Cambridge, July 29. 1850.
_One Bell._--Can any of your readers favour me with a reference to some
authority for the following, which may be found in Southey's _Book of
the Church_ (vol. ii. p. 121.)?
"Somerset pretended that one bell in a steeple was sufficient
for summoning the people to prayer; and the country was thus in
danger of losing its best music."
What follows is so beautiful and appropriate, that I may perhaps be
excused for lengthening my quotation:
"--a music, hallowed by all circumstances, which, according
equally with social exultation and with solitary pensiveness,
though it falls upon many an unheeding ear, never fails to find
some hearts which it exhilarates, and some which it softens."
It is a curious fact, that in many towers there may be often found a
solitary _black-letter Bell_ (if I may so call it), evidently of
ante-Reformation date, making one of the peal.