (whose spirit has since mingled with the shades of the heroes who had preceded him, not to the hall of Odin, but we trust to a more Christian place,) made his appearance, with his brilliant staff, on —— Moor; whither he came down ostensibly for the purpose of reviewing the troops—really, to marry his nephew and heir to the grand-daughter of a manufacturing millionnaire. (Commercial gold, or heraldic or, is a good modern "tricking;" though we query whether our ancestors would have countenanced such bad heraldry, or been content with such abatements of honour on their old shields!)

The wild sounds streamed on the crisp morning air—'twas one of those September days whose mature beauty rivals the budding grace of spring—with a strange wayward beauty, a barbaric grandeur, that carried away both our heart and ears; and we enjoyed it to the full as much as did the steed of a military lady present, that verily danced with the tingling delight. We had a fellow feeling with the brute, and could ourselves, grave and sensible as we are, have pranced about in an ecstasy of admiration, which was by no means allayed when the deep-toned sullen music—for such it is to us—of the artillery uttered its majestic bass to the sharp ringing fire of musketry. While, as wreath after wreath of the light morning mist floated away before the breeze, the glittering files and compact bristling squares, the centaur-like cavalry, and stealthy riflemen gliding along the windings of the copse, became apparent, stretching far into the distance; now hidden for a moment by the rolling vapour from a discharge of firearms, then, as it curled above them, dimming the clear sky, glancing bright in the sun, which blithely kissed sabre and epaulet, and dancing plume, and the knightly-looking pennoned weapon of the picturesque lancer. Truly the scene was beautiful, and one to breathe a warlike spirit into the most unexcitable. And we gazed in a paroxysm of admiration at the exquisite evolutions and fierce charges that seemed as though they must bear all before them, till this perfection of discipline came to an end, and the long files of troops had taken their slow dusty departure; when, hot and fagged, and with bright colours still dancing before our eyes, we returned to our home. There, as each "pleasure has its pain," we found that one was superinduced on ours, in the shape of a robbery of our plate committed while we were staring ourselves out of countenance at the gay spectacle; our faithless domestics having taken that opportunity of indulging their own taste for the "sublime and beautiful." 'Tis to be hoped they got enough of the "beautiful" at the show, as we indulged them with a touch of the "sublime" (which has one of its sources in terror) when we discovered our loss. But we enjoyed the review thoroughly for all that, and are ready for another to-morrow, first taking the precaution to "lock up all our treasure," warned by a catastrophe which nearly reduced us to wooden spoons and hay-makers.

Military music! But to feel its power fully, let it be heard when the exulting strains that are wont to fill the air with exuberant harmony are saddened into the sweet, mournful, heart-breaking notes that steal on the ear at a soldier's funeral, and the gaudy splendour of military array has passed into the drear pomp of that most touching, most monitory sight. Faint mournful bugle-notes are wafted fitfully on the wind, plumes and glittering weapons glance and disappear as the procession advances, now hidden by the hedge-rows, now flashing on the sight, in the autumnal sun, as it winds slowly along the devious road; louder and louder swell those short abrupt trumpet-notes as it draws near, till the whole sad array, in its affecting beauty, is presented to the eye. The life in death that pervades the melancholy ceremonial!—"Our brother is not dead, but sleepeth," seems written on the impressive pageant; and we almost expect, while we gaze, to see the deep slumber chased from the closed eyelids, and the recumbent form start up again to claim the warlike weapons with which it was wont to be girt, and that now lie, as if awaiting their master's grasp, in unavailing display on the funereal pall. But a mightier than he has for ever wrenched them from his hold, and vain the sword, the helm, the spear, in that unequal conflict. The last contest is over, and "he is in peace."

"Brother, wrapp'd in quiet sleep,
Thou hast ceased to watch and weep;
Wipe the toil-drops from thy brow,
War and strife are over now;
Bow the head, and bend the knee,
For the crown of victory."

But suppose not pathos confined to the "bugle's wailing sound," and the sad subdued bursts of well-modulated military music—to the long files of slow-pacing troops with reversed arms, and the riderless steed, vainly caparisoned for the battle, that proclaim the obsequies of a chief. We are not ashamed to confess that the tear has been wrung from our eye by the plaintive notes of the few rude instruments that alone lament over the poor private's simple bier—the inharmonious fife, and the measured beats of the muffled drum; while the dull tramp of the appointed mourners following a comrade to his obscure resting-place falls chilly on the heart. Though even he, lowly in death as in life, shares with his leader in the brief wild honours of a soldier's grave—the sharp volleys of musketry pealing over his narrow home, a strange farewell to its passionless inhabitant, on whom the sanctity of the tomb has already passed; the unholy sound falls voiceless on his dull ear, fast closed until

"The last loud trumpet-notes on high
Peal through the echoing sky,
And cleave the quivering ground"—

breaking, with dreadful summons, "the eternal calm wherewith the grave is bound."

