THE BARFLEUR FAMILY
I am writing these notes on Tuesday, November twenty-eighth, very close
to a grate fire in a pretty little sitting-room in an English country
house about twenty-five miles from London, and I am very chilly.
We reached this place by some winding road, inscrutable in the night,
and I wondered keenly what sort of an atmosphere it would have. The
English suburban or country home of the better class has always been
a concrete thought to me--rather charming on the whole. A carriage
brought us, with all the bags and trunks carefully looked after (in
England you always keep your luggage with you), and we were met in the
hall by the maid who took our coats and hats and brought us something
to drink. There was a small fire glowing in the fireplace in the
entrance hall, but it was so small--cheerful though it was--that I
wondered why Barfleur had taken all the trouble to send a wireless
from the sea to have it there. It seems it is a custom, in so far as
his house is concerned, not to have it. But having heard something of
English fires and English ideas of warmth, I was not greatly surprised.
“I am going to be cold,” I said to myself, at once. “I know it. The
atmosphere is going to be cold and raw and I am going to suffer
greatly. It will be the devil and all to write.”
I fancy this is a very fair and pretty example of the average country
home near London, and it certainly lacks none of the appointments
which might be considered worthy of a comfortable home; but it is as
cold as a sepulcher, and I can’t understand the evoluted system of
procedure which has brought about any such uncomfortable state and
maintains it as satisfactory. These Britons are actually warm when
the temperature in the room is somewhere between forty-five and fifty
and they go about opening doors and windows with the idea that the
rooms need additional airing. They build you small, weak coal fires in
large, handsome fireplaces, and then if the four or five coals huddled
together are managing to keep themselves warm by glowing, they tell you
that everything is all right (or stroll about, at least, looking as
though it were). Doors are left open; the casement windows flung out,
everything done to give the place air and draughtiness.
“Now,” said my host, with his usual directness of speech, as I stood
with my back to the hall fireplace, “I think it is best that you should
go to bed at once and get a good night’s rest. In the morning you shall
have your breakfast at whatever hour you say. Your bath will be brought
you a half or three-quarters of an hour before you appear at table, so
that you will have ample time to shave and dress. I shall be here until
eleven-fifteen to see how you are getting along, after which I shall
go to the city. You shall have a table here, or wherever you like, and
the maid will serve your luncheon punctually at two o’clock. At half
past four your tea will be brought to you, in case you are here. In the
evening we dine at seven-thirty. I shall be down on the five fifty-two
train.”
So he proceeded definitely to lay out my life for me and I had to
smile. “That vast established order which is England,” I thought
again. He accompanied me to my chamber door, or rather to the foot of
the stairs. There he wished me pleasant dreams. “And remember,” he
cautioned me with the emphasis of one who has forgotten something of
great consequence, “this is most important. Whatever you do, don’t
forget to put out your boots for the maid to take and have blacked.
Otherwise you will disrupt the whole social procedure of England.”
It is curious--this feeling of being quite alone for the first time in
a strange land. I began to unpack my bags, solemnly thinking of New
York. Presently I went to the window and looked out. One or two small
lights burned afar off. I undressed and got into bed, feeling anything
but sleepy. I lay and watched the fire flickering on the hearth. So
this was really England, and here I was at last--a fact absolutely of
no significance to any one else in the world, but very important to me.
An old, old dream come true! And it had passed so oddly--the trip--so
almost unconsciously, as it were. We make a great fuss, I thought,
about the past and the future, but the actual moment is so often
without meaning. Finally, after hearing a rooster crow and thinking of
Hamlet’s father--his ghost--and the chill that invests the thought of
cock-crow in that tragedy, I slept.
* * * * *
Morning came and with it a knocking on the door. I called, “Come in.”
In came the maid, neat, cleanly, rosy-cheeked, bringing a large tin
basin--very much wider than an American tub but not so deep--a large
water can, full of hot water, towels and the like. She put the tub and
water can down, drew a towel rack from the wall nearby, spread out the
towels and left.
I did not hear her take the boots, but when I went to the door they
were gone. In the afternoon they were back again, nice and bright. I
speculated on all this as an interesting demonstration of English life.
Barfleur is not so amazingly well-to-do, but he has all these things.
It struck me as pleasing, soothing, orderly--quite the same thing I
had been seeing on the train and the ship. It was all a part of that
interesting national system which I had been hearing so much about.
At breakfast it was quite the same--a most orderly meal. Barfleur was
there to breakfast with me and see that I was started right. His face
was smiling. How did I like it? Was I comfortable? Had I slept well?
Had I slept very well? It was bad weather, but I would rather have to
expect that at this season of the year.
