Part 20 (2/2)

”He came back yesterday,” said G.o.dfrey, ”and the flag he has hoisted is a large Union Jack.”

Now the Union Jack is of all flags the most provocative. Any other flag under the sun, even the Royal Standard, might be hoisted without giving any very grave offence to any one. But the Union Jack arouses the worst feelings of everybody. Some little time ago a fool flew a Union Jack out of the window of a Dublin house underneath which the Irish leader happened at the moment to be proclaiming his loyalty to the Empire and his ungovernable love for the English people. The fool who hoisted the flag was afterwards very properly denounced for having gone about to insult the Irish nation. The Dean might, I think, have set floating a banner with three Orange lilies emblazoned upon it like the fleur-de-lys of ancient France. No one's feelings would have been much hurt and no one's enthusiasm unusually stirred. But it is characteristic of the Dean that when he does a thing at all he does it thoroughly.

”Just come and look at it,” said G.o.dfrey. ”It's enormous.”

We went into the library, from the windows of which a clear view can be obtained of the town and the church which stands above it. There certainly was a flag flying from the church tower. I took a pair of field-gla.s.ses and satisfied myself that it was the Union Jack.

”Would you like me to speak to the Dean about it?” said G.o.dfrey.

”Certainly not,” I said. ”Any interference on your part would merely--and these are rather exciting times. The Dean is ent.i.tled, I think, to a little license. I don't suppose he means to keep it there permanently.”

Then, borne to us by a gentle breeze across the bay, came the sound of the church bells. We have a fine peal of bells in our church, presented to the parish by my father. They are seldom properly rung, but when they are--on Christmas Day, at Easter and on the 12th of July--the effect is very good.

”Surely,” I said, ”the Dean can't be having a Harvest Thanksgiving Service yet? It's not nearly time.”

Then I noticed that instead of one of the regular chimes the bells were playing a hymn tune. It was, as I might have guessed, the tune to which ”O G.o.d, our help in ages past” is sung in Ireland. The hymn, since Babberly's first demonstration in Belfast, had become a kind of battle song. It is, I think, characteristic of the Irish Protestants that they should have a tune of their own for this hymn. Elsewhere, in England, in Scotland, in the United States and the Colonies this metrical version of the 90th Psalm is sung to a fine simple tune called St. Ann. But we are not and never have been as other men are.

Without a quiver of our nerves we run atilt at the most universally accepted traditions. The very fact that every one else who uses the hymn sings it to the tune called St. Ann would incline us to find some other tune if such a thing were obtainable. We found one which musicians, recognizing that we had some right to claim it as ours, called ”Irish” or ”Dublin.” This tune emerged suddenly from nowhere in response to no particular demand in the middle of the eighteenth century. It is anonymous, but it was at once wedded to the words of that particular hymn, and we have used it ever since. It is difficult to give an opinion on the comparative merits of two hymn tunes, and I hesitate to say that ours is a finer one than that used by the rest of the English-speaking world. I am, however, certain that there is in our tune an unmistakable suggestion of majestic confidence in an eternal righteousness, and that it very well expresses the feeling with which we sing the hymn at political demonstrations and elsewhere.

It came to me that day across the waters of the bay, hammered slowly out by the swinging bells, with a tremendous sense of energy. The English St. Ann seemed lilty and almost flippant in comparison.

I raised my gla.s.ses again and took another look at the Union Jack, blown out from its flag-post and displaying plainly its tangled crosses. Then I noticed that men were entering the churchyard singly, in pairs and in little groups of three and four.

”The Dean,” I said, ”must have some sort of service in church to-day.

If it isn't the Harvest Thanksgiving it must be an anniversary of something. What happened at this time of year, G.o.dfrey? I can't remember anything.”

I still stared through my gla.s.ses. I was struck by the unusual fact that only men were going into the church. Then, quite suddenly, I saw that every man was carrying a gun. I laid down my gla.s.ses and turned to G.o.dfrey.

”I wish,” I said, ”that you'd go down to the town--not to the church, mind, G.o.dfrey, but into the town, and ask somebody--ask the police sergeant at the barrack what is going on in the church.”

G.o.dfrey is always at his very best when he has to find out something.

He would have made almost an ideal spy. If any one is ever wanted by the nation for the more disagreeable part of secret service work I can confidently recommend G.o.dfrey.

Half an hour later he returned to me hot and breathless.

”The police sergeant told me, Excellency, that the Dean's going to march all the Orangemen and a lot of other men along with them to Belfast for the Unionist demonstration. They are having service in the church first and they've all got rifles.”

I have all my life steadily objected to politics being mixed with religion. I hold most strongly that the Church ought not to be dominated by politicians. The Church is degraded and religion is brought into contempt when they are used by party leaders. But--the bells had ceased ringing. The hymn was now, no doubt, being sung by the men within. It occurred to me suddenly that on this occasion it was not the politicians who were taking possession of religion, but religion which was a.s.serting its right to dominate politics. This is plainly quite a different matter. I can even imagine that politics might be improved if religion a.s.serted itself a little more frequently than it does. I still maintain that it is only right and fair to keep politics out of the Church. I am not at all sure that it is right to keep the Church out of politics.

”I told the sergeant,” said G.o.dfrey, ”that he had better go and stop them at once.”

”Oh, did you?” I said. ”Do you know, G.o.dfrey, that's just the kind of suggestion I'd expect you to make under the circ.u.mstances.”

”Thanks awfully, Excellency,” said G.o.dfrey. ”I'm awfully glad you're pleased.”

There are besides the sergeant three constables in our police barrack.

<script>