hich appeared to have reference to the
union between Church and State, inasmuch as they were
compounded of the Evening Hymn and 'God Save the King.'

Whatever music he had in him must have been of a sub-conscious
nature, for shortly afterwards he affirms that

the still small voice is a-singing comic songs within
me, and all is happiness and joy.

His sister Sally is not a songster, nor is Quilp, though he
quotes 'Sally in our Alley' in reference to the former. All
we know about his musical attainments is that he

occasionally entertained himself with a melodious
howl, intended for a song but bearing not the faintest
resemblance to any scrap of any piece of music, vocal
or instrumental, ever invented by man.

Bass singers, and especially the Basso Profundos, will be glad
to know that Dickens pays more attention to them than to the
other voices, though it must be acknowledged that the references
are of a humorous nature. 'Bass!' as the young gentleman in one
of the _Sketches_ remarks to his companion about the little
man in the chair, 'bass! I believe you. He can go down lower
than any man; so low sometimes that you can't hear him.'

And so he does. To hear him growling away, gradually
lower and lower down, till he can't get back again,
is the most delightful thing in the world.

Of similar calibre is the voice of Captain Helves, already
referred to on p. 62.

Topper, who had his eye on one of Scrooge's niece's sisters
(_C.C._),

could growl away in the bass like a good one, and
never swell the large veins in his forehead or get
red in the face over it.

Dickens must certainly have had much experience of basses, as he
seems to know their habits and eccentricities so thoroughly. In
fact it seems to suggest that at some unknown period of his
career, hitherto unchronicled by his biographers, he must have
been a choirmaster.

He also shows a knowledge of the style of song the basses
delighted in

at the harmony meetings in which the collegians at the
Marshalsea[18] used to indulge. Occasionally a vocal
strain more sonorous than the generality informed the
listener that some boastful bass was in blue water
or the hunting field, or with the reindeer, or on the
mountain, or among the heather, but the Marshal of the
Marshalsea knew better, and had got him hard and fast.

We are not told what the duet was that Dickens heard at