AFTER all I had profited but imperfectly by the opportunity I had so
boldly achieved of speaking to Mdlle. Henri; it was my intention to ask
her how she came to be possessed of two English baptismal names, Frances
and Evans, in addition to her French surname, also whence she derived
her good accent. I had forgotten both points, or, rather, our colloquy
had been so brief that I had not had time to bring them forward;
moreover, I had not half tested her powers of speaking English; all I
had drawn from her in that language were the words “Yes,” and “Thank
you, sir.” “No matter,” I reflected. “What has been left incomplete now,
shall be finished another day.” Nor did I fail to keep the promise thus
made to myself. It was difficult to get even a few words of particular
conversation with one pupil among so many; but, according to the old
proverb, “Where there is a will, there is a way;” and again and again
I managed to find an opportunity for exchanging a few words with Mdlle.
Henri, regardless that envy stared and detraction whispered whenever I
approached her.
“Your book an instant.” Such was the mode in which I often began these
brief dialogues; the time was always just at the conclusion of the
lesson; and motioning to her to rise, I installed myself in her place,
allowing her to stand deferentially at my side; for I esteemed it wise
and right in her case to enforce strictly all forms ordinarily in
use between master and pupil; the rather because I perceived that in
proportion as my manner grew austere and magisterial, hers became easy
and self-possessed--an odd contradiction, doubtless, to the ordinary
effect in such cases; but so it was.
“A pencil,” said I, holding out my hand without looking at her. (I am
now about to sketch a brief report of the first of these conferences.)
She gave me one, and while I underlined some errors in a grammatical
exercise she had written, I observed--
“You are not a native of Belgium?”
“No.”
“Nor of France?”
“No.”
“Where, then, is your birthplace?”
“I was born at Geneva.”
“You don’t call Frances and Evans Swiss names, I presume?”
“No, sir; they are English names.”
“Just so; and is it the custom of the Genevese to give their children
English appellatives?”
“Non, Monsieur; mais--”
“Speak English, if you please.”
“Mais--”
“English--”
“But” (slowly and with embarrassment) “my parents were not all the two
Genevese.”
“Say BOTH, instead of ‘all the two,’ mademoiselle.”
“Not BOTH Swiss: my mother was English.”
“Ah! and of English extraction?”
“Yes--her ancestors were all English.”
“And your father?”
“He was Swiss.”
“What besides? What was his profession?”
“Ecclesiastic--pastor--he had a church.”
“Since your mother is an Englishwoman, why do you not speak English with
more facility?”
“Maman est morte, il y a dix ans.”
“And you do homage to her memory by forgetting her language. Have the
goodness to put French out of your mind so long as I converse with
you--keep to English.”
“C’est si difficile, monsieur, quand on n’en a plus l’habitude.”
“You had the habitude formerly, I suppose? Now answer me in your mother
tongue.”
“Yes, sir, I spoke the English more than the French when I was a child.”
“Why do you not speak it now?”
“Because I have no English friends.”
“You live with your father, I suppose?”
“My father is dead.”
“You have brothers and sisters?”
“Not one.”
“Do you live alone?”
“No--I have an aunt--ma tante Julienne.”
“Your father’s sister?”
“Justement, monsieur.”
“Is that English?”
“No--but I forget--”
“For which, mademoiselle, if you were a child I should certainly devise
some slight punishment; at your age--you must be two or three and
twenty, I should think?”
“Pas encore, monsieur--en un mois j’aurai dix-neuf ans.”
“Well, nineteen is a mature age, and, having attained it, you ought to
be so solicitous for your own improvement, that it should not be needful
for a master to remind you twice of the expediency of your speaking
English whenever practicable.”
To this wise speech I received no answer; and, when I looked up, my
pupil was smiling to herself a much-meaning, though not very gay smile;
it seemed to say, “He talks of he knows not what:” it said this
so plainly, that I determined to request information on the point
concerning which my ignorance seemed to be thus tacitly affirmed.
“Are you solicitous for your own improvement?”
“Rather.”
“How do you prove it, mademoiselle?”
An odd question, and bluntly put; it excited a second smile.
