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It pealed loudly and shrilly through the stillness of the night, and when the matron turned angrily to reprove the person who so inconsiderately disturbed the rest of the others, the woman clapped her hands and instantly a chorus of sharp, screaming voices rose around her.
No bells pealed out to greet him; no flags were flung to the breeze; but at least he had the glory of knowing in his heart that he had conquered that grim, unknown, menacing Atlantic Ocean which man had feared since the beginning of time. The merciless storm that had beaten Columbus across the ocean swept over Spain after he landed.
He entered by the western porch, and, proceeding to the choir, seated himself in the magnificently-carved stall formerly used by Paslew, and placed where it stood, a hundred years before, by John Eccles, ninth abbot. Midnight struck. The great door of the church swung open, and the organ pealed forth the "De profundis."
In the depths of the country, far from the sea, we can find many deserted shrines, many churches that once echoed with the songs of praise of faithful worshippers, wherein were celebrated the divine mysteries, and organs pealed forth celestial music, but now forsaken, desecrated, ruined, forgotten.
The light died out as rapidly as it had flashed in, the wheels drew close and stopped, and a bell pealed forth in the silent house. "Merciful Heavens!" cried the Prophet, pressing his hands to his throbbing brow. "Merciful Heavens! who can that be?" There was no answer, and the bell pealed again. "Grannie will be disturbed!" exclaimed the Prophet, addressing himself, passionately to the darkness.
The last hallelujah had been pealed forth, the shades of eve were thickening among the aisles, when the priests gave the signal to the nuns. They rose, they moved; and, with eyes which were not lifted for a moment from the floor on which they trod, they disappeared by the same private door by which they had entered.
The clouds seemed to bear it up for testimony; the cold cliffs held aloft their heads for justice; the snow-flakes fell like the ballots of jurymen, voting for revenge all nature seemed roused to animation by this one act. An icicle dropped with a keen ring like a knife, and the stream below pealed a shrill alarum. He had done the bad, dark deed.
All sectarian barriers were for the time burned away by the flame of sympathy, and wonderful to tell, the Universalist clergyman who married us was allowed to pronounce the eulogy in an orthodox Congregational church. When the organ pealed the requiem and the choir chanted the ever dear words of the hymn "Only waiting till the shadows are a little longer grown,"
No one was singing, but the music pealed on and on till some wild rumour of disaster reached the waiting chaplain, and he stepped across the chancel and touched the organist's shoulder. Instantly silence fell a terrible, nerve-racking silence. Colonel Chester had entered. He stood just within the door, pale and stern, whispering to the officer in charge of the men.
Its bells marked the canonical hours; rang the workman to his work, the merchant to his desk, the statesman to the Senate; they pealed for victory or tolled for the demise of a Doge.
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