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MY FIRST SUNDAY AT MARSHMALLOWS.
These events fell on the Saturday night. On the Sunday morning, I
read prayers and preached. Never before had I enjoyed so much the
petitions of the Church, which Hooker calls "the sending of angels
upward," or the reading of the lessons, which he calls "the
receiving of angels descended from above." And whether from the
newness of the parson, or the love of the service, certainly a
congregation more intent, or more responsive, a clergyman will
hardly find. But, as I had feared, it was different in the
afternoon. The people had dined, and the usual somnolence had
followed; nor could I find in my heart to blame men and women who
worked hard all the week, for being drowsy on the day of rest. So I
curtailed my sermon as much as I could, omitting page after page of
my manuscript; and when I came to a close, was rewarded by
perceiving an agreeable surprise upon many of the faces round me. I
resolved that, in the afternoons at least, my sermons should be as
short as heart could wish.
But that afternoon there was at least one man of the congregation
who was neither drowsy nor inattentive. Repeatedly my eyes left the
page off which I was reading and glanced towards him. Not once did I
find his eyes turned away from me.
There was a small loft in the west end of the church, in which stood
a little organ, whose voice, weakened by years of praising, and
possibly of neglect, had yet, among a good many tones that were
rough, wooden, and reedy, a few remaining that were as mellow as
ever praiseful heart could wish to praise withal. And these came in
amongst the rest like trusting thoughts amidst "eating cares;" like
the faces of children borne in the arms of a crowd of anxious
mothers; like hopes that are young prophecies amidst the downward
sweep of events. For, though I do not understand music, I have a
keen ear for the perfection of the single tone, or the completeness
of the harmony. But of this organ more by and by.
Now this little gallery was something larger than was just necessary
for the organ and its ministrants, and a few of the parishioners had
chosen to sit in its fore-front. Upon this occasion there was no one
there but the man to whom I have referred.
The space below this gallery was not included in the part of the
church used for the service. It was claimed by the gardener of the
place, that is the sexton, to hold his gardening tools. There were a
few ancient carvings in wood lying in it, very brown in the dusky
light that came through a small lancet window, opening, not to the
outside, but into the tower, itself dusky with an enduring twilight.
And there were some broken old headstones, and the kindly spade and
pickaxe--but I have really nothing to do with these now, for I am,
as it were, in the pulpit, whence one ought to look beyond such
things as these.
Rising against the screen which separated this mouldy portion of the
church from the rest, stood an old monument of carved wood, once
brilliantly painted in the portions that bore the arms of the family
over whose vault it stood, but now all bare and worn, itself gently
flowing away into the dust it commemorated. It lifted its gablet,
carved to look like a canopy, till its apex was on a level with the
book-board on the front of the organ-loft; and over--in fact upon
this apex appeared the face of the man whom I have mentioned. It was
a very remarkable countenance--pale, and very thin, without any
hair, except that of thick eyebrows that far over-hung keen,
questioning eyes. Short bushy hair, gray, not white, covered a well
formed head with a high narrow forehead. As I have said, those keen
eyes kept looking at me from under their gray eyebrows all the time
of the sermon--intelligently without doubt, but whether
sympathetically or otherwise I could not determine. And indeed I
hardly know yet. My vestry door opened upon a little group of
graves, simple and green, without headstone or slab; poor graves,
the memory of whose occupants no one had cared to preserve. Good men
must have preceded me here, else the poor would not have lain so
near the chancel and the vestry-door. All about and beyond were
stones, with here and there a monument; for mine was a large parish,
and there were old and rich families in it, more of which buried
their dead here than assembled their living. But close by the
vestry-door, there was this little billowy lake of grass. And at
the end of the narrow path leading from the door, was the churchyard
wall, with a few steps on each side of it, that the parson might
pass at once from the churchyard into his own shrubbery, here
tangled, almost matted, from luxuriance of growth. But I would not
creep out the back way from among my people. That way might do very
well to come in by; but to go out, I would use the door of the
people. So I went along the church, a fine old place, such as I had
never hoped to be presented to, and went out by the door in the
north side into the middle of the churchyard. The door on the other
side was chiefly used by the few gentry of the neighbourhood; and
the Lych-gate, with its covered way, (for the main road had once
passed on that side,) was shared between the coffins and the
carriages, the dead who had no rank but one, that of the dead, and
the living who had more money than their neighbours. For, let the
old gentry disclaim it as they may, mere wealth, derived from
whatever source, will sooner reach their level than poor antiquity,
or the rarest refinement of personal worth; although, to be sure,
the oldest of them will sooner give to the rich their sons or their
daughters to wed, to love if they can, to have children by, than
they will yield a jot of their ancestral preeminence, or acknowledge
any equality in their sons or daughters-in-law. The carpenter's son
is to them an old myth, not an everlasting fact. To Mammon alone
will they yield a little of their rank--none of it to Christ. Let me
glorify God that Jesus took not on. Him the nature of nobles, but
the seed of Adam; for what could I do without my poor brothers and
sisters?