“Why, monsieur, I am not inattentive--am I? I learn my lessons well--”
“Oh, a child can do that! and what more do you do?”
“What more can I do?”
“Oh, certainly, not much; but you are a teacher, are you not, as well as
a pupil?”
“Yes.”
“You teach lace-mending?”
“Yes.”
“A dull, stupid occupation; do you like it?”
“No--it is tedious.”
“Why do you pursue it? Why do you not rather teach history, geography,
grammar, even arithmetic?”
“Is monsieur certain that I am myself thoroughly acquainted with these
studies?”
“I don’t know; you ought to be at your age.”
“But I never was at school, monsieur--”
“Indeed! What then were your friends--what was your aunt about? She is
very much to blame.”
“No monsieur, no--my aunt is good--she is not to blame--she does what
she can; she lodges and nourishes me” (I report Mdlle. Henri’s phrases
literally, and it was thus she translated from the French). “She is not
rich; she has only an annuity of twelve hundred francs, and it would be
impossible for her to send me to school.”
“Rather,” thought I to myself on hearing this, but I continued, in the
dogmatical tone I had adopted:--
“It is sad, however, that you should be brought up in ignorance of the
most ordinary branches of education; had you known something of history
and grammar you might, by degrees, have relinquished your lace-mending
drudgery, and risen in the world.”
“It is what I mean to do.”
“How? By a knowledge of English alone? That will not suffice; no
respectable family will receive a governess whose whole stock of
knowledge consists in a familiarity with one foreign language.”
“Monsieur, I know other things.”
“Yes, yes, you can work with Berlin wools, and embroider handkerchiefs
and collars--that will do little for you.”
Mdlle. Henri’s lips were unclosed to answer, but she checked herself,
as thinking the discussion had been sufficiently pursued, and remained
silent.
“Speak,” I continued, impatiently; “I never like the appearance of
acquiescence when the reality is not there; and you had a contradiction
at your tongue’s end.”
“Monsieur, I have had many lessons both in grammar, history, geography,
and arithmetic. I have gone through a course of each study.”
“Bravo! but how did you manage it, since your aunt could not afford to
send you to school?”
“By lace-mending; by the thing monsieur despises so much.”
“Truly! And now, mademoiselle, it will be a good exercise for you to
explain to me in English how such a result was produced by such means.”
“Monsieur, I begged my aunt to have me taught lace-mending soon after
we came to Brussels, because I knew it was a METIER, a trade which was
easily learnt, and by which I could earn some money very soon. I learnt
it in a few days, and I quickly got work, for all the Brussels ladies
have old lace--very precious--which must be mended all the times it is
washed. I earned money a little, and this money I gave for lessons
in the studies I have mentioned; some of it I spent in buying books,
English books especially; soon I shall try to find a place of governess,
or school-teacher, when I can write and speak English well; but it will
be difficult, because those who know I have been a lace-mender will
despise me, as the pupils here despise me. Pourtant j’ai mon projet,”
she added in a lower tone.
“What is it?”
“I will go and live in England; I will teach French there.”
The words were pronounced emphatically. She said “England” as you might
suppose an Israelite of Moses’ days would have said Canaan.
“Have you a wish to see England?”
“Yes, and an intention.”
And here a voice, the voice of the directress, interposed:
“Mademoiselle Henri, je crois qu’il va pleuvoir; vous feriez bien, ma
bonne amie, de retourner chez vous tout de suite.”
In silence, without a word of thanks for this officious warning, Mdlle.
Henri collected her books; she moved to me respectfully, endeavoured to
move to her superior, though the endeavour was almost a failure, for her
head seemed as if it would not bend, and thus departed.
Where there is one grain of perseverance or wilfulness in the
composition, trifling obstacles are ever known rather to stimulate than
discourage. Mdlle. Reuter might as well have spared herself the trouble
of giving that intimation about the weather (by-the-by her prediction
was falsified by the event--it did not rain that evening). At the close
of the next lesson I was again at Mdlle. Henri’s desk. Thus did I accost
her:--
“What is your idea of England, mademoiselle? Why do you wish to go
there?”
