[Illustration:
CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL
OF
POPULAR
LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART
FIFTH SERIES
ESTABLISHED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, 1832
CONDUCTED BY R. CHAMBERS (SECUNDUS)
NO. 49.—VOL. I. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1884. PRICE 1½_d._]
POISONING.
An examination of the Registrar-general’s annual Report for 1882 gives
some interesting and suggestive statistics as to cases of poisoning,
which we think it may not be out of place to call attention to.
Probably few of our readers will be aware how frequently cases of
poisoning occur in the ordinary course of events. In the year 1881,
for example, there were five hundred and sixty-nine deaths recorded
in England alone from poisoning; while the year 1882 shows a record
considerably in excess of this, namely, five hundred and ninety-nine,
or one in every eight hundred and sixty-three of the total deaths
registered. Fully two-fifths of these cases are classified under the
heading ‘Accident and Negligence’—the remainder are suicides, of which
we will have a word to say by-and-by—and as it is not too much to
assume that in nearly every instance such cases are preventable, we
purpose calling attention to some of the more common causes of these
fatalities, in the hope that the suggestions and warnings thrown out
may not be without their influence in producing more care in the
handling and use of these dangerous substances.
Glancing over the various poisons, we find that the well-known
preparations of opium, laudanum, and morphia—opium itself being
included—head the list, having caused eighty-five deaths through
accident or negligence. This might have been expected from preparations
so largely used in domestic remedies; but the seventy-eight deaths from
lead-poisoning which follow do surprise us, in view of the fact that
the conditions which produce as well as the conditions which mitigate
or counteract the effects of this subtle poison, are now so well known.
Lead is followed by the four stronger acids—hydrochloric, nitric,
sulphuric, and carbolic, which amongst them have caused thirty-four
deaths under the same category. Arsenic, again, caused nine;
phosphorus, eleven; chlorodyne, six; chloral, fourteen; chloroform,
four; soothing syrup, four; with a host of casualties from substances
of minor importance.
Reading between the lines of the Registrar-general’s Report, which
it is not difficult to do, with the help of the medical journals, we
will find that there are two prolific causes of these accidents—first,
the giving or taking of overdoses of certain remedies containing
poisons; and second, the substitution of one bottle or substance for
another, as, for example, where a number of substances are congregated
together, as in the case of the domestic cupboard. In the first class
may be instanced the giving of overdoses of opiates or soothing
preparations to children; the taking of overdoses of narcotics or
soothing compounds, such as chloral, by habitual drinkers; and the
general familiarity which the handling or using of these powerful
agents frequently begets in those habitually using them. In the second
class may be instanced such mistakes as the substituting of one bottle
containing, say, a poisonous liniment, for a mixture intended for
internal administration; the hasty and foolish practice of quaffing off
a draught from any jug, bottle, or dish without examining the contents;
and lastly, mistakes caused from accumulating within easy access
powerful medicines, in the hope that they may come of future use.
Now, every good housewife may not be a trained nurse, but she is almost
certain to be called upon at one time or another to act as nurse, and
she may save herself many a bitter reflection if she would only attend
to the following simple and easy to be remembered rules:
(1) Never give an infant an opiate or other powerful soothing remedy
without first obtaining the sanction of the doctor. No practice is more
common when mothers meet than to talk over their children’s complaints,
suggest remedies, and magnify their several experiences, with the
result that domestic recipes are lauded, approved, and tried too often
in total ignorance either of their suitability or safety. Few mothers
are aware of the important fact, that a medicine containing a narcotic
or soothing ingredient may cure one infant and kill another of equal
strength, age, &c. This varied action of soothing remedies on infants
cannot be too well known or too strongly impressed upon mothers.
(2) Where powerful remedies, particularly such as contain opiates or
chloral, are being administered, the patients should not be allowed
to measure them or repeat the dose for themselves. In the midst of
racking pain or tossing about with sleeplessness, the chances are
that the patient will take a larger dose than that prescribed, to
obtain speedier relief; although it is not even in this that the
principal risk of accident lies. The great risk is that the patient
will repeat the dose before the influence of the previous dose has
exhausted itself; repeating the dose in a state of semi-consciousness
or of complete recklessness, to the total disregard of either quantity
or consequence. It would be well if persons in the habit of taking
laudanum, morphia, chloral, and chlorodyne would keep this danger in
mind.
(3) Never place bottles or packets containing poison alongside of those
intended for internal use. This is one of the most prolific causes of
accidents; and experience has shown that neither the distinctive blue
corrugated bottles, which are now frequently used to hold poisons,
nor labels, are sufficient to insure immunity from accident, even
among trained nurses, where medicines are allowed to be collected
indiscriminately together. (In the act of writing this, a case in point
has come under our observation which well illustrates the fearful
risk that is run in failing to attend to this simple rule. A daughter
was requested by her mother to give her a dose of her medicine. Only
two bottles were on the dressing-room table, the one containing the
medicine required, and the other containing a poisonous liniment. The
daughter saw the liniment bottle, read the label poison, took up the
other bottle containing the mixture correctly, but put it down again
to pick something up, and the second time took up the bottle, but this
time without reading the label, with the result that the liniment was
given instead of the mixture, with fatal results. Similar cases might
be multiplied indefinitely.)
