THE COUNTRY SUNDAY. 51 



glove was stirring, the delicious atmosphere of summer, 

 sun-laden and scented, filled the deep valleys ; a morning 

 of the richest beauty and deepest repose. All things 

 reposed but man, and man is so busy with his vulgar 

 aims that it quite dawns upon many people as a won- 

 derful surprise how still nature is on a Sunday morning. 

 Nature is absolutely still every day of the week, and 

 proceeds with the most absolute indifference to days 

 and dates. 



The sharp metallic clangour of a bell went bang, 

 bang, bang, from one roof ; not far distant a harsher and 

 deeper note — some Tartar-like bell of universal uproar 

 — hammered away. At intervals came the distant 

 chimes of three distinct village churches — ding dong, 

 dong ding, pan go, frango, jango — very much jango— 

 bang, clatter, clash — a humming vibration and dreadful 

 stir. The country world was up in arms, I was about 

 to say — I mean in chimney-pot hat and pomade, en route 

 to its various creeds, some to one bell, some to another, 

 some to ding dong, and some to dong ding ; but the 

 most of them directed their steps towards a silent chapel. 

 This great building, plain beyond plainness, stood beside 

 a fir copse, from which in the summer morning there 

 floated an exquisite fragrance of pine. If all the angles 

 of the architects could have been put together, nothing 

 could have been designed more utterly opposite to the 

 graceful curve of the fir tree than this red-bricked crass 

 building. Bethel Chapel combined everything that could 

 be imagined contrary to the spirit of nature, which 

 undulates. The largest erection of the kind, it was 

 evidently meant for a large congregation. 



Of all the people in this country there are none so 

 devout as the cottagers in the lanes and hamlets. They 

 are as uncompromising as the sectaries who smashed the 



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