"That'll not do. We must have it altogether different. You two lads are singing like bumblebees in a pitcher--border there, boys!--it's no laughing matter--put down those papers and keep your eyes on me--inflate the chest--" (his own seemed to fill the field of vision) "and try and give forth those noble words as if you'd an idea what they meant."
No satire was intended or taken here, but the two boys, who were practicing their duet in an anthem, laid down the music, and turned their eyes on their teacher.
"I'll run through the recitative," he added, "and take your time from the stick. And mind that OH."
The parson's daughter struck a chord, and then the burly choirmaster spoke with the voice of melody:
"My heart is disquieted within me. My heart--my heart is disquieted within me. And the fear of death is fallen--is fallen upon me."
The terrier moaned without, and Jack thought no boy's voice could be worth listening to after that of the choirmaster. But he was wrong. A few more notes from the organ, and then, as night-stillness in a wood is broken by the nightingale, so upon the silence of the church a boy-alto's voice broke forth in obedience to the choirmaster's uplifted hand:
"Then, I said--I said----"
Jack gasped, but even as he strained his eyes to see what such a singer could look like, with higher, clearer notes the soprano rose above him --"Then I sa--a--id," and the duet began:
"Oh that I had wings--O that I had wings like a dove!"
Soprano.--"Then would I flee away." Alto.--"Then would I flee away." Together.--"And be at rest--flee away and be at rest."