(4) Never put any poison, such as carbolic acid, oxalic acid, or any
other of the stronger acids into beer-bottles, jugs, cups, or other
vessels which both children and adults are apt to associate in their
minds with substances not in themselves dangerous. One can hardly
take up a medical journal without finding some death recorded in this
manner. A bottle or cup is standing on a table or in a cupboard, and
under the impression that it contains beer or spirits, tea or coffee,
or even pure water, some one quaffs the contents, and only finds when
it is probably too late that he has drunk some virulent poison. One
is very apt to say, ‘How stupid!’ on reading such cases, and yet one
of the earliest experiences of the writer was in connection with a
mistake in every respect resembling this, and it well illustrates how
such mistakes may be made by intelligent if not even educated men—men
trained to exercise eyes, nose, and mouth—without their being detected
until too late. A student in the dispensary, one hot dusty day,
feeling thirsty, thought he would slake his thirst not at the tap, but
from the ‘Aqua fontana’ bottle on the shelf. Next this bottle stood
another containing turpentine, both bottles being correctly and plainly
labelled. Feeling confident in his bottle, he carelessly lifted it
from the shelf, took a long draught, and never discovered that he was
quaffing the turpentine until the bottle was withdrawn from his mouth.
Fortunately, nature dealt kindly by the lad, in quickly rejecting the
nauseous liquid.
Lastly, never accumulate powerful remedies, in the belief that they
may be required on some future occasion. It is highly probable that
many of our readers will have a family medicine chest in which there
is a place for every bottle, and in which every bottle must be in its
place, and the whole in beautiful order. This is the very idea for a
medicine cupboard—not only a place for everything, and everything in
its place, but all plainly and correctly marked. As a rule, however,
nothing can be further from the reality than such a picture. The
ordinary domestic medicine cupboard is too frequently a shelf of
some press or dark closet, where all medicines and remedies not in
use—poisonous liniments, poisonous mixtures, simples, and so on—are
all literally huddled together, with nothing to mark their contents
save the stereotyped directions: ‘The liniment for external use,’ or,
‘A teaspoonful three times a day.’ It is not difficult under such
circumstances to picture a typical case of what is almost certain
sooner or later to occur. Johnny, one of the children, is frequently
troubled with a cough, but the east winds having for a time been
propitious, Johnny’s cough mixture is put away in the cupboard.
By-and-by, however, Johnny overheats himself, is again caught by the
east wind, and so his mamma goes to the cupboard for his mixture.
Johnny escapes it may be all the poisonous liniments, for the bottle is
distinctly marked, ‘A teaspoonful three times a day;’ but Johnny does
not by any means escape all risk, for it is more than probable that his
mamma has quite forgotten about his papa’s tonic mixture containing
strychnine, or her own fever mixture containing aconite, or his older
brother’s mixture containing arsenic, and probably many others, all
labelled, ‘A teaspoonful three times a day,’ and all resembling
Johnny’s as much as two peas do each other. This is no fanciful
picture, but one which we have experienced again and again—sometimes
with serious consequences, but more frequently with more fright than
hurt. Still, such a risk should never be run. The agony which a
mother feels when she realises either that she has given, or that her
child has taken an overdose of poison or of some powerful medicine by
mistake, requires to be witnessed to be understood in all its terrible
reality; but once witnessed, we think it might be sufficient to act as
a warning as to getting too familiar or careless in the handling or
storing of such potent agents.
Nevertheless, it is a remarkable fact that some persons never acquire
this caution, even with such a bitter experience as that described. We
remember being called up one midnight to a case of poisoning, where
an ounce of saltpetre had been given for an ounce of Epsom salts. The
mother recollected placing the salts in the cupboard, but she forgot
one other very important fact, that she had also placed the packet of
saltpetre in the same place some time previously, and so she took the
first packet that came to her hand and made it up without the slightest
inspection. Notwithstanding this experience, a week or two later she
made a similar mistake with another poison from the same cupboard. A
phial of croton oil, used to produce an eruption on the chest, was
lifted instead of a phial of olive oil, and poured into the ear to
relieve earache.
Referring for a moment to suicides, of which there were two hundred
and eighty-eight for the same period, we find some curious and
even extraordinary statistics. For example, there is a very great
difference, as a rule, in the agents employed by men and by women
to effect suicide. A class of poisons under the generic name of
vermin-killers, but which in the majority of instances are merely
arsenic or strychnine disguised, have been the agents used by seventeen
females and only seven males. The opium preparations, on the other
hand, very nearly reverse these proportions, having been used by
twenty males and only twelve females. Carbolic acid, again, has been
used by thirteen females and only six males; and so on. Apparently,
the agent used in the majority of cases is determined either by a
facility in the obtaining of the poison, or by a certain familiarity in
the every-day use of it, otherwise we cannot account for the general
use of some slow, uncertain, and frightfully painful poisons such as
carbolic acid and phosphorus. Of more importance, however, than this
are the following facts, which we think require some explanation or
investigation. We find one hundred and one deaths recorded—fifty-eight
by accident and forty-three by suicide—from seven substances alone, not
one of which the legislature at present requires to be labelled poison!
