Welsh Journals

Too far to have visited us this week ? But here's a fire. I'll dry your clothes, and bring food and drink." Yes What's in that cage, Brennie ? A canary, sir. The man who brought it said it's a green African." "An old sailor, eh? Did he say it would survive in an English pub ? What, in that cage, sir ? A thermometer rings a bell when it's down to fifty, then glass shutters fall, and an electric tube warms up." That's all as ugly as the cage." Ugly ? But it's got fluted bars that play a tune if you strike them." So that's it. And the bird never leaves the cage ? Why should it ? There are leaves, running water, and mirrors for its loneliness. The bird hardly knows It hardly knows If we could have new lies to subjugate us. We must go now, Brennie." You'll have a drink, sir ? No thanks. We called because we'd lost our way." "Lost your way!" Death is only the final incredulity: "Where were you going, sir ? 0, Brennie, I hoped you could tell us." The landlord grinned. We lit cigarettes, the last stand against despair. Well, one drink perhaps." Plainsong-and Merbecke By the Rev. W. G. HARGRAVE THOMAS (Vicar of Needham Market). APPENDIX II in the Report of the Archbishops' Committee on Music in Worship, states as an agreed point, that, The Study of Plainsong should be part of the general training of all church musicians, whether it is likely to be used in the churches where they serve or not." This would include, of course, the clergy, who are, or should be, church musicians par excellence. But how often one meets priests who know nothing of Plainchant, that traditional unisonal church song of the West, which has come down to us from Christian antiquity, derived originally from Hebrew, Greek and other Eastern sources, and