"And the thousands come and go
All along the crowded street;
But they give no ear to the things we know,
And they pass with careless feet.
For some hearts are hard with gold,
And some are crushed in the throng,
And some with the pleasures of life are cold--
How long, O Lord, how long!"
"If I am to begin at the beginning, my dears," said little Mrs Dorothy,
"I must tell you that I was born in a farmhouse, about a mile from Saint
Albans, on the last day of the year of our Lord 1641; that my father was
the Reverend William Jennings, brother to Sir Edward; and that my mother
was Mrs Frances, daughter to Sir Jeremy Charlton."
"Whatever made your father take up with a parson's life?" said Rhoda.
"I wouldn't be one for an apron full of money! Surely he was married
first, wasn't he?"
"He was married first," answered Mrs Dorothy; "and both his father and
my mother's kindred took it extreme ill that he should propose such
views to himself,--the rather because he was of an easy fortune, his
grandmother having left him some money."
"Would I have been a parson!" exclaimed Rhoda. "I'm too fond of jellies
and conserves--nobody better."
"Well, my dear Mrs Rhoda, if you will have me say what I think,"
resumed Mrs Dorothy.
"You can if you like," interjected Rhoda.
"It does seem to me, and hath ever done so, that the common custom
amongst us, which will have the chaplain to rise and withdraw when
dessert is served, must be a relique of barbarous times."
Dessert at that time included pies, puddings, and jellies.
"O Mrs Dorothy! you have the drollest notions!"
And Rhoda went off in a long peal of laughter. The idea of any other
arrangement struck her as very comical indeed.
"Well, my dear," said Mrs Dorothy, "I hope some day to see it
otherwise."
"Oh, how droll it would be!" said Rhoda. "But go on, please, Mrs
Dolly."
"Through those troublous times that followed on my birth," resumed the
old lady, "I was left for better safety with the farmer at whose house I
was born; for my father had shortly after been made parson of a church
in London, and 'twas not thought well that so young a child as I then
was should be bred up in all the city tumults. My foster-father's name
was Lawrence Ingham; and he and his good wife were as father and mother
to me."
"But what fashion of breeding could you get at a farmhouse?" demanded
Rhoda, with a scornful pout.
"Why, 'twas not there I learned French, child," answered Mrs Dorothy,
smiling; "but I learned to read, write, and cast accounts; to cook and
distil, to conserve and pickle; with all manner of handiworks--sewing,
knitting, broidery, and such like. And I can tell you, my dear, that in
all the great world whereunto I afterwards entered I never saw better
manners than in that farmhouse. I saw more ceremonies, sure; but not
more courtesy and kindly thought for others."
"Why, I thought folks like that had no manners at all!" said Rhoda.
"Then you were mightily mistaken, my dear. Farmer Ingham had two
daughters, who were like sisters to me; but they were both older than I.
Their names were Grace and Faith. 'Twas a very quiet, peaceful
household. We rose with the sun in summer, and before it in winter--"
"Catch me!" interpolated Rhoda.
"And before any other thing might be done, there was reading and prayer
in the farmhouse kitchen. All the farm servants trooped in, and took
their places in order, the men on the right hand of the master, and the
women on the left of the mistress. Then the farmer read a chapter, and
afterwards prayed, all joining in `Our Father' at the end."
"But--he wasn't a parson?" demanded Rhoda, with a perplexed look.
"Oh no, my dear."
"Then how could he pray?" said Rhoda. "He'd no business to read the
Prayer-Book; and of course he couldn't pray without it."
"Ah, then he made a mistake," replied Mrs Dorothy very quietly. "He
fancied he could."
"But who ever heard of such a thing?" said Rhoda.
"We heard a good deal of it in those days, my dear. Why, child, the
Common Prayer was forbid, even in the churches. Nobody used it, save a
few here and there, that chose to run the risk of being found out and
punished."
"How queer!" cried Rhoda. "Well, go on, Mrs Dolly. I hope the prayers
weren't long. I should have wanted my breakfast."
"They were usually about three parts of an hour."
"Ugh!" with a manufactured shudder, came from Rhoda.
"After prayers, for an hour, each went to her calling. Commonly we took
it turn about, the girls and I--one with the mistress in the kitchen,
one with the maids in the chambers, and the third, if the weather was
fine, a-weeding the posies in the garden, or, if wet, at her sewing in
the parlour. Then the great bell was rung for breakfast, and we all
gathered again in the kitchen. For breakfast were furmety, eggs, and
butter, and milk, for the women; cold bakemeats and ale for the men."
"No tea?" asked Rhoda.
"I was near ten years old, child, ere coffee came into England; and tea
was some years later. The first coffee-house that ever was in this
realm was set up at Oxford, of one Jacobs, a Jew; and about two years
after was the first in London. For tea, 'twas said Queen Catherine
brought it hither from Portingale; but in truth, I believe 'twas known
among us somewhat sooner. But when it came in, for a long time none
knew how to use it, except at the coffee-houses. I could tell you a
droll tale of a neighbour of Farmer Ingham's, that had a parcel of tea
sent her as a great present from London, with a letter that said 'twas
all the mode with the quality. And what did she, think you, but boiled
it like cabbage, and bade all her neighbours come taste the new greens."
