32 LLANDDWYN 



voices began to quaver out almost like the bleating 

 of sheep, increasing in number and force as at one 

 point or another new suppliants broke out in spon- 

 taneous and simultaneous prayer. Some were shrill 

 voices of women, others the deeper voices of men. 

 Some, hurried on by emotion which outstripped their 

 powers of extemporary speech, repeated endlessly 

 the same words, the same cry ; others, of readier 

 speech, were quickened to freer utterance by their 

 fervour. One man, apparently beside himself, 

 bellowed inarticulately in stentorian tones. Uproar, 

 confusion reigned. One woman wailed unceasingly, 

 her piercing cries ringing round the old courtyard, 

 and the rhythmic clapping of her hands declaring 

 that she had passed into a limbo of hysteria. Women 

 fainted and were carried away ; men collapsed, spent 

 and exhausted, in the arms of comrades who sup- 

 ported them. Any unusual outburst of emotion was 

 greeted by the leaders of the mission with a loud 

 laugh, the intention of which was doubtless to offer 

 encouragement, but the mode of expressing it jarred 

 upon one, as well-meant but coarsely extended sym- 

 pathy will jar. The scene sickened and disgusted 

 me ; and this stimulation of excitement, which had at 

 times something bestial in its fury and self-abandon- 

 ment, seemed equally brutal, and, in persons them- 

 selves almost unmoved, culpable. 



I must add, however, that when the confusion 

 arising from simultaneous prayer and discordant 

 cries threatened to carry the meeting beyond control, 

 the director would override those who were declaiming 

 by causing a hymn to be sung, himself giving an 

 address, or by "testing" the meeting, this last 