"Facilis descensus!" We cannot say that we admire the hurdy-gurdy, that synthesis of a grindstone and a Jew's-harp, yea, of all that is detestable, musically speaking, which must have owed its origin to a desire on the part of Jupiter Musicus, in a bad temper, to invent a suitable purgatory for expiating the sins of delinquent musicians; affording, on this supposition, an exquisite illustration of the perfect adaptation of means to an end—one well worthy the attention of all future writers on that subject. Independently of the nuisance of its inexpressibly harsh-jingling tones, (as, if you were being hissed by a quantity of rusty iron wire,) it always gives us the fidget to hear it for the sake of poor Abel, (surely its only admirer,) grinding away for dear life, to the extreme exacerbation of the bears growling beneath, under the combined irritation of no supper and his abominable tinkling. How they must have longed to gobble him up, were it only for the sake of popping an extinguisher on the "zit zan zounds" overhead! It was the reverse of the old tale, "no song no supper;" for they got the song, instead of a supper on the nice plump artist, which they would have liked much better. We wish he had stuck to his text, and persisted in his refusal to play; for then the fate that awaited him would but have been poetical justice for his utter and criminal want of taste—an adequate retribution on a wretch patronising an instrument whose demerits transcend every adjective that occurs to us at this present moment.

But as we cannot, even in the wildest freaks of our imagination, conceive of any one really liking the hurdy-gurdy—nay, we are prepared to demonstrate much affection absolutely impossible—we incline to think there must have been some corruption of this tradition in the course of its being handed down to us, so far at least as concerns the name of the instrument played at such a price; and on the antiquarian principle that consonants are changeable at pleasure, and vowels go for nothing, we take leave for hurdy-gurdy (what a vulgar sound it has!) to read flute, violin, lute, or, in short, any other presentable musical instrument that may chance to find the greatest favour in our eyes. A change which has the twofold merit of saving Abel's character for taste, and preserving so excellent a story from carrying a lie on the face of it; and for this service of ours, we desire alike the thanks of musicians and moralists, to whom we most respectfully present our improved version, as suitable for circulation by the most fastidious artist, or rigid precisian.

Mercy on us! What a rattling and clattering of doors and windows! The windows will certainly be blown in at last, for they strain and creak like a ship at sea; and how the wind roars and bellows in the chimney, as if Æolus and all his noisy crew were met on a tipsy revel! There—that last gust shook the house! It is to be hoped the chimneys stand with their feather-edge to it, or we shall have a stack or two about our ears in a trice. We wonder whether the cellars would be the safest place, or, indeed, whether there is a safe place about the house at all! We have often heard of the music of the wind, but never felt less disposed to admire it in our life—for the gale has been howling in our ears all day; and this last hour or two, there has been, as the sailors say, a fresh hand at the bellows; so that we are in no humour to sentimentalize on what is, within a few yards of us, curling the dark waves, that, since the day in which their fluctuation was first decreed, have swallowed up so much of what is goodly and beloved of this earth, and that now roar as if for their prey! of which may the great God that ruleth over the sea, as well as the dry land, disappoint their ravening jaws! We shrink and are half appalled at their clamour, while we are on the point of uttering a hasty vow never again to locate ourselves at the sea-side, though it were prescribed by fifty physicians; or, at all events, not so very near that dun mass of troubled waters, blending on the horizon in strange confusion with the lowering, tempestuous sky. Who could believe, as he views them in their milder mood, as we did yesterday—lying placid as a clear lake among the mountains, wherein the bright face of heaven is mirrored, reflecting each light cloud that floats in the deep azure, or the many-tinted hues of evening—that anon, lashed into foaming wrath, they should devour "rich fruit of earth, and human kind," the gold, and the gems, and the priceless treasures wrung from both hemispheres; and the young, the brave, the loved—the bright locks, and the manly beauty, and the hoary head; crushing their diverse hopes into one watery ruin, surging a wild tumultuous dirge over their one fathomless tomb! And then, sated with destruction, smile and glisten beneath the morning sunbeams with all the sportiveness of child-like innocence.

