"This is truth the Poet sings, That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things!" "ALAS! IN LOOKING BACK OVER ONE'S LIFE, HOW MANY THINGS THERE ARE TO CAUSE ONE TO REGRET!" "OH, YES, INDEED! I OFTEN REGRET I DIDN'T EAT MORE OYSTERS WHEN THEY WERE EIGHTPENCE A DOZEN!"] * * * * * THE CHIMES. (_Dickens once again adapted to the Season and the Situation._) High up in the steeple of an old old Tower, of ancient foundation, somewhat incongruous and complicated in design, but of sound Constitution--as _everybody_, even the angriest campanological opponents, admitted--far above the light and the noise of the town, if far below the flying clouds that shadow it, dwelt the Chimes I tell of. They were old Chimes, trust me. Centuries ago those Bells had been hung by our ancestors, so many centuries ago, that the register of their first suspension, the record of their first peal, was lost in antiquarian mist as impenetrable as the darkness of the belfry corners on a starless November night. They had had their donors and sponsors, these Bells; but time had mowed down their donors, and mislaid the names of their sponsors, and they now hung nameless and dateless, but sound and sonorous still, in that high old Tower, time-worn but steadfast and four-square to all winds, Party or otherwise, that have blown or that shall blow. Not speechless though. Far from it. They had clear, loud, lusty, sounding voices, had these Bells; and far and wide they might be heard upon the wind. Much too sturdy Chimes, moreover, were they, to be dependent upon the mere pleasure of the wind, of any of the winds--Party or otherwise--aforementioned. They had been pulled at by many generations of ringers, pulled at sometimes skilfully, often awkwardly and ill; sometimes in tune, and with the well-ordered harmony which was natural to them; sometimes again, wildly and wilfully, by incompetent or angry ringers, ringers ill-matched and ill-accordant, who did their worst to mar their melody, and spoil their tunefulness, and upset their time, and make them sound, in the great Singer's words:-- "Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune, and harsh." But the fault was ever less in the Bells than in the Bell-ringers. Cracked were they not, nor were they cacophonous; let their clappers swing free, and keep their throats unrusted and unclogged, and in skilled, and loyal, and well-conducted hands, they would ever sound out strongly and sweetly, and send forth on and against the wildest and angriest of the winds aforesaid, most excellent and inspiring music. * * * * *