I can see his smiling face--a little cynical and disillusioned--get
some faint revival of his own native interest in England in my
surprise, curiosity and interest. The room was cold, but he did not
seem to think so. No, no, no, it was very comfortable. I was simply not
acclimated yet. I would get used to it.
This house was charming, I thought, and here at breakfast I was
introduced to the children. Berenice Mary Barfleur, the only girl and
the eldest child, looked to me at first a little pale and thin--quite
peaked, in fact--but afterwards I found her not to be so--merely a
temperamental objection on my part to a type which afterwards seemed to
me very attractive. She was a decidedly wise, high-spoken, intellectual
and cynical little maid. Although only eleven years of age she
conversed with the air, the manner and the words of a woman of twenty.
“Oh, yes. Amáyreeka! Is that a nice place? Do you like it?”
I cannot in the least way convey the touch of lofty, well-bred feeling
it had--quite the air and sound of a woman of twenty-five or thirty
schooled in all the niceties of polite speech. “What a child,” I
thought. “She talks as though she were affected, but I can see that
she is not.” Quite different she seemed from what any American child
could be--less vigorous, more intellectual, more spiritual; perhaps not
so forceful but probably infinitely more subtle. She looked delicate,
remote, Burne-Jonesy--far removed from the more commonplace school of
force we know--and I think I like our type better. I smiled at her and
she seemed friendly enough, but there was none of that running forward
and greeting people which is an average middle-class American habit.
She was too well bred. I learned afterward, from a remark dropped at
table by her concerning American children, that it was considered bad
form. “American children are the kind that run around hotel foyers with
big bows on their hair and speak to people,” was the substance of it. I
saw at once how bad American children were.
Well, then came the eldest boy, Percy Franklin Barfleur, who reminded
me, at first glance, of that American caricature type--dear to
the newspaper cartoonist--of Little Johnnie Bostonbeans. Here he
was--“glawses,” inquiring eyes, a bulging forehead, a learned air;
and all at ten years, and somewhat undersized for his age--a clever
child; sincere, apparently; rather earnest; eager to know, full of the
light of youthful understanding. Like his sister, his manners were
quite perfect but unstudied. He smiled and replied, “Quite well, thank
you,” to my amused inquiries after him. I could see he was bright and
thoughtful, but the unconscious (though, to me, affected) quality
of the English voice amused me here again. Then came Charles Gerard
Barfleur, and James Herbert Barfleur, who impressed me in quite the
same way as the others. They were nice, orderly children but English,
oh, so English!
It was while walking in the garden after breakfast that I encountered
James Herbert Barfleur, the youngest; but, in the confusion of meeting
people generally, I did not recognize him. He was outside the coach
house, where are the rooms of the gardener, and where my room is.
“And which little Barfleur might this be?” I asked genially, in that
patronizing way we have with children.
“James Herbert Barfleur,” he replied, with a gravity of pronunciation
which quite took my breath away. We are not used to this formal dignity
of approach in children of so very few years in America. This lad was
only five years of age and he was talking to me in the educated voice
of one of fifteen or sixteen. I stared, of course.
“You don’t tell me,” I replied. “And what is your sister’s name, again?”
“Berenice Mary Barfleur,” he replied.
“Dear, dear, dear,” I sighed. “Now what do you know about that?”
Of course such a wild piece of American slang as that had no
significance to him whatsoever. It fell on his ears without meaning.
“I don’t know,” he replied, interested in some fixture he was fastening
to a toy bath tub.
“Isn’t that a fine little bath tub you have,” I ventured, eager to
continue the conversation because of its novelty.
“It’s a nice little bawth,” he went on, “but I wouldn’t call it a tub.”
I really did not know how to reply to this last, it took me so by
surprise;--a child of five, in little breeches scarcely larger than my
two hands, making this fine distinction. “We surely live and learn,” I
thought, and went on my way smiling.
This house interested me from so many other points of view, being
particularly English and new, that I was never weary of investigating
it. I had a conversation with the gardener one morning concerning his
duties and found that he had an exact schedule of procedure which
covered every day in the year. First, I believe, he got hold of the
boots, delivered to him by the maid, and did those; and then he brought
up his coal and wood and built the fires; and then he had some steps
and paths to look after; and then some errands to do, I forget what.
There was the riding pony to curry and saddle, the stable to clean--oh,
quite a long list of things which he did over and over, day after
day. He talked with such an air of responsibility, as so many English
servants do, that I was led to reflect upon the reliability of English
servants in general; and he dropped his h’s where they occurred, of
course, and added them where they shouldn’t have been. He told me how
much he received, how much he had received, how he managed to live on
it, how shiftless and irresponsible some people were.