No, no—speak not to us of the "music of the wind." For to us, in our gloomy moods, it breathes but of desolation, sorrow, and suffering; while, as the blast rises higher, its sentimental mournfulness is mingled with painful thoughts, which press on our spirit, of the peril in which it places so many of our fellow-creatures; and, "God help the poor souls at sea!" rises earnestly in our heart, and even unconsciously passes the barrier of our lips, as we retire, utterly unsympathizing with the selfish enjoyment of those who delight to wrap up themselves, warm and cozy, in their curtained and downy repose, lulled to deeper slumber by the blustering cold in which others are shivering, or, haply, contending with the winds and waves so soon to overwhelm them. And in our more ordinary everyday humour—if it chance to rise above what in our humble opinion ought to be its maximum, a gentle refreshing breeze, just enough to waft sweet woodland sounds, or ripple the quiet stream—why, it discomposes and discomforts us, whistling, howling, and rattling among slates and chimney-tops, and making whirligigs of the dust, in the town; and in the country, soughing among the boughs, as though the trees had got some horrible secret which they were whispering to each other, while their long arms lash each other as if for a wager; the whole exciting in us a most uneasy and undefinable sensation, as though we had done something wrong, and were every minute expecting to be found out! A sensation which might fairly be deemed punishment sufficient for all the minor offences of this offensive world, and which we most decidedly object to having inflicted on us for nothing.

"The music of the wind!" Why, what can be more detestable than the wind whistling through a key-hole? or singing its shrill melancholy song among the straining cordage of the storm-threatened ship? Then, uninteresting accidents happen during squally weather: hats are blown off; coat-tails, and eke the flowing garments of the gentler sex, flap, as if waging war with their distressed wearers; grave dignified persons are compelled to scud along before the gale, shorn of all the impressiveness of their wonted solemn gait, holding, perchance, their shovel-hat firmly on with both hands; and finally, there is neither pathos nor glory in having your head broken by a chimney-pot, or volant weathercock. No, the wide sea is an emblem of all that is deceitful and false, smiling most blandly when preparing to devour you; and the wind is only one shade more respectable—nay, perchance the worse of the two; for the waters, in the self-justifying, neighbour-condemning spirit, apparently inherent in human nature—and for which Father Adam be thanked—may very possibly lay the blame of their fickleness upon it, and bring a host of witnesses into court to testify to their general good behaviour—their calmness, and amenity, and inoffensiveness, till exposed to the evil influence of Æolus's unruly troop—the most wholesale agitators going, and never so happy as when raising a riot.

N.B.—The whole tribe of zephyrs, gentle airs, and evening and morning breezes, will please to consider themselves as not included under the term wind; to which alone, in its common-place hectoring style, this tirade is meant to apply.

(We hate any thing important being popped within a parenthesis, but as the literary sin pinches us less than the immorality, we must here state what truth requires us to say—that the above, being written during a fit of the spleen, induced by the hubbub of winds and waters adverted to, must be received by the candid reader with considerable allowance.)

So much for the wind, which has blown music completely out of our head for a while. What a pity we did not bethink us of placing our Æolian harp in the window, before it had sunk into those short angry gusts which are now alone heard—the mere dregs of the gale; and so have drawn our inspiration from that which puffed it out! But, somehow or other, our bright thoughts generally present themselves too late to be of any use; and this is one in that predicament!

