The Hall Farm
Evidently that gate is never opened, for the long grass and the great
hemlocks grow close against it, and if it were opened, it is so rusty
that the force necessary to turn it on its hinges would be likely to
pull down the square stone-built pillars, to the detriment of the two
stone lionesses which grin with a doubtful carnivorous affability above
a coat of arms surmounting each of the pillars. It would be easy
enough, by the aid of the nicks in the stone pillars, to climb over the
brick wall with its smooth stone coping; but by putting our eyes close
to the rusty bars of the gate, we can see the house well enough, and
all but the very corners of the grassy enclosure.
It is a very fine old place, of red brick, softened by a pale powdery
lichen, which has dispersed itself with happy irregularity, so as to
bring the red brick into terms of friendly companionship with the
limestone ornaments surrounding the three gables, the windows, and the
door-place. But the windows are patched with wooden panes, and the
door, I think, is like the gate—it is never opened. How it would groan
and grate against the stone floor if it were! For it is a solid, heavy,
handsome door, and must once have been in the habit of shutting with a
sonorous bang behind a liveried lackey, who had just seen his master
and mistress off the grounds in a carriage and pair.
But at present one might fancy the house in the early stage of a
chancery suit, and that the fruit from that grand double row of
walnut-trees on the right hand of the enclosure would fall and rot
among the grass, if it were not that we heard the booming bark of dogs
echoing from great buildings at the back. And now the half-weaned
calves that have been sheltering themselves in a gorse-built hovel
against the left-hand wall come out and set up a silly answer to that
terrible bark, doubtless supposing that it has reference to buckets of
milk.
Yes, the house must be inhabited, and we will see by whom; for
imagination is a licensed trespasser: it has no fear of dogs, but may
climb over walls and peep in at windows with impunity. Put your face to
one of the glass panes in the right-hand window: what do you see? A
large open fireplace, with rusty dogs in it, and a bare boarded floor;
at the far end, fleeces of wool stacked up; in the middle of the floor,
some empty corn-bags. That is the furniture of the dining-room. And
what through the left-hand window? Several clothes-horses, a pillion, a
spinning-wheel, and an old box wide open and stuffed full of coloured
rags. At the edge of this box there lies a great wooden doll, which, so
far as mutilation is concerned, bears a strong resemblance to the
finest Greek sculpture, and especially in the total loss of its nose.
Near it there is a little chair, and the butt end of a boy’s leather
long-lashed whip.
The history of the house is plain now. It was once the residence of a
country squire, whose family, probably dwindling down to mere
spinsterhood, got merged in the more territorial name of Donnithorne.
It was once the Hall; it is now the Hall Farm. Like the life in some
coast town that was once a watering-place, and is now a port, where the
genteel streets are silent and grass-grown, and the docks and
warehouses busy and resonant, the life at the Hall has changed its
focus, and no longer radiates from the parlour, but from the kitchen
and the farmyard.
Plenty of life there, though this is the drowsiest time of the year,
just before hay-harvest; and it is the drowsiest time of the day too,
for it is close upon three by the sun, and it is half-past three by
Mrs. Poyser’s handsome eight-day clock. But there is always a stronger
sense of life when the sun is brilliant after rain; and now he is
pouring down his beams, and making sparkles among the wet straw, and
lighting up every patch of vivid green moss on the red tiles of the
cow-shed, and turning even the muddy water that is hurrying along the
channel to the drain into a mirror for the yellow-billed ducks, who are
seizing the opportunity of getting a drink with as much body in it as
possible. There is quite a concert of noises; the great bull-dog,
chained against the stables, is thrown into furious exasperation by the
unwary approach of a cock too near the mouth of his kennel, and sends
forth a thundering bark, which is answered by two fox-hounds shut up in
the opposite cow-house; the old top-knotted hens, scratching with their
chicks among the straw, set up a sympathetic croaking as the
discomfited cock joins them; a sow with her brood, all very muddy as to
the legs, and curled as to the tail, throws in some deep staccato
notes; our friends the calves are bleating from the home croft; and,
under all, a fine ear discerns the continuous hum of human voices.
For the great barn-doors are thrown wide open, and men are busy there
mending the harness, under the superintendence of Mr. Goby, the
“whittaw,” otherwise saddler, who entertains them with the latest
Treddleston gossip. It is certainly rather an unfortunate day that
Alick, the shepherd, has chosen for having the whittaws, since the
morning turned out so wet; and Mrs. Poyser has spoken her mind pretty
strongly as to the dirt which the extra number of men’s shoes brought
into the house at dinnertime. Indeed, she has not yet recovered her
equanimity on the subject, though it is now nearly three hours since
dinner, and the house-floor is perfectly clean again; as clean as
everything else in that wonderful house-place, where the only chance of
collecting a few grains of dust would be to climb on the salt-coffer,
and put your finger on the high mantel-shelf on which the glittering
brass candlesticks are enjoying their summer sinecure; for at this time
of year, of course, every one goes to bed while it is yet light, or at
least light enough to discern the outline of objects after you have
bruised your shins against them. Surely nowhere else could an oak
clock-case and an oak table have got to such a polish by the hand:
genuine “elbow polish,” as Mrs. Poyser called it, for she thanked God
she never had any of your varnished rubbish in her house. Hetty Sorrel
often took the opportunity, when her aunt’s back was turned, of looking
at the pleasing reflection of herself in those polished surfaces, for
the oak table was usually turned up like a screen, and was more for
ornament than for use; and she could see herself sometimes in the great
round pewter dishes that were ranged on the shelves above the long deal
dinner-table, or in the hobs of the grate, which always shone like
jasper.