"Did they like them?" asked Rhoda, as well as she could speak for
laughing.
"I heard they all thought with their hostess, who said, `If those were
quality greens, the quality were welcome to keep 'em; country folk would
rather have cabbage and spinach any day.'"
"Well!" said Rhoda, bridling a little, when her amusement had subsided;
"'tis very silly for mean people to ape the quality."
"It is so, my dear," replied Mrs Dorothy, with that extreme quietness
which was the nearest her gentle spirit could come to irony. "'Tis
silly for any to ape another, be he less or more."
"Why, there can be no communication between them," observed Rhoda, with
a toss of her head.
"`Communication,' my dear," said Mrs Dolly. "Yonder's a new word.
Where did you pick it up?"
"O Mrs Dolly! you can't be in the mode if you don't pick up all the new
words," answered Rhoda more affectedly than ever. She was showing off
now, and was entirely in her element.
"And pray what are the other new words, my dear?" inquired Mrs Dorothy
good-naturedly, and not without a little amusement. "That one sounds
very much like the old-fashioned `commerce.'"
"Well, I don't know them all!" said Rhoda, with an assumption of
humility; "but now-o'-days, when you speak of any one's direction, you
must say _adresse_, from the French; and if one is out of spirits, you
say he is _hipped_--that's from hypochondriacal; and a crowd of people
is a _mob_--that's short for mobile; and when a man goes about, and
doesn't want to be known, you say he is _incog._--that means incognito,
which is the Spanish for unknown. Then you say Mr Such-an-one spends
_to the tune of five_ hundred a year; and there are a lot of men _of his
kidney_; and _I bantered them_ well about it. Oh, there are lots of new
words, Mrs Dolly."
"So it seems, my dear. But are you sure incognito is Spanish?"
"Oh, yes! William Knight told me so," said Rhoda, with another toss of
her head.
"I imagined it was Latin," observed Mrs Dorothy. "But 'tis true, I
know nought of either tongue."
"Oh, William Knight knows everything," said Rhoda, hyperbolically.
"He must be a very ingenious young man," quietly observed Mrs Dorothy.
"Well, he is," said Rhoda, scarcely perceiving the satire latent in Mrs
Dorothy's calm tones.
"I am glad to hear it, my dear," returned the old lady.
"But he's very uppish,--that's pos.," resumed the young one.
"Really, my dear, you are full of new words," said Mrs Dorothy,
good-naturedly. "What means `pos.,' pray you?"
"Why, `positive,'" said Rhoda, laughing. "And _rep._ means reputation,
and _fire_ means spirit, and _smart_ means sharp, and a _concert_ means
a lot of people singing and playing on instruments of music, and an
_operation_ means anything you do, and a _speculation_ means--well, it
means--it means a speculation, you know."
"Dear, dear!" cried little Mrs Dorothy, holding up her hands. "I
protest, my dear, I shall be drove to learn the English tongue anew if
this mode go on."
"Well, Mrs Dolly, suppose your tale should go on?" suggested Rhoda.
"Heyday! do you know what everybody is saying?--everybody that is
anybody, you understand."
"I thought that everybody was somebody," remarked Mrs Dorothy, with a
comical set of the lips.
"Oh dear, no!" said Rhoda. "There are ever so many people who are
nobody."
"Indeed!" said Mrs Dorothy. "Well, child, what is everybody saying?"
"Why, they say the Duke is not so well with the Queen as he has been.
'Tis thought, I assure you, by many above people."
"Is that one of the new words?" inquired Mrs Dorothy, with a little
laugh. "Dear child, what mean you?--the angels?"
"Oh, Mrs Dorothy, you are the oddest creature!" cried Rhoda. "Why, you
know very well what I mean. Should you be sorry, Mrs Dolly, if the
Duke became inconsiderable?"
"No, my dear. Why should I?"
"Well, I thought--" but Rhoda's thought went no further.
"You thought," quietly continued the old lady, "that I had not had enow
of town vanities, and would fain climb a few rungs up the ladder,
holding on to folks' skirts. Was that it, child?"
"Well, I don't know," said Rhoda uneasily, for Mrs Dorothy had
translated her thought into rather too plain language.
"Ah, my dear, that is because you would love to climb a little
yourself," said Mrs Dorothy, smilingly, "and you apprehend no
inconveniency from it. But, child, 'tis the weariest work in all the
world--except it be climbing from earth to heaven. To climb on men's
ladders is mostly as a squirrel climbs in its cage,--round and round;
you think yourself going vastly higher, but those that stand on the firm
ground and watch you see that you do but go round. But to climb up
Jacob's ladder, whereof the Lord stands at the top, it will be other
eyes that behold you climbing up, when in your own eyes you have not
bettered yourself by a step. Climb as high as you will there, dear
maids!--but never mind the ladders that go round. They are infinitely
disappointing. I know it, for I have climbed them."