Surely this requires some looking after. We find seventy-eight deaths
(not suicides) from lead-poisoning. We would like to know how far these
seventy-eight deaths are to be accounted for from absorption of the
poison by those working amongst it, and how far they might have been
avoided by ordinary precautions? Lastly, we find one hundred and two
deaths—twenty-six by accident and seventy-six by suicide—from poisons
which should not be sold unless under the strictest regulations. We
would like to know how far these regulations have been observed in
these cases, as we have reason to conclude that there is a laxity
existing somewhere.
ONE WOMAN’S HISTORY.
_A NOVELETTE._
BY T. W. SPEIGHT.
CHAPTER XI.
The first thing that struck Colonel Woodruffe on entering the room of
Madame De Vigne was the extreme pallor of her face. She looked like a
woman newly restored to the world after a long and dangerous illness.
Although the window was wide open, the venetians were lowered, while
Mora herself was dressed in black, and in the semi-obscurity of the
room, her white, set face, with its sorrow-laden eyes, had an effect
that was almost ghostlike to one coming suddenly out of the glaring
sunlight. At least so it seemed to Colonel Woodruffe. He felt that at
such a time all commonplace questions would seem trivial and out of
place, so he went forward without a word, and lifting her hand, pressed
it gently to his lips.
‘Read this, please,’ she said as she handed him her husband’s letter.
Then they both sat down.
He read the note through slowly and carefully. As he handed it back to
her, he said: ‘What do you mean to do?’
‘I shall see him at the hour he specifies, and shall tell him that I
have already commissioned you to seek out Sir William Ridsdale and tell
him everything.’
‘Everything?’ he asked.
‘Everything,’ she answered in the same hard, dry voice; a slight
trembling of her long, thin fingers was the only sign that betrayed
the emotion pent up within. ‘Dear friend,’ she went on, ‘I want you at
once to find Sir William and tell him everything as I told it to you on
Wednesday. It will then be for him to decide whether he can accept the
sister of an ex-convict’s wife for his daughter-in-law. If he cannot,
then God help my poor Clarice! But nothing must be kept back from him,
whatever the result may be.’ Then after a little pause, she said,
looking earnestly into his face: ‘Do you not agree with me?’
‘I do,’ he answered. ‘The right thing is always the best thing to do,
whatever consequences may follow. Depend upon it, you will lose nothing
in the eyes of Sir William by throwing yourself on his generosity in
the way you propose doing.—But I have had news. Sir William will be
here—at the _Palatine_—in the course of a few hours.’
‘Ah! So much the better. So will the climax come all the more quickly.
But, my poor Clari! Oh, my poor, darling Clari!’ Her lips quivered, a
stifled sob broke from her heart, but her eyes were as dry and tearless
as before.
The colonel waited a moment, and then he said: ‘What you purpose
telling a certain person at your interview this evening will enable you
to set him at defiance—will it not?’
‘It will—thoroughly and completely. I shall have taken the initiative
out of his hands, and he will be powerless to harm me.’
‘Your fortune?’ he said.
‘Is settled strictly on myself. He cannot touch a penny of it.’ Then,
after a pause, she added: ‘Not that I want him to starve; not that I
would refuse him a certain share of my money—if I could only feel sure
it would keep him from evil courses. But it would never do that—never!
In such as he, there is no possibility of change.’
‘I will make a point of seeing Sir William as soon as he arrives,’ said
the colonel as he rose and pushed back his chair. ‘I suppose that is
what you would like me to do?’
‘The sooner the better,’ answered Mora, also rising. ‘You will come to
me the moment you have any news?’
‘I will not fail to do so. For the present, I presume you will say
nothing to your sister?’
‘Why trouble her till the time comes? Let her linger in her love-dream
while she may. The waking will be a cruel one when it comes.’
‘With all my heart, I hope not!’ answered the colonel fervently. Then,
as he took her hand, he added: ‘We shall meet again in a few hours.’
‘How good you are!’ she murmured, with a little break in her voice.
He shook his head, but would not trust himself to speak. He was more
moved than he would have cared to own. Once more he lifted her fingers
to his lips. Next moment she was alone.
* * * * *
Mr Dulcimer and Miss Wynter went gaily on their way to the lake. To
hear them talking and laughing, no one would have thought that they had
a care beyond the enjoyment of the passing hour, yet each was secretly
conscious that for them that day might perchance prove one of the
most momentous in their lives. They found a boat with fishing-tackle
awaiting them. Bella shook a little as she bade farewell to _terra
firma_. She felt as an ancient Greek might have felt—that the Fates
were against her—that destiny was stronger than she, and urged her
forward whether she wished it or not. She who had heretofore been so
wilful seemed to have no power of will left in her.
Before long they found themselves at a point near the head of the lake
where Dick had been told that he might possibly find some fish. For a
quarter of an hour or so he plied his rod industriously, but not even a
nibble rewarded his perseverance. ‘Ah,’ said he at last, ‘the fish are
evidently off their feed this morning.’
He did not seem in the least put about by his ill-luck, but laying
his rod across the thwarts, he proceeded leisurely to light his pipe.
Bella watched him nervously. As soon as his pipe was fairly under way,
he looked straight into Bella’s eyes and said: ‘I did not so much come
out here this morning to fish as to secure an opportunity for a little
quiet talk with you.’
