All people that on earth do dwell,
Sing to the Lord with cheerful voice,
arises from the congregation in all its simple exultant majesty, forcing, as it were, every voice to break forth into singing unless it be choked by heart-swelling.
The last note has died away, but there is a sweet hush, as though lingering still, ere breaking the sense that this is none other than the gate of heaven.
Rattle and rumble, the vehicles are coming! The children rise, and somewhere begins the indispensable cheer. The gentlemen take the lead. ‘Three times three for Mr. Fulmort!’ ‘Three cheers for Sir John Raymond!’ ‘Three for the Forest show!’ Shouting and waving of hats will never cease, the gentlemen are as crazy as the boys, and what will become of the train?
Tumble them in—hoist up the girls while mankind is still vociferous. What’s all this, coming in at the omnibus windows? Stand back, child, you don’t want to be set down in London! Your nosegay, is it? Here are the prize nosegays, prize potatoes, prize currants, prize everything showering in on the Londoners to display or feast on at home. Many a family will have a first taste of fresh country green meat to-morrow, of such freshness, that is, as it may retain after eight hours of show and five of train. But all is compared! How the little girls hug their flowers. If any nosegays reach London alive, they will be cherished to their last hour, and maybe the leaves will live in prayer-books for many a year.
Poor little things! It has been to them apparently a rather weary and oppressive pleasure, too strange for the most part to be thoroughly enjoyed; but it will live in their memories for many a day, and as time goes on, will clear itself from the bewilderment, till it become one of the precious days that make gems on the thread of life.
Mervyn! Where has he been all this time? True, he once said he would see nothing of it, and seems to have kept his word. He did not even acknowledge the cheers for Mr. Fulmort.
Is not something visible behind the broad smooth bole of yonder beech tree? Have Mervyn and Cecily been there all the time of the evening service?
It is a remarkable fact, that though nobody has told anybody, every person who is curious, and many who are not, know who is to be Mrs. Fulmort of Beauchamp.