standing. As soon as the light shone from the window, the
carol was resumed, and the familiar tones were louder and harsher, but
he loved them, with all their rudeness and dissonance, and throwing up
the window, called the singers by name, asking why they stood out in the
snow, instead of coming into the hall, as usual.

The oldest of the set came to the window to answer,--so old a man that
his voice was cracked, and his performance did more harm than good in
the psalms at church.

'You see, Sir Guy,' said he, 'there was some of us thought you might not
like to have us coming and singing like old times, 'cause 'tis not all
as it used to be here with you. Yet we didn't like not to come at all,
when you had been away so long, so we settled just to begin, and see
whether you took any notice.'

'Thank you. It was a very kind thought, James,' said Guy, touched by the
rough delicacy of feeling manifested by these poor men; 'I had rather
hear the carols than anything. Come to the front door; I'll let you in.'

'Thank you, sir,' with a most grateful touch of the hat; and Guy
hastened to set things in order, preferring the carols to everything at
that moment, even though disabused of his pristine admiration for James
Robinson's fiddle, and for Harry Ray's grand shake. A long space was
spent in listening, and a still longer in the endeavour to show what Mr.
Ashford meant by suggesting some improvements which they were regarding
with dislike and suspicion, till they found Sir Guy was of the same
mind. In fact, when he had sung a verse or two to illustrate his
meaning, the opinion of the choir was, that, with equal advantages, Sir
Guy might sing quite as well as Harry Ray.

It was the first time he had heard his own voice, except at church,
since the earlier days of St. Mildred's, but as he went up the long
stairs and galleries to bed, he found himself still singing. It was,

Who lives forlorn,
On God's own word doth rest,
His path is bright
With heavenly light,
His lot among the blest.

He wondered, and remembered finding music for it with Amy's help. He
sighed heavily, but the anguish of feeling, the sense of being in the
power of evil, had insensibly left him, and though sad and oppressed,
the unchangeable joy and hope of Christmas were shedding a beam on him.

They were not gone when he awoke, and rose to a solitary breakfast
without one Christmas greeting. The light of the other li