So the play ended, and the interrupted service went on.
Simple as it was, the little scene no doubt persuaded the congregation that S. Nicholas was a great and powerful personage, and the impression it made upon them was one they were not likely to forget, because of the strange and interesting manner in which the lesson was taught.
This is the first play we know anything about, but we may guess that others more or less like it, began to be very popular, for we find from old books—books written hundreds of years ago, that twice a year at least, at Christmas and at Easter, the people were taught by means of acting, two of the greatest events in the life of Christ.
Let us try to imagine a Christmas Eve in Westminster Abbey, long ago, when Henry III was king. The Abbey was not nearly so large then as it is to-day, for much of it has been built since. Yet the central part was finished, and six hundred years ago people looked up at some of the same soaring arches, and leant against some of the same pillars as those we now see in the beautiful church.
The Abbey bells had been ringing for a long time, calling the Londoners from their homes, and from the crooked narrow lanes of the city, through the gates in the walls which then surrounded Westminster, there had come flocking to the church a great crowd of gentle and simple folk. There were merchants and shopkeepers, wearing hoods like jelly-bags with their long points dangling at the back; ladies with strange fantastic head-dresses; poor women and children muffled in cloaks; soldiers, nobles, and monks of various orders. Some of them stood thronging the aisles, others knelt on stools, or beside wooden benches.
The church was dark and mysterious. Only on the altars, candles blazed like golden stars, and above them the arches rose stretching up into the gloom overhead. The air was full of a sweet heavy scent—the scent of incense.
Near the altar, surrounded by gleaming lights, the people could see a rough cradle shaped like a manger, and beside it, dressed in long robes, an image of the Virgin Mary.
Then from the side-doors leading to the space about the altar, there entered, in twos and threes, men dressed as shepherds, holding crooks, and driving before them real sheep. They were followed by dogs, who kept the flock together, running round them, and ordering them in the wonderful way of sheep-dogs. Some of the shepherds lay down as though to sleep. Others watched their flock, wide awake and talking amongst themselves.
Suddenly, while interested and curious the congregation looked on, a blast of trumpets rang out, and before the startling sound had died away, echoing through the aisles and the arches, an angel in a robe of rose colour, with big white wings, appeared in the pulpit. Very sweet and clear his voice sounded as he announced tidings of great joy. Christ was born in Bethlehem.
Then, somewhere from the darkness above, there followed, in a burst of song, the voices of the angels.