I have often noticed that almost everyone has his own individual small
economies—careful habits of saving fractions of pennies in some one
peculiar direction—any disturbance of which annoys him more than spending
shillings or pounds on some real extravagance. An old gentleman of my
acquaintance, who took the intelligence of the failure of a Joint-Stock
Bank, in which some of his money was invested, with stoical mildness,
worried his family all through a long summer’s day, because one of them
had torn (instead of cutting) out the written leaves of his now useless
bank-book; of course, the corresponding pages at the other end came
out as well; and this little unnecessary waste of paper (his private
economy) chafed him more than all the loss of his money. Envelopes
fretted his soul terribly when they first came in; the only way in which
he could reconcile himself to such waste of his cherished article, was
by patiently turning inside out all that were sent to him, and so making
them serve again. Even now, though tamed by age, I see him casting
wistful glances at his daughters when they send a whole inside of a
half sheet of note-paper, with the three lines of acceptance to an
invitation, written on only one of the sides. I am not above owning that
I have this human weakness myself. String is my foible. My pockets get
full of little hanks of it, picked up and twisted together, ready for
uses that never come. I am seriously annoyed if anyone cuts the string of
a parcel, instead of patiently and faithfully undoing it fold by fold.
How people can bring themselves to use india-rubber rings, which are a
sort of deification of string, as lightly as they do, I cannot imagine.
To me an india-rubber ring is a precious treasure. I have one which is
not new; one that I picked up off the floor, nearly six years ago. I have
really tried to use it; but my heart failed me, and I could not commit
the extravagance.
Small pieces of butter grieve others. They cannot attend to conversation,
because of the annoyance occasioned by the habit which some people have
of invariably taking more butter than they want. Have you not seen the
anxious look (almost mesmeric) which such persons fix on the article?
They would feel it a relief if they might bury it out of their sight by
popping it into their own mouths and swallowing it down; and they are
really made happy if the person on whose plate it lies unused, suddenly
breaks off a piece of toast (which he does not want at all) and eats up
his butter. They think that this is not waste.
Now Miss Matty Jenkyns was chary of candles. We had many devices to use
as few as possible. In the winter afternoons she would sit knitting for
two or three hours; she could do this in the dark, or by firelight; and
when I asked if I might not ring for candles to finish stitching my
wristbands, she told me to “keep blind man’s holiday.” They were usually
brought in with tea; but we only burnt one at a time. As we lived in
constant preparation for a friend who might come in any evening (but who
never did), it required some contrivance to keep our two candles of the
same length, ready to be lighted, and to look as if we burnt two always.
The candles took it in turns; and, whatever we might be talking about or
doing, Miss Matty’s eyes were habitually fixed upon the candle, ready to
jump up and extinguish it, and to light the other before they had become
too uneven in length to be restored to equality in the course of the
evening.
One night, I remember, this candle economy particularly annoyed me. I had
been very much tired of my compulsory “blind man’s holiday,”—especially
as Miss Matty had fallen asleep, and I did not like to stir the fire and
run the risk of awakening her; so I could not even sit on the rug and
scorch myself with sewing by fire-light, according to my usual custom. I
fancied Miss Matty must be dreaming of her early life; for she spoke one
or two words, in her uneasy sleep, bearing reference to persons who were
dead long before. When Martha brought in the lighted candle and tea, Miss
Matty started into wakefulness, with a strange bewildered look around,
as if we were not the people she expected to see about her. There was a
little sad expression that shadowed her face as she recognised me; but
immediately afterwards she tried to give me her usual smile.