LATE HOURS. 415 



either side sang with more truth or judgment than their fellow- 

 choristers. 



" Such/' said my friend, as the congregation began to disperse, " is 

 the character of the church music of the metropolis, and I wished to 

 see how it would strike a stranger. I might have taken you to St. 

 Paul's, or one or two other churches, where the music would have 

 gratified you, or perhaps among some of the dissenting congregations 

 you might have been better pleased, for the nonconformists are too 

 well aware of the effect of music not to avail themselves of its at- 

 tractions." 



Is it not surprising that the music of the established church of 

 England should be in this degraded and neglected state ? I am well 

 aware that it is inconsistent with the nature of the service as estab- 

 lished by law to occupy much time in music ; but why should not 

 what music is allowed be good of its kind ? There would be nothing 

 heterodox in this, for at the Chapel Royal, where the King and 

 Queen attend divine service, first-rate professors are employed, who 

 give to music all the benefit and interest obtained from careful culti- 

 vation, corrected taste, and laborious study. 



C. A. 





LATE HOURS. 







; 

 " Whether have I spirit to shake off an intolerable yoke." 



HUMPHREY CLINKER. 



THERE was no contending against it. A fixed displeasure was 

 seated on her countenance, while at intervals she bent her brows 

 firmly, still keeping her eyes riveted on the fire ; a slight convulsion 

 of the upper lip plainly showed she was labouring under the in- 

 fluence of some deep mental misery. This is an odd reception, 

 thought I, after frequent attempts to draw my aunt Ursula into con- 

 versation ; my uncle had been snoring on the other side of the fire- 

 place for an hour. 



It was my first visit. My uncle Benjamin and aunt Ursula were 

 brother and sister, and had lived together on a comfortable scale of 

 independence some thirty years. ' My uncle becoming childless and 

 a widower early in life, had retired from business and taken up his 

 abode with his sister " for better for worse/' My aunt Ursula had 

 never married, she might have done so, she had refused the best 

 offers, and broken the hearts of many, she was the belle of every 

 ball-room, she might have kept her carriage. All these facts I have 

 gathered from her own lips. 



A long absence from England had made me ignorant of my uncle 

 and aunt's way of living ; I had only returned from India on the day 

 before my visit; and as they were my nearest relations, by full three 

 hundred miles, I repaired at once to their neat habitation at Hen- 

 don big with expectation of the delight they would feel at my re- 