Some people profess to be never tired of music, but to enjoy it À l'outrance, at all times and in all places. With such, we must own, we have no sympathy. With all our love—not mere liking—for the art, we still hold that it is indebted for its charm to the categories of time and place, at least as much as its neighbours; for (but this confession should be made in the smallest, most modest-looking type in the world) there are both times and places when we hate it cordially, and fervently wish that neither harmony, nor its ancestor, melody, had ever been invented. In some such mood as made the very heavens themselves odious and pestilential to Hamlet, does music appear to us as unlike itself, as they really were to his crazed imagination of them; and we look forward with malicious pleasure to the time when, if Dryden is to be believed—but your poets are not always prophets—"music shall untune the sky," as a period when all the miseries it has inflicted on us shall be amply revenged by its perpetrating, or assisting at, this gigantic mischief. 'Tis then that your first-fiddle is but impertinent catgut—your fluent organ a vile box of whistles, fit representative of its Tube-al inventor—and the sweetest pipe ever resonant with the clear, music-breathing air of Italy, or bravely struggling against the damper atmosphere of our humid isle, sounds harsh and shrilly in our ears, instead of soothing our "savage breast," which seems to marshal all its powers the more emphatically to give the poet the lie. This—now that we are in the confessional—we are free to own—yea, it is incumbent on us to do ourselves this justice—is only when we are in one of our unamiable moods, luckily about as rare as snow at mid-summer, but correspondingly chilling and shocking to the genial ones around us,—ourselves usually most so, like quiet sunshine in November. We are, by nature, the meekest of individuals—a "falcon-hearted dove," or anything else, pretty and poetical, that might give the idea of our possessing a brave heart under a most gentle exterior; but when roused, then indeed are we a very dragon; or rather, to keep up our former simile, (which we think a taking one, though, alas! it is not our own,) and delineate, by one expressive phrase, a mouldering, rage kept in check; by the constitutional cowardice on which it is superinduced—then are we a pigeon-hearted hawk, wanting only the courage to be desperately cross! (An impertinent friend, who has been looking over our shoulder, suggests that ourselves, under the two above-named phrases, would be better adumbrated by the figure of a dish of skimmed milk, and that same milk curdled! A plague on friends, say we! the most impertinent impertinencies that fall to our lot in this cross-cornered world are sure to emanate from them.)

Another of our sins which—to make "a clean breast"—we must confess, is that of fickleness in our loves; an occasional flirting with other arts and sciences, in their turn—for we protest against the profligacy of making love to more than one at once! We string together fearful and unreadable lengths of iambics, and dactyles, and trochaics, and write sonnets to the bright queen of night, beginning "O thou!" and stick fast in the middle of sorely-laboured and at length baffling extempores to this, that, and t'other; and, wickeder still, then we din them into the ears of a wretched friend, who having once, in the extremity of his courtesy, unhappily proved himself a good listener, is, for his sins, fated to continue so to the end of the chapter—i.e., our interminable rhymes; til, tired of exchanging our bad prose for worse poetry, (and having the fear of his maledictions before our eyes,) we throw it aside in a pet. Then comes a change over our spirit; and we dabble in paint-pots, and flourish a palette, and are great on canvass, and in chalks, and there is a mingled perfume of oil and turpentine in our studio (whilome study) that is to us highly refreshing, and good against fainting; and we make tours in search of the picturesque, climbing over stone walls, and what not, to gain some hill-top whence we may see the sun set or the moon rise, haply getting soused in a peat-drain for our pains—and we pencil sketches from nature, really very like; and the blue mountains, the solemn sunsets, and purple shadows among the woods, or falling on the tawny sands, girdling the sea, whose blue-gray melts into the horizon, throw us into quick ecstasies of delight that almost paralyse the adventurous hand as it seeks, often vainly, to transfer the quick-changing loveliness to the enduring canvass. And then we fling away our pencils in despair, and worship, with all the devotion of which ignorance is the mother, (for we never handled the chisel,) the serene beauty of sculpture; most passionless, most intellectual art, breathing the repose of divinity, the grand inaction of the All-powerful; shadowing forth in this its perfection, sublime truth, with its faint, troubled, yet still sublime reflection, error;—the "without passions" of Divine revelation, and its perversion, its undue development, the unconsciousness, issuing in the final perfection of annihilation, of Braminical deity. So are the extremes of truth and error linked—the error depending for its existence on its antagonist truth. Painting is objective, sculpture subjective, throwing the mind more upon itself, to seek there the hidden forms of grace and beauty yet unmanifested by pencil or chisel. The one appeals more to the senses, the other to the imagination and the mind; exciting ideas rather than presenting them. Painting, sublimate it as you will, is still of the earth; albeit a purer one than this desolated habitation in which the sons of Adam mourn their exile—even the unviolated Eden; of which it is one of the fairest, tenderest emanations, reaching forward to the angelic, yet still a child of earth with mortality on its brow. Sculpture is of the gods, with its Titanic majesty, and calm, celestial grace.

