I did hush, and saw the congregation come in and walk down the aisles and take their seats. Some brought books that seemed like Bibles under their arms; and all of them took off their hats, as was proper.
One thing struck me as peculiar: no ladies came into any place but the galleries, and up there they whispered and laughed in a way that made my blood run cold.
By and by a man came in, walked down the broad aisle, and went up into the pulpit.
Two or three men were sitting in the deacons" seat,--which ran along below the pulpit, and they began to whisper together--a thing I didn"t like in the deacons of a church.
The minister put his hands together beautifully. The congregation stood up, as good Presbyterians ought to do, and I stood up too, with my arms folded, and bending my head a little, while a solemn prayerfulness crept over me; but the next minute I dropped both arms and opened both eyes wide.
The minister was coming down the pulpit stairs. The congregation sat down. The deacons each took up a pen--so did the singers, who hadn"t sung a note yet.
"What _does_ this mean?" I whispered to Cousin E. E.
"The prayer is over," says she.
"Over!" says I. "Why, the minister hadn"t begun to tell the Lord what sinners we all are."
"Oh!" says she, almost laughing out in meeting, "that would be too heavy work for one man. Only think how much of it there is to represent in this place."
"Cousin," says I, "your levity in this sacred place shocks me."
"Sacred place," says she. "Oh, Phmie, you will be the death of me."
"Have you no regard for your own soul?" says I, in an austere whisper that ought to have riled up the depths of her conscience.
"My soul, indeed!" says she, with her eyes and her lips all a-quivering with fun; "as if people ever thought of such things here."
I dropped into my seat--her sinful levity took away my breath.
The woman absolutely began to talk out loud, and didn"t even stop when a man got up in the congregation and began to exhort. In the distress her conduct gave me I did not hear just what he said, but at last he held out a paper. A handsome little boy came up and carried it toward the pulpit and gave it to one of the deacons.
Up to this time I had thought the congregation Presbyterians, but the boy puzzled me. I remembered the little fellow in red at that High Church service, and thought perhaps the good old New England stand-by meeting had got some of these new-fangled additions to their board of deacons. The thought troubled me, but not so much as the conduct of that congregation. The ladies in the gallery behaved shamefully--I must say it. They whispered, they laughed, they flirted their fans and flirted with their lips and eyes. Sometimes they turned their backs on the congregation downstairs. They kept moving about from one seat to another. In fact, I cannot describe the actions of these females. The idea of piety never entered one of their heads--I am sure of that.
There must have been a good many notices and publishments to give out; more than I ever heard of in our meeting-house, for ever so many papers were sent up to the pulpit, where another minister sat now ready to begin his sermon.
I must own it, there was some confusion among the congregation in the body of the church. The members moved about more than was decorous, and there was whispering a-going on there as well.
In Vermont the minister would have rebuked his congregation--especially the flighty females around me.
I was saying this to Cousin E. E. when that man in the pulpit took up a little wooden hammer that lay on the desk before him, and struck it down with a force that hushed the whole congregation into decency at once.
I was glad of it, and in my innermost heart said "Amen!"
By and by a man got up to exhort. He must have been brought up as a clerk in some thread-needle store, I should think, by the way he measured off his long, rolling sentences, that seemed to come through the bung-hole of an empty cider barrel; and his arms went spreading out with each sentence, as if he were measuring tape, and meant to give enough of it.
"Who is that?" says I, whispering to Cousin E. E.
"That," says she, "is a gentleman from ----."
"No doubt he"s a member," says I; "how earnest he seeks for protection!"
"Of course he is a member or they wouldn"t let him speak," whispers she.
"I know that," says I. "The Presbyterians don"t allow any but members to speak in their meeting, of course; but it seems to me they do a great deal more talking than praying here, or singing either."
"Oh, I don"t believe any one but the chaplain ever thinks of praying here, and he cuts it short as pie-crust."
"Don"t be irreverent," says I.
Cousin E. E. got up from her seat; so did Dempster.
"Come," he said, "I am tired of hearing about salt."
"Especially if the salt has lost its savor," says I, hoping to draw both their thoughts to the Scriptures, and get them in a proper frame of mind for the occasion.
"The tax is what I want it to lose," says he, and I saw by his manner that thoughts of humility and prayer were far from him; so, rather than join in this mockery of holy things, I followed him out of that beautiful and sacred edifice, softened, and, I hope, made better by the service in which my soul had joined.
"Well," says Cousin Dempster, when we stood once more on the stone carpet of the hall, "how did you like the House?"
"What house?" says I.
"The House of Representatives, to be sure," says he.
"When I have seen it, I can tell you better," says I.
"Oh, nonsense! you have seen it," says he, "in full session, too."
"Look a-here, cousin," says I; "all this morning you"ve been talking about old houses and new houses, as if this heap of marble was a green, with buildings all round it. I"ve seen the place you call a rotunda--halls, with scrumptious stone carpets on them, and as fine a meeting-house as Solomon need have wanted. Now, if you want to show me that house where the Representatives meet, do it, and no more parsonizing about it."
"But, cousin, I do a.s.sure you, we have just come from it. You have heard the members speaking."
"I have seen a meeting-house, and worshipped in it," says I.
"Are you really in earnest?" says he.
"Would I, the member of a church, trifle on a sacred subject?" says I.
"Oh!" says Cousin Dempster, a-leaning his back against the marble wall--"oh! hold me, or I shall laugh myself to death."
I wish he had. There!
XLVII.
EASTER.