‘I can quite believe it. There is something underhand about most things
that you do,’ she answered as she dipped one of her hands carelessly
into the water.
Dick smiled amiably. He delighted in a skirmish.
‘Am I to go back to London to-morrow morning, or am I not? That’s the
question.’
‘Really, Mr Dulcimer, or Mr Golightly, or whatever your name may be, I
am at a loss to know why you should put such a question to me.’
Dick burst into a guffaw.
‘May I ask, sir, what you are laughing at?’
‘At you, of course.’
‘Oh!’ It came out with a sort of snap.
‘You look so comical when you put on that mock-dignified air, that it
always sets me off. Of course I know you can’t help it.’
‘Wretch!’ she retorted, half-starting to her feet. Next moment she sat
down again in mortal terror. The boat was swaying ominously, or so it
seemed to her.
‘Please not to flop about so much,’ he said drily, ‘unless you wish
to find yourself in the water. I’m a tolerable swimmer, and I might,
perhaps, be able to lug you ashore, but I wouldn’t like to guarantee
it.’
Her temper vanished like a flash of summer lightning. ‘Oh, do please
take me back!’ she said, looking at him with a pitiful appeal in her
eyes. Like many town-bred girls, she had an unconquerable dread of
water.
‘You are just as safe here as on shore, so long as you sit still,’ he
answered re-assuringly. And with that he changed his seat and went and
sat down close in front of her.
The colour began to return to her cheeks. He looked so strong and brave
and handsome as he sat there, that she felt ashamed of her fears. What
harm could happen to her while he was there to protect her!
‘Look here, Bella,’ he presently began; ‘where’s the use of you and I
beating any longer about the bush? I must have a distinct answer from
you to-day, Yes or No, whether you will promise to become my wife or
whether you won’t. You know that I love you, just as well as if I told
you so a thousand times. You know that my love is the genuine article,
that there’s nothing sham or pinchbeck about it. Your own heart has
told you that before to-day. There’s something else, too, that it has
told you.’ He paused.
‘Indeed!’ she said, thrusting out her saucy chin a little way. ‘And
what may that be, if you please?’ Her spirit was coming back. She was
not inclined to strike her colours without a struggle.
‘It has told you that you love me,’ he answered slowly and
deliberately, still looking straight into her eyes.
She was silent for a moment. A little spot of deepest red flashed into
each of her cheeks. ‘Indeed, sir, you are mistaken,’ she answered with
a sort of supercilious politeness. ‘I am not aware that my heart has
told me anything of the kind.’
‘Then it’s high time it did tell you,’ was the cool rejoinder. ‘You
love me, Bella, whether you know it or not, and the best of it is that
you can’t help yourself.’
‘Oh! this is too much,’ she cried, and again she half-started to her
feet. The boat rocked a little.
‘You seem to have made up your mind for a ducking,’ said Dick, although
in reality there was not the slightest danger. Next moment she was as
still as a mouse.
He knocked the ashes out of his pipe. ‘Yes, _ma petite_, I’ve got your
heart in my safe keeping; and what’s more, I don’t mean to let you have
it back at any price. The pretty toy is not for sale.’
His audacity took her breath away, yet it may be that she did not like
him less on that account. Certainly Dick’s love-making was of a kind of
which she had had no previous experience.
‘You have got me here by a mean and shabby subterfuge,’ she cried. ‘You
have made a prisoner of me, and now you think you can say what you like
to me.’
‘That’s so,’ he answered equably. ‘Now that I’ve got you here, I mean
to say my say. Idiot if I didn’t!’
Bella had never felt so helpless in her life. This man seemed to turn
all her weapons against herself. And she was afraid even to stamp her
foot!
Richard proceeded to fill his pipe. ‘Don’t you think, _carissima_,
that we have had enough of fencing, you and I?’ he asked as he struck
a match. ‘Don’t you think we had better put the foils aside for the
present and talk a little quiet common-sense?’ His voice had softened
strangely. All his flippancy seemed to have vanished in a moment.
She did not answer. Her eyes were gazing straight over his shoulder
at the great solemn hills in the background—not that she saw them in
reality. He let his match burn itself out, and laid down his unlighted
pipe. Then he leaned forward and took one of her hands in his strong
brown palms. His touch thrilled her. All power of resistance seemed
taken from her. Her bosom rose and fell more quickly, a tender radiance
suffused her eyes, the roses in her cheeks grew larger, and their tints
deepened. Love’s sorcery was upon her. She had drunk of the potion, and
was lost. Never again could she be quite the same as she had been.
What was the ‘quiet common-sense’ he was going to talk? she wondered.
She had her doubts already as to the accuracy of his definition.
‘There comes a time in the lives of most of us,’ he began with unwonted
seriousness and still holding one of her hands, ‘when we are confronted
by two diverging paths, and are called upon to make our choice between
them. At such a crisis you, my dearest, have now arrived. Before you
lie two widely diverging paths, one only of which you can take, and
from which there can be no return. With one of these paths you are
already familiar; you have trodden it for two years; you know whither
it leads, or fancy that you know. If you believe that you will find
your happiness at the end of it, for heaven’s sake, keep to it still!
