As the bell was yet ringing and the great people were not yet come, I had leisure to glance over the church, which smelt as earthy as a grave, and to think what a shady, ancient, solemn little church it was. The windows, heavily shaded by trees, admitted a subdued light that made the faces around me pale, and darkened the old brasses in the pavement and the time and damp-worn monuments, and rendered the sunshine in the little porch, where a monotonous ringer was working at the bell, inestimably bright. But a stir in that direction, a gathering of reverential awe in the rustic faces, and a blandly ferocious assumption on the part of Mr. Boythorn of being resolutely unconscious of somebody's existence forewarned me that the great people were come and that the service was going to begin.

As the bell was still ringing, I had leisure to glance over the church, and to think what an ancient, solemn little church it was. The windows, heavily shaded by trees, admitted a subdued light that darkened the old monuments around me, and made the sunshine in the little porch seem very bright. A stir in that direction, and the reverential awe in the rustic faces, warned me that the great people were arriving and that the service was going to begin.