But next succeeds one of our hard, stern, misanthropical fits, in which verjuice and aloes might be taken as the type of our condition, and we propound strange heresies concerning the affections, social and domestic; the leading one being that they are greater inlets to misery than happiness, and that mankind would have been less wretched had they grown up, like blades of grass, alone and separate; a cheerless doctrine, but one which misanthropical logic legitimately deduces from the more comprehensive one, that in this world evil is more potential than good—more active and influential in its own nature. And we bitterly call to mind all the treachery with which our trustfulness has been met—our leaning on that broken reed, friendship—the placing our whole hope and stay on some loved one who has failed us in our extremity;—we call up (and how they throng at that call!) these gloomy recollections, clad in all the terrors of the dark and indistinct past, to build ourselves up in our gloomy creed. And in our utter weariness of soul, the thought of an uninterrupted sentient existence is oppressive: and we passionately wish that the rest of the grave might not be vouchsafed to our body alone, but that our spirit also might sleep a deep, tranquil sleep, until the great day of awakening. 'Tis a dreary mood—like clouded moonlight on troubled, turbid waters! And we could roast Love with his own torch—and we see every thing through crape spectacles, and have no clarity for the softer, more refined emotions and contemplations; so we plunge our head and ears into a chaos of most musty, dusty metaphysics; and by the time we are nearly choked with them, and have reasoned ourselves, first, out of all intercourse with an external world, secondly, out of its existence, thirdly, out of our own, we are right glad to be brought back to our senses, and our old love, whom we embrace with all the ardour of reconciliation after a lover's quarrel, and willingly yield ourselves to the humanizing effect of music—grave or gay, as our mood may dictate, either perfect after its kind.

Reader, should you haply be of the extreme North, has it ever chanced to you to be present at our glorious English cathedral service? If not, congratulate yourself on this enjoyment in reserve for you; and when you next visit our end of the little island, pass not, we beseech you, those Gothic towers, massive and rich, or taper spires rising majestically above the cloistered arches, buttresses, and pinnacles, of these monuments of the piety, consummate skill, and humility of our ancestors; for no modern black board, with gilt letters, proclaims the name of their founders, who have sought a simple, perchance a nameless, tomb within the sacred walls they have reared. Pass within that lofty doorway; and the silence, the stillness, the vastness within, awe the heart! From the care and turmoil without, one step has placed us lonely as in a desert;—from the surges of life to the presence of the dead, who sleep around as if under the more immediate keeping of the Mighty One in His holy temple! And if, entering, a solitary memorial of the more clouded faith which they inherited from their fathers—the jewel, dimmed by its frail setting—should meet the eye, start not, with the pride of knowledge, from the meek petition, "Ora pro me," enscrolled beneath that mitred effigy, worn by the thoughtless feet of the generations passed away; but believe, and fear not to do so, that "it is accepted according to that a man hath," and that the sincere devotion of the heart, even when erroneously expressed, through involuntary ignorance, shall not be rejected by that just Being who seeks not to reap where He hath not sowed; but that it may come up as holy incense before Him, when our cold, unloving, orthodox prayers, backed by our heathenish lives, and meaner offerings on the altar of our God, shall return, blighted and blighting, into our own bosoms. Or should you be too petrified with pious horror at this—Popery, as with your longest, dismalest face, you will style it—to think with any charity of those who dwelt but in the twilight of your open day—the very verger, sleek, round, and smiling, as he stands by you in his sake-robes, shall, in his honest zeal, supply an antidote for the evil, moralizing on the vanity of such supplications, and winding up his simple homily with the significant—"Where the tree falleth, there it shall lie!" Think on that, rigid critic, and take heed how you fall!—nor, if you have the capacity for finding "good in every thing," will you disdain to learn the lesson of instruction, which your own heart had failed to supply, from so lowly a source.

But you still curl your sanctimonious lip, and shrug your pious shoulders, in intimation of your knowing vastly better than your poor, ignorant forefathers! Ah, well—then live better; that is all we have got to say to you!

Our very parish churches are now emulating the impressive ceremonial and exquisite musical service of the cathedral. Enter, then, with us one that has seemed, in some degree, to revive the glory of the olden time, when men, as they received, gave lavishly for the service of the altar; nor meted out their offerings with the niggard hand that is moved by the heart of this generation; unmoved, unwarmed, but boastful of its light—the light of a moonbeam playing on an iceberg! There is the long sweep of the nave, with the open chancel (not separated from the former by the richly carved and fretted screen, which, however beautiful in itself, mars the grand effect of the whole) leading to the altar—we are old-fashioned people, and fear not to offend by this old-fashioned term—whose sacred garniture glows beneath the many tints of the fine eastern window, with its monograms and emblems, and flowing-robed apostles, through which the mellowed summer sun shines obliquely, throwing strange, grotesque, many-coloured shadows on the walls and pavement; while on either side tall lancet-shaped windows, thickly covered with heraldic devices, bear modest record to the willing service of those whose munificence has reared the pile, and give increased light and richness to the scene. The great western window, also covered with armorial bearings, throws a dim, yet kindling, tint on the stone font aptly placed beneath it, as figurative of its character—initial to that further sacrament, meetly celebrated where the star of Him who first blessed it proclaimed His advent to the expectant world. While throughout the holy building, high-springing arch, and sombre aisle, and vaulted ceiling, and curiously-wrought oaken roof; all combine to impress the mind with awe and admiration, with thoughts of the past and hopes for the future.