“They don’t know ’ow to get along, sir,” he informed me with the same
solemn air of responsibility. “They just doesn’t know ’ow to manige,
sir, I tyke it; some people doesn’t, sir. They gets sixteen or highteen
shillin’s, the same as me, sir, but hawfter they goes and buys five or
six g’uns (I thought he said guns--he actually said gallons) o’ beer in
the week, there hain’t much left fer other things, is there, sir? Now
that’s no wy, sir, is it, sir? I hawsk you.”
I had to smile at the rural accent. He was so simple minded--so
innocent, apparently. Every one called him Wilkins--not Mr. Wilkins (as
his colleagues might in America) or John or Jack or some sobriquet, but
just Wilkins. He was Wilkins to every one--the master, the maid, the
children. The maid was Dora to every one, and the nurse, Nana. It was
all interesting to me because it was so utterly new.
And then this landscape round about; the feel of the country was
refreshing. I knew absolutely nothing about it, and yet I could see
and feel that we were in a region of comfortable suburban life. I
could hear the popping of guns all day long, here--and thereabouts--this
being the open season for shooting, not hunting, as my host informed
me; there was no such thing as hunting hereabouts. I could see men
strolling here and there together, guns under their arms, plaid caps
on their heads, in knee breeches, and leather leggings. I could see,
from my writing desk in the drawing-room window, clever-riding English
girls bounding by on light-moving horses, and in my limited walks I
saw plenty of comfortable-looking country places--suburban homes. I
was told by a friend of mine that this was rather a pleasant country
section, but that I might see considerable of the same thing anywhere
about London at this distance.
“Dora” the maid interested me very much. She was so quiet, so silent
and so pretty. The door would open, any time during the day when I was
writing, and in she would come to look after the fire, to open or close
the windows, to draw the curtains, light the candles and serve the tea,
or to call me to luncheon or dinner. Usually I ate my luncheon and
drank my four-o’clock tea alone. I ate my evening meal all alone once.
It made no difference--my eating alone. The service was quite the same;
the same candles were lighted--several brackets on different parts of
the table; the fire built in the dining-room. There were four or five
courses and wine. Dora stood behind me watching me eat in silence, and
I confess I felt very queer. It was all so solemn, so stately. I felt
like some old gray baron or bachelor shut away from the world and given
to contemplating the follies of his youth. When through with nuts and
wine--the final glass of port--it was the custom of the house to retire
to the drawing-room and drink the small cup of black coffee which was
served there. And on this night, although I was quite alone, it was the
same. The coffee was served just as promptly and dignifiedly as though
there were eight or ten present. It interested me greatly, all of it,
and pleased me more than I can say.
Personally I shall always be glad that I saw some rural aspects
of England first, for they are the most characterful and, to me,
significant. London is an amazing city and thoroughly English, but
the rural districts are more suggestive. In what respects do the
people of one country differ from those of another, since they eat,
sleep, rise, dress, go to work, return, love, hate, and aspire alike?
In little--dynamically, mechanically speaking. But temperamentally,
emotionally, spiritually and even materially they differ in almost
every way. England is a mood, I take it, a combination of dull
colors and atmosphere. It expresses heaven only knows what feeling
for order, stability, uniformity, homeliness, simplicity. It is
highly individual--more so almost than Italy, France or Germany. It
is vital--and yet vital in an intellectual way only. You would say
off-hand, sensing the feel of the air, that England is all mind with
convictions, prejudices, notions, poetic longings terribly emphasized.
The most egotistic nation in the world because, perhaps, the most
forcefully intellectual.
How different is the very atmosphere of it from America. The great open
common about this house smacked of English individuality, leisure,
order, stratification--anything you will. The atmosphere was mistily
damp, the sun at best a golden haze. All the bare trees were covered
with a thin coating of almost spring-green moss. The ground was
springy, dewy. Rooks were in the sky, the trees. Little red houses
in the valleys, with combination flues done in quaint individual
chimney pots send upward soft spirals of blue smoke. Laborers, their
earth-colored trousers strapped just below the knees by a small leather
strap, appeared ever and anon; housemaids, spick and span, with black
dresses, white aprons, white laces in their hair, becoming streamers of
linen made into large trig bows at their backs, appeared at some door
or some window of almost every home. The sun glints into such orderly,
well-dressed windows; the fields suspire such dewy fragrances. You can
encounter hills of sheep, creaking wains, open common land of gorse
and wild berries. My little master, smartly clad, dashes by on a pony;
my young mistress looks becomingly gay and superior on a Shetland or
a cob. A four-year-old has a long-eared white donkey to ride. That is
England.
How shall it be said--how described? It is so delicate, so remote, so
refined, so smooth, a pleasant land of great verse and great thought.