"It really is, I think!" responded Lady Beaulyon, languidly, turning
her fair head to look at the plain sallow girl with the untidy black
hair whom she had only seen for a few minutes on her arrival at
Abbot's Manor the previous day, and whom she had scarcely noticed.
But Cicely saw her not--her whole soul was in her singing,--and she
had no glance even for Julian Adderley, who, gazing at her as if she
were already the prima donna in an opera, listened enrapt.
"The Lord is my Shepherd; He feedeth me,
In the depth of a desert land;
And, lest I should in the darkness slip,
He holdeth me by the hand."
Maryllia felt a contraction in her throat, and her eyes
unconsciously filled with tears. How sweet that hymn was!--how very
sweet! Tender memories of her father crowded upon her,--her mother's
face, grown familiar to her sight from her daily visits to the now
no longer veiled picture in the Manor gallery, shone out upon her
from the altar like a glorified angel above the white sarcophagus
where the word 'Resurget' sparkled jewel-like in the sunshine,--and
she began to feel that after all there was something in the
Christian faith that was divinely helpful and uplifting to the soul.
"The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want,
My mind on Him is stayed,
And though through the Valley of Death I walk,
I shall not be afraid!"
Pure and true rang Cicely's young, fresh and glorious voice,
carrying all the voices of the children with it on the pulsating
waves of the organ chords,--and an impression of high exaltation,
serenity and peace, rested on the whole congregation with the
singing of the last verse--
"The Lord is my Shepherd: O Shepherd sweet,
Leave me not here to stray;
But guide me safe to Thy heavenly fold,
And keep me there, I pray!
Amen!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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