But if you don’t so believe—why, then, the other path is open to you.’
He paused. She withdrew her hand. He at once began to feel for his
match-box. She regretted that she had not allowed him to retain her
fingers.
‘And that other path leads—whither?’ she asked softly, and with her
eyes still fixed vaguely on the hills behind him.
‘To love in a cottage—or, say, in a semi-detached villa at Camden Town
or Peckham Rye, with one small servant, not overclean.’ Evidently he
had not forgotten what she had said to him on Wednesday. Their eyes
met, and they both broke into a laugh. He put the match-box back in his
pocket and took possession of her hand again.
‘You know that all I can offer you is a warm heart and a slender
purse,’ he said. ‘Not much, I grant, from a worldly point of view;
still, I believe cases have been known where two people have been
venturesome enough to start in life together on a capital as
ridiculously insignificant as that just named, and have not been
unhappy afterwards. On the other hand, you know the brilliant future
which your aunt predicts for you, if you will only be an obedient girl
and do as she wants you to do; that is to say, if you will only marry
the first rich man who proposes to you, whether you care for him or
whether you don’t. Well, there are many young ladies nowadays who seem
to find their happiness in that direction. Why shouldn’t you? As you
said yourself the other day, you are a piece of human bric-à-brac to
be knocked down to the highest bidder.’
‘Don’t, don’t!’ she cried with quivering lips.
‘Be mine, then!’ exclaimed Dick passionately. ‘Become the wife of the
man who loves you, and save yourself from further degradation. At
present you are a slave—a chattel. Break your fetters, cast them behind
you for ever, and come to my arms: there is your proper home!’
‘O Dick, what would my aunt say—what would she do?’ she asked in an
uncertain, tremulous voice.
‘There! now you’ve done it!’ he exclaimed with a laugh, that yet
sounded as if there were a tear in it.
‘Done—what?’ she asked in amaze.
‘Told me all that I want to know!’ he cried in triumph. ‘If your aunt
is the only obstacle—I don’t care for ten thousand aunts! You are
mine—my own—and all the she-dragons in the world shall not tear you
from me!’
Bella saw the uselessness of further resistance, and, like a sensible
girl, she capitulated without another word.
* * * * *
When Friday morning broke clear and sunny, Lady Renshaw’s good temper,
which seemed somehow to have evaporated in the rain and fog of the
previous day, came back to her in a lump as it were. She spent an extra
half-hour over the mysteries of her toilet, donned one of her most
becoming costumes, and descended to the breakfast-room, on conquest
bent. But, alas, when she reached the room she found no one there
to conquer; the enemy was nowhere to be seen. She had the _salle_
almost to herself. Then it began to dawn upon her that there was
just a possibility that both Dr Mac and the vicar might have ‘made
tracks’ thus early in the day on purpose to escape her. And yet such
an idea was almost too preposterous for belief. Had they not both been
unmistakably infatuated on Wednesday, each in his own peculiar way?
Had they not both been palpably jealous of each other? Why, then,
should they try to shun her on Friday? Why should forty-eight hours
make such a vast difference in their feelings? But, perhaps, there was
something in the background of which she knew nothing. Perhaps some one
had been prejudicing the two gentlemen against her. If such were the
case, she could only set it down as the handiwork of that obnoxious
Miss Gaisford. She had felt from the first that she could never like
the vicar’s sister; and besides, was it not just possible that Miss
Gaisford herself might be setting her cap at the doctor? If so, poor
thing, it evidently would be labour in vain.
This thought put her ladyship into a somewhat better humour. Matters
should be altered on the morrow. She would make an heroic effort, and
rise with the lark, or at least early enough to breakfast at the same
time that the gentlemen partook of that meal. It would be her own
fault, then, if she allowed them to slip through her fingers. The poor
dear vicar might go as soon as he had served her purpose in keeping
alive the doctor’s jealousy; but the latter individual she meant to
bring, metaphorically, to his knees before he was many days older, and
she never for a moment doubted her ability to do so. Miss Gaisford,
indeed! Ah ha! let those laugh who win.
She found herself in the sitting-room by the time she arrived at this
triumphant peroration. It was empty. Lady Renshaw, in accordance
with her usual tactics when no one was about, began to pry and peer
here and there, opening such drawers in the writing-table as did not
happen to be locked, turning over the paper and envelopes, and even
submitting the blotting-pad to a careful examination; she had heard
that strange secrets had sometimes been revealed by the agency of a
sheet of blotting-paper. Nothing, however, rewarded her perquisition.
She next crossed to the chimney-piece. Careless people occasionally
left envelopes, and even letters, on that convenient shelf. Here, too,
her search was without success. She felt somewhat aggrieved.
Suddenly her eye was caught by a gleam of something white just inside
the scroll-work of the fender. She had pounced upon it in an instant.
