It is written, but perhaps it is not true, that in old times - not very
old times - the parish clergyman had a legal right, by which every person
in the parish was compelled to appear once on a Sunday in the church.
Those who did not come were fined a shilling.
Now look at the Shillings this Sunday morning flowing of their own
freewill along the crooked lanes, and over the stiles, and through the
hops, and down the hill to the chapel which can offer no bribe and can
impose no fine.
Old women - wonder 'tis how they live on nothing a day - still manage to
keep a decent black dress and come to chapel with a penny in their
pockets in spite of their age and infirmities. The nearest innkeeper,
himself a most godly man, has work enough to do to receive the horses and
traps and pony-carriages and stow them away before service begins, when
he will stride from the stable to the pew. Then begins the hollow and
flute-like modulation of a pitch-pipe within the great building. One of
the members of the congregation who is a musician is setting the ears of
the people to the tune of the hymn that is about to be given forth. The
verse is read, and then rises the full swell of hundreds of voices; and
while they sing let us think what a strange thing the old pitch-pipe - no
organ, no harmonium - what a strange thing the whole scene is, with its
Cromwellian air in the midst of the modern fields.
This is a picture, and not a disputation: as to what they teach or preach
inside Bethel, it is nothing to me; this paper has not the slightest
theological bias.
You may tell when the service is nearly over by the stray boys who steal
out and round the walls to throw stones at the sparrows in the roads;
they need a little relaxation; nature gets even into Bethel. By-and-by
out come some bigger lads and tie two long hop-poles together with which
to poke down the swallows' nests under the chapel eaves. The Book inside,
of which they almost make an idol, seemed to think the life of a
sparrow - and possibly of a swallow - was of value; still it is good fun to
see the callow young come down flop on the hard ground.
When the church doors are thrown open by the noiseless vergers, and
patchouli and macassar, and the overpowering, rich smell of silks and
satins rushes out in a volume of heated air, in a few minutes the whole
place is vacant.
