Page:Francesca Carrara 3.pdf/267

264 rebuke to the questioning discontent of his previous mood. What were the few passing bubbles of this life in the boundless eternity whose balance is hidden far from human eye?

Evelyn paused on the top of a hanging bank, which enabled him to command the scene below. Some twenty or thirty men and women were gathered in the ill-omened dell, which took its name from Rufus's Stone. Most of the faces were familiar to him, and all wore the same exalted and earnest expression, as every eye was upraised to the moonlit heaven, and every lip joined in the sacred song. In the midst stood one who leant exhausted against a tree—listening intent, but lacking power to swell the solemn strain. He was so wan, so altered, that Evelyn at first could scarcely recognise Major Johnstone.

It was obvious that this was one of those meetings held by the stricter sect of the Puritans, who, debarred from the free exercise of their religious observances, were fain to congregate in the lone forest and the silent night, and render up that worship whose danger was the best proof of its sincerity. There was not a stir nor a sound save that harmonious chant, which rose as if ascending, a worthy offering, to the Heaven above. The forest was like a mighty cathedral: the arches of