It proved to be merely a scrap of half-charred paper; but when she
had opened it, which she did very carefully, she found it to be
covered with writing. It was, in fact, a fragment of the letter given
by Madame De Vigne to Colonel Woodruffe. The colonel had watched
the flames devour the letter, till it was all gone except the small
portion held between his thumb and finger. This he had dropped without
thought into the fender, where it had till now remained, untouched by
the housemaid’s brush. Lady Renshaw went to the window, and having
first satisfied herself that no one was watching her, she put on her
glasses, and tenderly straightening out the paper on the palm of one
hand, she proceeded to decipher it. The fire had left nothing save a
few brief sentences, which lacked both beginning and end. Such as they
were, however, they seemed pregnant with a sinister significance. Her
ladyship’s colour changed as she read. She was nearly certain that
the writing was that of Madame De Vigne; but in order to make herself
certain on the point, she turned to an album belonging to Clarice which
lay on the table, in which were some verses written by her sister and
signed with her name. Yes—the writing was indisputably that of Madame
De Vigne!
Once more she turned to the scrap of paper and read the words. She
wanted to fix them in her memory. They ran as follows:
‘My husband ... five years ago ... sentenced to penal servitude.... You
now know all.’
‘The key of the mystery, as I live!’ cried Lady Renshaw triumphantly.
‘The widow of a convict! Well might she not care to speak about her
past life. Ah ha! my fine madam, your reign is nearly at an end. I
wonder what Mr Etheridge will say to this. He may be back by now. I
will go in search of him at once. But for whom can the letter have been
intended? In any case, she seems to have repented writing it, and to
have burnt it rather than send it.’
She took a book off the table and placed the fragment carefully between
the leaves, so as to preserve it intact. She then went in search of
Mr Etheridge. That gentleman and Clarice had just returned from their
excursion. Their first care was to examine the letter-rack in the
hall. There they each found a telegram. Clarice tore hers open with a
fluttering heart. This is what it said:
‘Nothing seen here of governor. Telegram from him to Blatchett. Am to
return to Windermere by first train. Hurrah! Governor will meet me at
_Palatine_ to night. Queer, very. No matter. Shall see you as well.’
Clarice turned first red and then white. The terrible Sir William
coming to the _Palatine_—and to-night! It was enough to flutter any
girl’s nerves. She turned to Mr Etheridge and put the message into his
hands. ‘Read it,’ was all she could say.
He had just finished reading his own message, which seemed to be a very
brief one.
‘Well, what do you think?’ she asked nervously, as he returned the
paper to her with a smile.
‘I think it’s about the wisest thing Sir William could do. He
ought to come and see with his own eyes, instead of sending other
people. Of course, the fact of his summoning Mr Archie to London,
and then declining to see him, can only be put down to the score of
eccentricity—though I have no doubt the boy has enjoyed his little trip
to town.’
Clarice looked at him a little reproachfully. As if Archie could enjoy
being anywhere where she was not!
‘I must go and tell Mora the news,’ she said. ‘But oh! Mr Etheridge, do
you think Sir William will want to see me?’
‘I think it very likely indeed.’
‘I was never so frightened in my life. I wish I could hide myself
somewhere till to-morrow.’
‘Pooh, pooh, my dear young lady; Sir William is not an ogre. He is only
a man, like the rest of us.’
‘But he is Archie’s papa.’
‘Is that any reason why you should be frightened at him?’
She nodded her head with considerable emphasis. But at this juncture
Lady Renshaw was seen approaching, and Clarice fled.
‘Can you favour me with a few minutes’ private conversation, Mr
Etheridge?’ said her ladyship.
‘Willingly, madam. Shall we take a stroll on the lawn, as we did
before? There seems to be no one about.’
‘That will do very nicely. I will just fetch my sunshade and then join
you.’ Which she accordingly did. ‘You may recollect, Mr Etheridge, that
one portion of our conversation this morning had reference to Madame De
Vigne?’ began her ladyship in her most confidential manner.
‘I have not forgotten, madam.’
‘Since that time I have made a most surprising discovery—a discovery
I feel bound to say which only tends to confirm the opinion I then
ventured to express. Will you be good enough, my dear sir, to look at
this, and then tell me what you think?’
She opened the book at the page where she had inserted the scrap of
paper, and placed it in his hands.
He stopped in his walk while he read it; but his face was inscrutable,
and Lady Renshaw could gather nothing from it. Presently he lifted his
eyes from the paper and stared at her for a moment or two, his bushy
eyebrows meeting across the deep furrow in his forehead.
‘Where did you obtain this from, may I ask? And what is the meaning of
it?’
‘As you will have observed, it is evidently a fragment of a burnt
letter. I picked it up quite by accident on the floor of the
sitting-room. The writing I know for a fact to be that of Madame De
Vigne. As for the meaning of it—your penetration, my dear sir, is
surely not at fault as regards that?’
‘It is a curious document, certainly—a very curious document,’ remarked
the old man drily.
‘It is more than that, Mr Etheridge,’ remarked her ladyship in her most
tragic tones—‘it is a revelation! Who is this husband of whom mention
is made? Who is this convict who is so openly alluded to? Are they, or
are they not, one and the same man, and if so, is he alive or dead?
Those are points, I should imagine, on which Sir William will require
to be fully enlightened; for, of course, Mr Etheridge, you will see how
imperative it is that the paper should at once be laid before him. What
a very, very fortunate thing that I happened to find it in the way I
did!’
‘Yes, madam, Sir William shall see the paper, undoubtedly. A very
fortunate thing, as you say, that your ladyship happened to find it,
and not any one else, for you, madam, I am quite sure, are discretion
itself.’
