Wordsworth.
We give ourselves up to the artificial habits and objects of ambition, till we endanger the higher and better feelings and capacities of our being; and it is alone to the united influence of religion, literature, and nature, that we must look for the preservation of our moral nobility. Whenever, therefore, I behold one of our old fieldpaths closed, I regard it as another link in the chain which Mammon is winding around us,—another avenue cut off by which we might fly to the lofty sanctuary of nature for power to withstand him.
H.
Bells and Bell Ringing at Bury St. Edmund’s.
To the Editor of the Every-Day Book.
Lambeth, July 13, 1826.
My dear Sir,—To your late interesting [notices] of “Bells” and “Bell-ringing,” the following singular letter, which appears in a Suffolk paper, may be added. I happen to know something of this “jangling;” and when I resided in the town of Bury St. Edmund’s some years back, was compelled to listen to “the most hideous noise” of St. James’s lofty opponents. But “who shall decide when doctors disagree?”—Why, Mr. Editor,—we will. It is a hardship, a cruelty, a usurpation, a “tale of woe.” Listen to St. James’s statement, and then let us raise our bells, and ring a “righte sounde and merie” peal, such as will almost “split the ears of the groundlings.”—
“To the Editor of the Bury Post.
“Sir,—Since we have been repeatedly asked why St. James’s ringers lost the privilege of ringing in St. Mary’s steeple, as far as it lies in our power we will answer it. Ever since the year 1714, up to the period of 1813, the ringing in this town was conducted by one company only, who had the liberty of ringing at both steeples; and in St. Mary’s steeple there are recorded two peals rung by the Bury company, one of which was rung in 1779, and the other in 1799. In 1813, the bells of St. Mary’s wanting some repairs, the ringers applied to the churchwardens, and they having declined doing any thing to them, the ringers ceased from ringing altogether until the bells were repaired. At length an offer was made to the churchwardens to raise a young company, which offer was accepted by them, and the bells were partially repaired. In consequence of which a company was raised, and a part of it consisted of old men who were incapable of learning to ring; youth being the only time when such an art can be acquired. It was agreed that when this company could ring one course of eight (or 112 changes), that each one should receive one pound, which they have never asked for, well knowing they were never entitled to it; at the same time, it appears evident that the parish consented they should learn to ring. In 1817, only two years and a half after the company was raised, three bells were obliged to be rehung, at nearly twenty pounds’ expense. Taking an account of the annual repairs of the bells, and the repairs in 1814, the three years of sixteen-change ringers cost the parish nearly thirty pounds, which would have rehung the whole peal, being a deal more than what the old ringers would have caused them to be repaired for in 1814. We, the present company of St. James’s ringers, are well aware that St. Mary’s company had the offer to learn to ring in September, 1814, which we made no opposition to; and if St. Mary’s had learnt, we would have gladly taken them by the hand as brother ringers; but after twelve years’ arduous struggle in endeavouring to learn to ring, they are no forwarder than the first week they began. They could only then ring (no more than they can now) sixteen changes, and that very imperfectly, being but a very small part of the whole revolution of changes on eight bells, which consist of 40,320. We, St. James’s ringers, or ‘old ringers,’ as we have been commonly called, often get blamed for the most hideous noise made in St. Mary’s steeple; and after the jangling of the bells, miscalled ringing, which they afforded the other evening, we indulge in the hope that our future use of the steeple will be generally allowed.