The habit of trying to sing “second” was a very severe trial to listen to, and I remonstrated with one old man that I looked on as a kind of ringleader, at the pain his efforts caused me. His voice was by way of being a tenor, and his disregard of all harmony induced me to christen him “Wagner.” One day poor old Wagner appeared with his neck painted with iodine, and the feeble croaks that he emitted, however painful to himself, were a considerable relief to me. Remembering, too, that when the Devil is sick he is supposed to be most susceptible of good impressions, and not wishing to lose the opportunity of working on his feelings, I determined to let him have it. I impressed on him the brittleness of tenor voices in general; how susceptible their metempsychosis was to disorganisation; how the epidermis of the carotid artery was peculiarly sensitive; and, with a casual glance at his neck, implored him for his own sake, if not for mine, to give his voice a rest. With beads of perspiration and iodine trickling down his back, he gasped compliance; and thus I reduced my “crosses” by one. Another horrid old man never failed to irritate me. He was undergoing twelve months’ imprisonment for inciting little boys to steal, but was now on the religious tack. So religious, indeed, had he become, that in a portion of “The Creed” he could not say “hell,” but invariably substituted “the grave.” I had never heard this impertinent innovation before, and could have kicked him and his hypocrisy into Wagner’s lap. Instantaneous conversions, such as took place years ago during the so-called Revivals, were of occasional occurrence, brought about, as I take it, by the thrilling discourses we were sometimes treated to, and the “awakened one” would stand up and hold forth. But very short work was made of these converts, and a couple of matter-of-fact warders soon trundled them out, to be brought up later on and punished for disturbing the service. I made a careful study of the two chaplains and their respective peculiarities in conducting the service. With the one I never had cause for annoyance, and though his sermons could not be said to bristle with eloquence, he was evidently in earnest, and mindful of the fact that the word Protestant embraced more denominations than one, and seemed particularly careful not to outrage the feelings of the many Presbyterians, Wesleyans, and other Nonconformists that formed a portion of the congregation. The other reverend individual had a partiality for the declamatory style, and whenever circumstances, or the calendar, gave him the option of selecting a psalm, never failed to declaim how “Moab is my washpot, over Edom will I cast out my shoe” (Ps. cviii.). I verily believe he used to think he was talking of his own household effects, and the expressions of admiration on the faces of the blacksmiths generally leave little or no doubt in my mind that they were thoroughly convinced