Accustomed by this time to the calculated abruptness of my manner, it no
longer discomposed or surprised her, and she answered with only so
much of hesitation as was rendered inevitable by the difficulty she
experienced in improvising the translation of her thoughts from French
to English.
“England is something unique, as I have heard and read; my idea of it is
vague, and I want to go there to render my idea clear, definite.”
“Hum! How much of England do you suppose you could see if you went there
in the capacity of a teacher? A strange notion you must have of getting
a clear and definite idea of a country! All you could see of Great
Britain would be the interior of a school, or at most of one or two
private dwellings.”
“It would be an English school; they would be English dwellings.”
“Indisputably; but what then? What would be the value of observations
made on a scale so narrow?”
“Monsieur, might not one learn something by analogy?
An--echantillon--a--a sample often serves to give an idea of the whole;
besides, narrow and wide are words comparative, are they not? All my
life would perhaps seem narrow in your eyes--all the life of a--that
little animal subterranean--une taupe--comment dit-on?”
“Mole.”
“Yes--a mole, which lives underground would seem narrow even to me.”
“Well, mademoiselle--what then? Proceed.”
“Mais, monsieur, vous me comprenez.”
“Not in the least; have the goodness to explain.”
“Why, monsieur, it is just so. In Switzerland I have done but little,
learnt but little, and seen but little; my life there was in a circle;
I walked the same round every day; I could not get out of it; had I
rested--remained there even till my death, I should never have enlarged
it, because I am poor and not skilful, I have not great acquirements;
when I was quite tired of this round, I begged my aunt to go to
Brussels; my existence is no larger here, because I am no richer or
higher; I walk in as narrow a limit, but the scene is changed; it would
change again if I went to England. I knew something of the bourgeois of
Geneva, now I know something of the bourgeois of Brussels; if I went to
London, I would know something of the bourgeois of London. Can you make
any sense out of what I say, monsieur, or is it all obscure?”
“I see, I see--now let us advert to another subject; you propose to
devote your life to teaching, and you are a most unsuccessful teacher;
you cannot keep your pupils in order.”
A flush of painful confusion was the result of this harsh remark; she
bent her head to the desk, but soon raising it replied--
“Monsieur, I am not a skilful teacher, it is true, but practice
improves; besides, I work under difficulties; here I only teach sewing,
I can show no power in sewing, no superiority--it is a subordinate
art; then I have no associates in this house, I am isolated; I am too a
heretic, which deprives me of influence.”
“And in England you would be a foreigner; that too would deprive you
of influence, and would effectually separate you from all round you; in
England you would have as few connections, as little importance as you
have here.”
“But I should be learning something; for the rest, there are probably
difficulties for such as I everywhere, and if I must contend, and
perhaps be conquered, I would rather submit to English pride than to
Flemish coarseness; besides, monsieur--”
She stopped--not evidently from any difficulty in finding words to
express herself, but because discretion seemed to say, “You have said
enough.”
“Finish your phrase,” I urged.
“Besides, monsieur, I long to live once more among Protestants; they are
more honest than Catholics; a Romish school is a building with porous
walls, a hollow floor, a false ceiling; every room in this house,
monsieur, has eyeholes and ear-holes, and what the house is, the
inhabitants are, very treacherous; they all think it lawful to tell
lies; they all call it politeness to profess friendship where they feel
hatred.”
“All?” said I; “you mean the pupils--the mere children--inexperienced,
giddy things, who have not learnt to distinguish the difference between
right and wrong?”
“On the contrary, monsieur--the children are the most sincere; they have
not yet had time to become accomplished in duplicity; they will tell
lies, but they do it inartificially, and you know they are lying; but
the grown-up people are very false; they deceive strangers, they deceive
each other--”
A servant here entered:--
“Mdlle. Henri--Mdlle. Reuter vous prie de vouloir bien conduire la
petite de Dorlodot chez elle, elle vous attend dans le cabinet
de Rosalie la portiere--c’est que sa bonne n’est pas venue la
chercher--voyez-vous.”
“Eh bien! est-ce que je suis sa bonne--moi?” demanded Mdlle. Henri; then
smiling, with that same bitter, derisive smile I had seen on her lips
once before, she hastily rose and made her exit.