Annals of a quiet neighborhood Author:George MacDonald Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER II. MY FIRST SUNDAY AT MARSHMALLOWS. These events fell on the Saturday night. On the Sunday morning I read prayers and preached. Never before had I... more » enjoyed so much the petitions of the Church, which Hooker calls "the sending of angels upward," or the reading of the lessons, which he calls " the receiving of angels descended from above." And whether from the newness of the parson, or the love of the service, certainly a congregation more intent or more responsive a clergyman will hardly find. But, as I had feared, it was different in the afternoon. The people had dined, and the usual somnolence had followed ; nor could I find it in my heart to blame men and women who worked hard all the week for being drowsy on the day of rest. So I curtailed my sermon as much as I could, omitting page after page of my manuscript, and when I came to a close, was rewarded by perceiving an agreeable surprise upon many of the faces round me. I resolved that, in the afternoons at least, my sermons should be as short as heart could wish. But that afternoon there was at least one man of the congregation who was neither drowsy nor inattentive. Repeatedly my eyes left the page off which I was reading and glanced toward him. Not once did I find his eyes turned away from me. There was a small loft in the west end of the church in which stood a little organ, whose voice, weakened by years of praising and possibly of neglect, had yet, among a good many tones that were rough, wooden, and reedy, a few remaining that were as mellow as ever praiseful heart could wish to praise withal. And these came in among the rest like trusting thoughts amid " eating cares;" like the faces of children borne in the arms of a crowd of anxious mothers ; like hopes that are young prophecies amid the downward swe...« less