“What’s the matter, Deacon?”
“I can’t read it,” replied the Deacon in a dolorous and despairing tone.
“Then spell it,” exclaimed a voice from the gallery.
All eyes were turned that way, and it was found to proceed from Tim Crackbrain, a fellow known for his odd and whimsical habits, and respecting whom nobody could ever satisfy himself whether he was knave, fool, or madman. The Deacon was astounded, the congregation gaped and stared, but there was no more singing that day. The profane behaviour of Tim caused great scandal, and he was severely taken in hand by a regular kirk session.
This, however, was not the whole, for it was plainly to be perceived that the old system had received a severe blow in this occurrence, as no one could deny that such an awkward affair could never have happened in the improved method of psalmody. The affair was seized by the advocates of improvement, and turned against their opponents. Deacon Dogskin and his old psalm-book got into decidedly bad odour; the result could no longer be doubtful; a parish meeting was held, and a resolution passed to abolish the old system, and establish a singing school. In such a manner departed this life, that venerable relic of ecclesiastical antiquity, read-a-line-and-sing-a-line, and we despatched our old acquaintance to the tomb of oblivion, unwept, unhonoured, but not unsung.
This event, like all great revolutions, did not fail to give sad umbrage to many in the church; and as to Deacon Dogskin, who had fought as the great champion of the primitive system, he took it in such dudgeon that he fell into a fit of the sullens, which resulted in a determination to leave a community where his opinion and authority had been so flagrantly set at nought. Within two years, therefore, he sold off his farm, settled all his concerns both temporal and spiritual in the town, and removed to a village about fifteen miles distant. His ostensible motive for the removal was his declining age, which he declared to be unequal to the cultivation of so large a farm as he possessed in our neighbourhood; but the true reason was guessed at by every one, as the Deacon could never speak of the singing-school without evident marks of chagrin.
Be this as it may, we proceeded to organise the singing-school forthwith, for it was determined to do things in style. First of all, it was necessary to find a singing-master who was competent to instruct us theoretically in the principles of the art, and put us to the full discipline of our powers. No one, of course, thought of going out of the town for this, and our directors shortly pitched upon a personage known to every body by the name of Hopper Paul. This man knew more tunes than any person within twenty miles, and, for aught we knew, more than any other man in the world. He could sing Old Hundred, and Little Marlborough, and Saint Andrews, and Bray, and Mear, and Tanzar, and Quercy, and at least half a dozen others whose names I have forgotten, so that he was looked upon as a musical prodigy.
I shall never forget Hopper Paul, for both the sounds and sights he exhibited were such as could hardly be called earthly. He was about six feet and a half high, exceedingly lank and long, with a countenance which at the first sight would suggest to you the idea that he had suffered a face-quake, for the different parts of his visage appeared to have been shaken out of their places and never to have settled properly together. His mouth was capable of such a degree of dilation and collapse and twisting, that it looked like a half a dozen pair of lips sewed into one. The voice to which this comely pair of jaws gave utterance might have been compared to the lowing of a cow, or the deepest bass of an overgrown bull-frog, but hardly to any sound made by human organs.
Hopper Paul, possessing all these accomplishments, was therefore chosen head singer, and teacher of the school, which was immediately set on foot. This was a great affair in the eyes of all the young persons of both sexes, the thing being the first of that sort which had ever been heard of in our parts; for though the natives of the town were a psalm-singing race, like all genuine New Englanders, yet they had hitherto learned to sing much in the same way as they learned to talk, not by theory, but in the plainest way of practice, each individual joining in with the strains that were chanted at meeting according to the best of his judgment. In this method, as the reader may suppose, they made but a blundering sort of melody, yet as the tunes were few, and each note drawled out to an unconscionable length, all were more or less familiar with their parts, or if they got into the wrong key, had time to change it ere the line was ended. But things were now to be set on a different footing; great deeds were to be done, and each one was anxious to make a figure in the grand choir. All the young people of the parish were assembled, and we began operations.
How we got through our first essays, I need not say, except that we made awkward work enough of it. There were a great many voices that seemed made for nothing but to spoil all our melody: but what could we do? All were determined to learn to sing, and Hopper Paul was of opinion that the bad voices would grow mellow by practice, though how he could think so whenever he heard his own, passes my comprehension. However, we could all raise and fall the notes, and that was something. We met two evenings in each week during the winter, and by the beginning of spring we had got so well drilled in the gamut that we began to practise regular tunes. Now we breathed forth such melodies as I think have seldom been heard elsewhere; but as we had no standard of excellence to show us the true character of our performances, we could never be aware that our music was not equal to the harmony of the spheres.