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In a few moments the minister came in, took his psalm-book from the window-sill, and striking up with the congregation, "Blest is the man whose strength thou art," marched up to the pulpit again, with only an added flash in his blue eyes and a little more triumphant swing to his coat-tails to indicate that anything had taken place.
When, however, Fairford repeated the summons with the end of his whip, the singing ceased, and Mr. Trumbull himself, with his psalm-book in his hand, kept open by the insertion of his forefinger between the leaves, came to demand the meaning of this unseasonable interruption.
There is earth over the coffin, there is earth within it; the psalm-book with its leaves is dust the rose with all its recollections has gone to dust. But above it bloom new roses, above is sings the nightingale, and the organ plays: we think of the old grandmother with the mild, eternally young eyes. Eyes can never die!
The last of these was the psalm-book; it was a fine piece, the gift of Mistress Clem, in distinct old-faced type, on paper that had begun to grow foxy in the warehouse not by service and she was used to wrap it in a handkerchief every Sunday after its period of service was over, and bury it end-wise at the head of her trunk.
Well, the poor widow, who had her cabin within a few miles of "the diggings," brought with her but few comforts from the old homeland a few simple articles of furniture, the bible and psalm-book of her youth, and an English lark to sing to her solitude the songs that had cheered her on the other side of the globe.
In the old Sigourney psalm-book the nineteenth psalm was thus rendered: "Les cieux en chaque lieu La puissance de Dieu Racourent aux humains Ce grand entour espars Publie en toutes parts L'ouvrage de ses mains. "Iour apres iour coulant Du Saigneur va parlant Par longue experience. La nuict suivant la nuict, Nous presche et nous instruicst De sa grad sapience"
He stole out into the silent, deserted street, and went to visit the veteran sculptor Dannecker. He found him in his parlour, sitting alone, with his psalm-book, and the reminiscences of a life of eighty years.
Instantly the guard was doubled, and Catinat searched: a psalm-book with a silver clasp and a letter addressed to "M. Maurel, called Catinat," were found on him, leaving no doubt as to his identity; while he himself, growing impatient, and desiring to end all these investigations, acknowledged that he was Catinat and no other.
Beautiful Christian, scriptural language, verses certainly taken from the psalm-book, were read on the graves; they were all read, for the service lasted several hours. This, however, can never be good for devotion. The crowd at length streamed from the church; the fiery-red and grass-green aprons glittered; but the mass of human beings became thicker, and closer, and pressed forward.
Of an afternoon, when the bells rang out for the sermon, the shops closed, and the good folk gathered to the churches, psalm-book in hand, we can imagine him drawing near to the English chapel in quite patriarchal fashion, with Mrs. Knox and Mrs. Bowes and Mrs. Locke, James his servant, Patrick his pupil, and a due following of children and maids.
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