I passed along the church to the northern door, and went out. The
churchyard lay in bright sunshine. All the rain and gloom were gone.
"If one could only bring this glory of sun and grass into one's hope
for the future!" thought I; and looking down I saw the little boy
who aspired to paint the sky, looking up in my face with mingled
confidence and awe.
"Do you trust me, my little man?" thought I. "You shall trust me
then. But I won't be a priest to you, I'll be a big brother."
For the priesthood passes away, the brotherhood endures. The
priesthood passes away, swallowed up in the brotherhood. It is
because men cannot learn simple things, cannot believe in the
brotherhood, that they need a priesthood. But as Dr Arnold said of
the Sunday, "They DO need it." And I, for one, am sure that the
priesthood needs the people much more than the people needs the
priesthood.
So I stooped and lifted the child and held him in my arms. And the
little fellow looked at me one moment longer, and then put his arms
gently round my neck. And so we were friends. When I had set him
down, which I did presently, for I shuddered at the idea of the
people thinking that I was showing off the CLERGYMAN, I looked at
the boy. In his face was great sweetness mingled with great
rusticity, and I could not tell whether he was the child of
gentlefolk or of peasants. He did not say a word, but walked away to
join his aunt, who was waiting for him at the gate of the
churchyard. He kept his head turned towards me, however, as he went,
so that, not seeing where he was going, he stumbled over the grave
of a child, and fell in the hollow on the other side. I ran to pick
him up. His aunt reached him at the same moment.
"Oh, thank you, sir!" she said, as I gave him to her, with an
earnestness which seemed to me disproportionate to the deed, and
carried him away with a deep blush over all her countenance.
At the churchyard-gate, the old man-of-war's man was waiting to have
another look at me. His hat was in his hand, and he gave a pull to
the short hair over his forehead, as if he would gladly take that
off too, to show his respect for the new parson. I held out my hand
gratefully. It could not close around the hard, unyielding mass of
fingers which met it. He did not know how to shake hands, and left
it all to me. But pleasure sparkled in his eyes.
"My old woman would like to shake hands with you, sir," he said.
Beside him stood his old woman, in a portentous bonnet, beneath
whose gay yellow ribbons appeared a dusky old face, wrinkled like a
ship's timbers, out of which looked a pair of keen black eyes, where
the best beauty, that of loving-kindness, had not merely lingered,
but triumphed.
"I shall be in to see you soon," I said, as I shook hands with her.
"I shall find out where you live."
"Down by the mill," she said; "close by it, sir. There's one bed in
our garden that always thrives, in the hottest summer, by the plash
from the mill, sir."
"Ask for Old Rogers, sir," said the man. "Everybody knows Old
Rogers. But if your reverence minds what my wife says, you won't go
wrong. When you find the river, it takes you to the mill; and when
you find the mill, you find the wheel; and when you find the wheel,
you haven't far to look for the cottage, sir. It's a poor place, but
you'll be welcome, sir."
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