‘Just so—just so,’ responded her ladyship uneasily.—‘What a strange
old man!’ she said to herself. ‘I don’t know what to make of him this
morning.’
‘Permit me to whisper a secret in your ladyship’s ear,’ resumed Mr
Etheridge with his odd little smile. ‘I have had a message. Sir William
will be here—here at the _Palatine_—in the course of a few hours.’
Her ladyship could not repress a start. Here was news indeed!
‘But not a word to any one at present, I beg,’ continued the old
gentleman. ‘I want Sir William’s arrival to be a surprise.’
‘Ah, just so,’ answered her ladyship with a complacent nod.—‘It will be
like a bombshell thrown into their midst,’ she added to herself. Then
aloud: ‘Not a word shall pass my lips, Mr Etheridge. By-the-bye, do you
think it at all likely that Sir William will require to see me—I mean
with regard to the scrap of paper?’
‘I think it very likely indeed, madam.’
‘In that case, I will hold myself in readiness. I have long desired the
pleasure of Sir William’s acquaintance. We could scarcely meet under
more agreeable auspices.’ Then suddenly grasping Mr Etheridge by the
sleeve, she said in her deepest tones: ‘I felt sure from the first
moment I set eyes on her that this Madame De Vigne was an impostor!’
‘Dear me!’ ejaculated the old gentleman with uplifted hands. ‘What
acumen—what acumen!’
Her ladyship smiled a superior smile. ‘For the present I will say
Ta-ta. You will not forget that I shall be in readiness to see Sir
William at any moment?’
‘I will be sure not to forget. _Au revoir_, madam—_au revoir_.’
Lady Renshaw walked back to the hotel with the serene consciousness of
having performed a meritorious action. Through her instrumentality an
impostor would be unmasked, and in so far, Society would owe her a debt
of gratitude. The service, too, was such a one as Sir William would not
be likely to forget. Suddenly, a great, an overwhelming thought flashed
across her mind. Sir William was a widower, but by no means a very old
man—at least, so she had been given to understand; and in any case, he
was not too old to marry again, if the whim were to take him. What if
he were to—— The mere idea of such a thing made her heart go pit-a-pat.
There was a mirror in the corridor. She simpered at herself in it as
she passed and gave a tug at one or two of her ribbons. Undeniably, she
was still a fine-looking woman. Far more unlikely things had happened
than that which her thoughts had barely hinted at. What was it that the
parrot in its gilded cage at the top of the stairs said to her as she
passed? Did her ears deceive her, or was it a fact that it screamed
after her, ‘Lady—Lady—La-dy Ridsdale?’
COOKING CLASSES FOR CHILDREN.
‘I have been reproaching myself,’ was the piteous plaint of Mrs Butler
(Fanny Kemble) in her _Records of Later Life_, ‘and reproving others,
and honestly regretting that, instead of Italian and music, I had not
learned a little domestic economy, and how much bread, butter, flour,
eggs, milk, sugar, and meat ought to be consumed per week by a family
of eight persons.’ This is the lesson that great part of the world
of women has still to learn. We have allowed mere accomplishments,
the fringe and lace of life, to draw our attention from those solid
and necessary things which a woman must know if her home is to be
comfortable, and which a man knows nothing about except that in their
results they make him contentedly happy or utterly miserable. A woman
can obtain a more sensible, more thorough, in every way a better
education in book-knowledge now than at almost any previous period of
our national life; but the gain has been made at a price. Reaction is
required, and indeed has set in already. We may see its fruits in the
schools of Cookery for Ladies established in all our great towns; in
the classes for dressmaking, clear-starching, and ironing; in the newly
awakened interest in domestic economy as a science, in the countless
books on that subject and on cookery published during the last few
years.
The work is by no means done yet. That there are many to be taught and
much to be learned, we may gather from a glance at the questions asked
on such subjects in our principal ladies’ papers; where but the other
day we find a newly married lady wishing to know if, on an income of
five hundred pounds a year, without house-rent, she can keep a butler,
a cook-housekeeper, a housemaid, a carriage and pair of horses, and a
pony and cart!
But we wish to turn now to the wants of another class, and see what has
been done and what can be done for our poorer sisters, who sorely need
our help in this matter.
If it be true that education is the work of drawing out the mental
powers of children so as to fit them thoroughly for their work in life,
then we certainly for a time overshot our mark in elementary schools,
so far as the girls were concerned. We taught them many things which
they did not need to know, and could not learn thoroughly for want
of time—much which almost unfitted them for their probable places
in life as working-men’s wives; and we left untaught altogether all
the womanly and useful arts of life except sewing. Good management
has become rarer and rarer in the homes of town working-men; the
thrifty, careful housewives seem as units among scores of careless,
bad—because ignorant—mismanagers. The early age at which girls go to
work in factories increases the evil; and, till lately, nothing which
was taught at school helped to remedy it. Here, too, however, the
change has begun, and now, in the Board Schools of London, Liverpool,
Birmingham, Glasgow, and other large towns, the practical teaching of
cookery holds almost as important a place in the education of girls as
the teaching of sewing. But the question remains for the managers of
voluntary schools: Is cooking worth teaching? Can it be successfully
taught in our schools? Will it pay?
