Unluckily there was a blunder at the
very outset; the musicians became flurried; Master Simon was in a fever;
everything went on lamely and irregularly until they came to a chorus
beginning "Now let us sing with one accord," which seemed to be a signal
for parting company: all became discord and confusion; each shifted for
himself, and got to the end as well, or rather as soon, as he could,
excepting one old chorister in a pair of horn spectacles bestriding and
pinching a long sonorous nose; who, happening to stand a little apart,
and being wrapped up in his own melody, kept on a quavering course,
wriggling his head, ogling his book, and winding all up by a nasal solo
of at least three bars' duration.
The parson gave us a most erudite sermon on the rites and ceremonies
of Christmas, and the propriety of observing it not merely as a day
of thanksgiving, but of rejoicing; supporting the correctness of his
opinions by the earliest usages of the Church, and enforcing them by the
authorities of Theophilus of Cesarea, St. Cyprian, St. Chrysostom, St.
Augustine, and a cloud more of Saints and Fathers, from whom he made
copious quotations. I was a little at a loss to perceive the necessity
of such a mighty array of forces to maintain a point which no one
present seemed inclined to dispute; but I soon found that the good man
had a legion of ideal adversaries to contend with; having, in the course
of his researches on the subject of Christmas, got completely embroiled
in the sectarian controversies of the Revolution, when the Puritans made
such a fierce assault upon the ceremonies of the Church, and poor old
Christmas was driven out of the land by proclamation of Parliament.
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