"The young ladies, sir, shall find I am not so uncompromising a Protestant as they fear, for you see I don't even protest against the justice of your sentence;" and with this he took his seat at the piano. "The song I shall attempt is not a very new one," he said, "for it was written in the year a thousand and forty by a monk of Cluny. The Benedictines, you will remember, have at all times been devoted to music." So saying, he threw his hand over the keys, and after a prelude, sang in a fine manly voice-- "Hora novissima, tempora pessima sunt; vigilemus!-- Ecce! minaciter imminet arbiter ille supremus,-- Imminet! imminet! ut mala terminet, æqua coronet, Recta remuneret, anxia liberet, æthera donet, Auferat aspera duraque pondera mentis onustæ; Sobria muniat, improba puniat, utraque justè." Astonishment and delight kept the company silent for a while after he had finished, and then the repressed feelings of the audience burst out with tenfold force. "Oh, Mr Mount Huxtable!" said they all, "you _must_ attend our Thursday practising in the church. It will be so delightful now, for all we required was a fine man's voice. How beautiful the words are, and how well adapted for singing! And the music, how splendid!--pray whose is the music?" "I am afraid I must confess myself the culprit in that respect," replied the Curate, very modestly. "I have been an enthusiast in music all my life, and have a peculiar delight in composing melodies to the old Catholic hymns." After this no more was said of flowers on St Ingulpus's day; and it was very evident that our new ally was carrying the war into the enemy's country, and, in fact, was turning their artillery against themselves. "If you are pleased with this simple song, I am sure that you will all be enchanted next week with two friends who have promised to visit me--both exquisite musicians, and very clever men." "Clergymen?" inquired two or three of the ladies. "Of course. I have very few lay acquaintances. You perhaps have heard their names,--the Reverend Launton Swallowlies, and the Reverend Iscariot Rowdy, both of Oxford." "No we don't know their names, but shall be delighted to see any friends of yours." And so the party broke up with universal satisfaction. There was a brilliant moon, and Mount Huxtable sent away his phaeton and two beautiful gray ponies, and walked to Hellebore gate with the Blazers. Christina Smiler would rather have had him drive home, and looked a little sad as they went off: but we heard happy voices all the way down the avenue; snatches of psalm-music, even, rose up from the shrubs that line the walk; and it appears that the whole group had stopt short on the little knoll that rises just within the parsonage gate, and sung the Sicilian Mariner's Hymn.