These are important questions; but they may all—even the last, which
comes very near to the hearts of all managers—be answered, we believe,
with a simple ‘Yes.’ Within the writer’s own knowledge, since the
establishment of cookery classes in elementary schools, case after
case has occurred where a girl of ten, eleven, or twelve has been
able to cook food well for a whole family; or in sickness, has been
the only person able to make beef-tea or gruel or to beat an egg. No
one who has not seen could guess or would believe what the cooking
in working-men’s homes too often is, or what waste and extravagance
arise out of utter ignorance; and even where the mother has not been
laid aside, it has been found that the girl’s knowledge, brought fresh
from school, has worked a reformation in the family management. Nor
is this all. The influence of the classes upon the girls attending
them is very good, especially when the children are drawn from the
very lowest ranks. The girls brighten up. Perhaps for the first time
they are learning something that really interests them, and seems a
link between home-life and school; they learn to weigh, to measure,
to calculate quantities, and they see the use of these things. Let no
one imagine that a cookery class is not educational. In the hands of
a competent teacher, it is an object lesson, an arithmetic lesson,
a general-knowledge lesson, and a lesson in common-sense. Even the
personal appearance of the children often improves; cleanliness,
neatness, orderliness are all encouraged; and in some schools, the
effect upon the scholars has been most curiously marked.
If this be so, surely we may admit that cookery is worth teaching. Can
it be taught successfully? We believe it can. But before attempting to
prove this, we must give a quotation from the Code of March 1882: ‘In
schools in which the inspector reports that special and appropriate
provision is made for the practical teaching of cookery, a grant of
four shillings is made on account of any girl over twelve years of age
who has attended not less than forty hours during the school-year at
the cooking class, and is presented for examination in the elementary
subjects in any standard.’
The forty hours allowed by government are divided into twenty lessons
of two hours each, which, taken once a week, can be finished in half
a year. The lessons given are found to succeed best if they are
alternately demonstration and practice—that is, at one lesson the
children watch the teacher, who shows them how to cook any given
dishes, carefully explaining the processes and the nature of the food;
and at the next lesson the children put what they have learned in
practice, and cook the same dishes themselves under the superintendence
of the teacher. Fifteen children are sufficient for a practice class,
though of course more can attend a demonstration. A very moderate-sized
classroom is large enough; and tables can be formed of boards on
tressels or on the backs of desks. Many classrooms already contain a
range large enough for all purposes; but if not, one can be fitted
up at a cost of three pounds, or a portable stove can be had for
thirty shillings. The utensils are few and simple; but of course the
first cost of them is considerable—about five pounds.[1] A teacher is
supplied by any of the principal training Schools of Cookery for a
fee of five pounds for twenty lessons and her travelling expenses. If
several schools in the same neighbourhood take lessons during the same
period, this last item can be much reduced.
The children work in five sets of three each. They are taught all the
simple processes of cooking, and the reason in any given case for using
one in preference to another. They are furnished with printed recipes
for each dish they cook; they are taught—and this is most important—to
clean properly and to put away all the utensils they use. They are
questioned as they proceed, to see that they understand what they are
doing; and at the end of the course, they go through both a verbal and
a practical examination; and certificates are awarded by the School of
Cookery, independent of examinations by Her Majesty’s inspector.
Here are a few sample recipes; and it must be remembered that special
pains are taken to suit the dishes taught to the requirements of the
district, many ways of cooking fish being taught in seaports, for
instance; while in country places, vegetables, bacon, and eggs are more
used.
_Brown Lentil Soup._—Half-pound brown lentils, 1½d.; one carrot, four
cloves, an ounce and a half of dripping, 1½d.; two quarts of water;
small bunch sweet herbs, three onions, pepper and salt, 1d. Wash the
lentils well in several waters; leave to soak in two quarts of water
for twenty-four hours. Slice and fry the onions in the dripping; let
them take a nice brown, but not burn. Cut up the carrot into small
pieces; fry it lightly also. Now put in the lentils and the two quarts
of water in which they were steeped; add the herbs and the cloves, but
not the pepper and salt. Boil all for three hours, adding more water,
to make up the waste from boiling. Add pepper and salt to taste. If
possible, put the soup through a coarse wire-sieve.
_Savoury Rice._—Rice, half-pound, 2d.; dripping, half-ounce, 1½d.; two
onions, one carrot, pepper and salt, 1d.; cloves, parsley, and thyme,
½d. Wash the rice, throw it into a saucepan full of boiling water and
a little salt. Add an onion stuck with four cloves and the carrot cut
up. Let it boil fast for fifteen or twenty minutes. Take care there is
plenty of water. To try the rice, take a grain and rub it between the
thumb and finger. When it will rub quite away, drain off all the water,
and let the rice dry before the fire. While the rice is boiling, put
half an ounce of dripping in a saucepan on the fire, and when quite
hot, fry in it a sliced onion. Take a tablespoonful of flour, sprinkle
it over the fried onion in the pan, stirring it with a spoon. When the
flour is brown, add half a pint of water, the parsley and thyme well
chopped, with salt and pepper. Boil it up; stir in the rice, and serve.