"Well, Mrs Dolly, do go on, now, and tell us all about it, there's a
good soul!" said Rhoda.
Little Mrs Dorothy was executing some elaborate knitting. She went on
with it for a few seconds in silence.
"I was but sixteen," she said, quietly, "when my mother came to visit
me. I could not remember seeing her before: and very frighted was I of
the grand gentlewoman, for so she seemed to me, that rustled into the
farmhouse kitchen in silken brocade, and a velvet tippet on her neck.
She was evenly disappointed with me. She thought me stiff and gloomy;
and I thought her strange and full of vanities. `In three years' time,
Dolly,' quoth she, `thou wilt be nineteen, and I will then have thee up
to Town, and thou shalt see somewhat of the world. Thou art not
ill-favoured,' quoth she,--'twas my mother that said this, my dears,"
modestly interpolated Mrs Dorothy,--"and I dare say thou wilt be the
Town talk in a week. 'Tis pity there is no better world to have thee
into!--and thy father as sour and Puritanical as any till of late, save
the mark!--but there, `we must swim with the tide,' saith she. `'Tis a
long lane that has no turning.' Ah me! but the lane had turned ere I
was nineteen."
"Why, Mrs Dolly, the Restoration must have been that very year,"
observed Rhoda.
"That very year," repeated Mrs Dorothy. "'Twas in April I quitted
Farmer Ingham's house, and was fetched up to London; and in May came the
King in, and was shortly thereafter crowned."
"If it please you," asked Phoebe, speaking for the first time of her own
accord, "were you glad to go, Madam?"
"Well, my dear, I was partly glad and partly sorry. I was sorrowful to
take leave of mine old friends, little knowing if I should ever see them
again or no; yet, like an untried maid, I was mightily set up with the
thought of seeing London, and the lions, and Whitehall, and the like.
Silly maid that I was! I had better have shed tears for the last than
for the first."
"What thought you the finest thing in London?" said Rhoda. "But tell
us, what thought you of London altogether?"
"Why, the first thing I thought of was the size and the noise," answered
Mrs Dorothy. "It seemed to me such a great overgrown town, so
different from Saint Albans; and so many carts and wheelbarrows always
rattling over the stones; and so many folks in the streets; and all the
strange cries of a morning. I thought my father a very strange, cold
man, of whom I was no little afraid; and my mother was sadly
disappointed that I did not roll my eyes, and had not been taught to
dance."
"Why did they ever leave you at a farmhouse?" inquired Rhoda, rather
scornfully.
"_I_ cannot entirely say, my dear; but I think that was mainly my
father's doing. My poor father!"
And Mrs Dorothy's handkerchief was hastily passed across her eyes.
"The first night I came," she said, "my mother had a large assembly in
her withdrawing-chamber. There were smart-dressed ladies fluttering of
their fans, and gentlemen in all the colours of the rainbow; and I,
foolish maid! right well pleased when one and another commended my
country complexion, or told me something about my fine eyes: when all at
once came a heavy hand on my shoulder, and my father saith, `Dorothy, I
would speak with you.' I followed him forth, not a little trembling
lest he should be about to chide me; but he led me into his own closet,
and shut the door. He bade me sit, and leaning over the fire himself,
he said nought for a moment. Then saith he, `Dorothy, you heard Mr
Debenham speak to you?' `Yes, Sir,' quoth I. `And what said he,
child?' goes on my father, gently. I was something loth to repeat what
he had said; for it was what I, in my foolish heart, thought a very fine
speech about Mrs Doll's fine eyes, that glistered like stars. Howbeit,
my father waited quiet enough; and having been well bred to obey by
Farmer Ingham, I brought it out at last. `Did you believe it, Dorothy?'
saith my father. `Did you think he meant it?' I did but whisper, `Yes,
Sir,' for I could not but feel very much ashamed. `Then, Dorothy,'
saith he, `the first lesson you will do well to learn in London is that
men and women do not always mean it when they flatter you. And he does
not. Ah!' saith my father, fetching a great sigh,--`'tis easy work for
fathers to say such things, but not so for maidens to believe them.
There is one other thing I would have you learn, Dorothy.' `Yes, Sir,'
quoth I, when he stayed. He turned him around, and looked in my face
with his dark eyes, that seemed to burn into me, and he saith, `Learn
this, Dorothy,--that 'tis the easiest thing in all the world for a man
to drift away from God. Ay, or a woman either. You may do it, and
never know that you have done it,--for a while, at least. David was two
full years ere he found it out. Oh Dorothy, take warning! I was once
as innocent as you are. I have drifted from God, oh my child, how far!
The Lord keep you from a like fate.' I was fairly affrighted, for his
face was terrible. An hour after, I saw him dealing the cards at ombre,
with a look as bright and mirthful as though he knew not grief but by
name."