down, to find the Irish gentleman, with
his face restored to its usual good humour, standing by our friend,
and holding her Prayer Book as well as his own. The young lady did not
speak, but, cheerfully remarking that we had plenty of time before us,
he took our books also, and we all set forth.

"I remember that walk so well, Ida! The hot, sweet summer
afternoon--the dusty plants by the pathway--the clematis in the hedges
(I put a bit into my Prayer Book, which was there for years)--the
grasshoppers and flies that our dresses caught up from the long grass,
and which reappeared as we sat during the sermon.

"The old gentleman was in his pew, but his glance was almost
benevolent, as, in good time, we took our places. We (literally)
_followed_ his example with much heartiness in the responses; and, if
he looked over into our pew during prayers (and from his position he
could hardly avoid it), he must have seen that even the Irishman had
rejected compromises, and that we all knelt together.

"There was one other feature of that service not to be forgotten. When
the sermon was ended, and I had lost sight of the last grasshopper in
my hasty rising, we found that there was to be a hymn. It was the old
custom of this church so to conclude Evening Prayer. No one seemed to
use a book--it was Bishop Ken's evening hymn, which everyone knew,
and, I think, everyone sang. But the feature of it to us was when the
Irishman began to sing. From her startled glance, I think not even the
red-haired young lady had known that he possessed so beautiful a
voice. It had a clearness without effort, a tone, a truth, a pathos,
such as I have not often heard. It sounded strangely above the nasal
tones of the school-children, and the scraping of a solitary fiddle.
Even our neighbour, who had lustily followed the rhythm of the tune,
though without much varying from the note on which he responded,
softened his own sounds and turned to look at the Irishman, who sang
on without noticing it, till, in the last verse, he seemed disturbed
to discover how many eyes were on him. Happily, self-consciousness had
come too late. The hymn was ended.

"We knelt again for the Benediction, and then went back through the
summer fields.

"The red-haired young lady talked very little. Once she said:

"'How is it we have never heard you sing?'

"To which the Irishman replied:

"'I don't understand music, I sing by ear; and I hate 'company'
performances. I will s