But this is not all: these are but the glories of art, worthily employed, indeed, in the service of the temple; 'tis but the body without the life, the soul that animates it. Return at the decline of day, when "man, who goeth forth unto his labour even unto the evening," has received a respite from his ordained toil, and seeks to refresh and elevate his spirit, wearied and worn down with the low, inevitable cares of the day, with the mingled prayer and chant, "rising and falling as on angels' wings," that duly, at each appointed eve, swell through the consecrated structure, filling its concave with solemn melody. The last flush of evening has died in the west, and the scattered worshippers are indistinctly seen by the dim lights, which, bringing out into strong relief the parts immediately adjacent to the massive yet graceful pillars to which they are attached, throw the rest of the interior into deeper gloom, brought into sharp contrast with the illuminated portions, by intersecting arch, clustered shaft, and all the endless intricacies of Gothic architecture; exuberant with profusely decorated spandrils, sculptured bosses, light flying buttresses, and delicate fan-like tracery. How beautiful and hushed is all around! Now the stillness is broken by approaching footsteps, and the white-robed train of priests and choristers is seen advancing along the aisle, the organ uttering its impressive modulations to soothe the heart, and still its tumult of worldly care and feelings, that these may not, "like birds of evil wing," mar the sacrifice about to be offered on its unworthy altar. And then, amid the succeeding silence, fall on the ear—ay, on the very soul!—the words of Holy Writ, deprecating the wrath of an offended Creator, announcing pardon to the repentant, and cleansing from the pollution of guilt to the heart, vexed with the defilement of this evil world, and yearning after the purity of that higher existence for which, erst designed, the inherited frailty of its nature, and the threefold temptations that unweariedly beset it, have rendered it unfit and unworthy.

How clear, simple, yet most thrilling, is the enunciation of those words! and mark the superb harmony with which, proceeding in the sacred service, the single plaintively modulated voice of the officiating minister is answered by the choral supplications of the assembled worshippers—swelling out in joyous exulting tones, and dying away in sorrowful minor cadence, as though the shadow of sin and suffering fell on those pathways to the highest heaven, clouding the radiance unmeet for mortal eye! And if rude tremulous notes, from some of the lowly ones who, still habited in their garb of daily toil, kneel by our side—for, in that house, distinctions are there none—mingle with the harmony, they mingle not harshly, for there is melody in the heart, and it is the voice of a brother; not the less "bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh," that the blessings of this life have been more sparingly bestowed on him—perchance to crown him more abundantly with glory and honour in that which is to come. Succeeding each other, the antiphonal chant—venerable with the port of near eighteen centuries; yea, with the hoar of Jewish, as well as Christian antiquity—the exuberant anthem with its ponderous chorus, and again, the joyous, melancholy, choral response, wherein blend the voices of childish innocence, strong manhood, and plaintive age, hear us on to the close;—that threefold blessing which none may hear unmoved, and whose magnitude seems to transcend our poor belief, as we reverently bow, in awed silence, musing on its unfathomable import; while the deep, mellow voice that pronounced it still lingers on the ear.

How imposing is the sight! One kneeling throng around—the indistinct light, that clothes with mysterious grace the beautiful lineaments of the Gothic structure—the bright gleam on the white and flowing vestments;—and the stillness! broken at length by a low, sad melody, in accordance with the subdued tone resting on all, gradually rising into the more swelling chords of the solemn organ, that, earthly strains though they be, seen not unmeet to mingle with those exalted ones that have gone before—rousing the heart from its more celestial contemplations, and by gentle transition—like a descending dove—bringing it down from its heavenward flight to that earth with which its present daily and active duties are concerned, the more fitly and cheerfully performed when thus hallowed; for, be it remembered, the preparation for that unseen world to which we are tending, is the best preparation for our continuance in this.

But the last wave of harmony has died away in the sounding aisles; one by one the lights are extinguished, throwing the varied beauty of arch, and niche, and pillar, into indistinguishable and fast deepening shade; and, last of the train, we, with heart tranquillized and elevated by the service of that evening hour, slowly follow the departing worshippers into the still, clear night.

M. J.