Everything was looking at its brightest at this moment, for the sun
shone right on the pewter dishes, and from their reflecting surfaces
pleasant jets of light were thrown on mellow oak and bright brass—and
on a still pleasanter object than these, for some of the rays fell on
Dinah’s finely moulded cheek, and lit up her pale red hair to auburn,
as she bent over the heavy household linen which she was mending for
her aunt. No scene could have been more peaceful, if Mrs. Poyser, who
was ironing a few things that still remained from the Monday’s wash,
had not been making a frequent clinking with her iron and moving to and
fro whenever she wanted it to cool; carrying the keen glance of her
blue-grey eye from the kitchen to the dairy, where Hetty was making up
the butter, and from the dairy to the back kitchen, where Nancy was
taking the pies out of the oven. Do not suppose, however, that Mrs.
Poyser was elderly or shrewish in her appearance; she was a
good-looking woman, not more than eight-and-thirty, of fair complexion
and sandy hair, well-shapen, light-footed. The most conspicuous article
in her attire was an ample checkered linen apron, which almost covered
her skirt; and nothing could be plainer or less noticeable than her cap
and gown, for there was no weakness of which she was less tolerant than
feminine vanity, and the preference of ornament to utility. The family
likeness between her and her niece Dinah Morris, with the contrast
between her keenness and Dinah’s seraphic gentleness of expression,
might have served a painter as an excellent suggestion for a Martha and
Mary. Their eyes were just of the same colour, but a striking test of
the difference in their operation was seen in the demeanour of Trip,
the black-and-tan terrier, whenever that much-suspected dog unwarily
exposed himself to the freezing arctic ray of Mrs. Poyser’s glance. Her
tongue was not less keen than her eye, and, whenever a damsel came
within earshot, seemed to take up an unfinished lecture, as a
barrel-organ takes up a tune, precisely at the point where it had left
off.
The fact that it was churning day was another reason why it was
inconvenient to have the whittaws, and why, consequently, Mrs. Poyser
should scold Molly the housemaid with unusual severity. To all
appearance Molly had got through her after-dinner work in an exemplary
manner, had “cleaned herself” with great dispatch, and now came to ask,
submissively, if she should sit down to her spinning till milking time.
But this blameless conduct, according to Mrs. Poyser, shrouded a secret
indulgence of unbecoming wishes, which she now dragged forth and held
up to Molly’s view with cutting eloquence.
“Spinning, indeed! It isn’t spinning as you’d be at, I’ll be bound, and
let you have your own way. I never knew your equals for gallowsness. To
think of a gell o’ your age wanting to go and sit with half-a-dozen
men! I’d ha’ been ashamed to let the words pass over my lips if I’d
been you. And you, as have been here ever since last Michaelmas, and I
hired you at Treddles’on stattits, without a bit o’ character—as I say,
you might be grateful to be hired in that way to a respectable place;
and you knew no more o’ what belongs to work when you come here than
the mawkin i’ the field. As poor a two-fisted thing as ever I saw, you
know you was. Who taught you to scrub a floor, I should like to know?
Why, you’d leave the dirt in heaps i’ the corners—anybody ’ud think
you’d never been brought up among Christians. And as for spinning, why,
you’ve wasted as much as your wage i’ the flax you’ve spoiled learning
to spin. And you’ve a right to feel that, and not to go about as gaping
and as thoughtless as if you was beholding to nobody. Comb the wool for
the whittaws, indeed! That’s what you’d like to be doing, is it? That’s
the way with you—that’s the road you’d all like to go, headlongs to
ruin. You’re never easy till you’ve got some sweetheart as is as big a
fool as yourself: you think you’ll be finely off when you’re married, I
daresay, and have got a three-legged stool to sit on, and never a
blanket to cover you, and a bit o’ oat-cake for your dinner, as three
children are a-snatching at.”
“I’m sure I donna want t’ go wi’ the whittaws,” said Molly, whimpering,
and quite overcome by this Dantean picture of her future, “on’y we
allays used to comb the wool for ’n at Mester Ottley’s; an’ so I just
axed ye. I donna want to set eyes on the whittaws again; I wish I may
never stir if I do.”
“Mr. Ottley’s, indeed! It’s fine talking o’ what you did at Mr.
Ottley’s. Your missis there might like her floors dirted wi’ whittaws
for what I know. There’s no knowing what people _wonna_ like—such ways
as I’ve heard of! I never had a gell come into my house as seemed to
know what cleaning was; I think people live like pigs, for my part. And
as to that Betty as was dairymaid at Trent’s before she come to me,
she’d ha’ left the cheeses without turning from week’s end to week’s
end, and the dairy thralls, I might ha’ wrote my name on ’em, when I
come downstairs after my illness, as the doctor said it was
inflammation—it was a mercy I got well of it. And to think o’ your
knowing no better, Molly, and been here a-going i’ nine months, and not
for want o’ talking to, neither—and what are you stanning there for,
like a jack as is run down, instead o’ getting your wheel out? You’re a
rare un for sitting down to your work a little while after it’s time to
put by.”
“Munny, my iron’s twite told; pease put it down to warm.”
The small chirruping voice that uttered this request came from a little
sunny-haired girl between three and four, who, seated on a high chair
at the end of the ironing table, was arduously clutching the handle of
a miniature iron with her tiny fat fist, and ironing rags with an
assiduity that required her to put her little red tongue out as far as
anatomy would allow.
“Cold, is it, my darling? Bless your sweet face!” said Mrs. Poyser, who
was remarkable for the facility with which she could relapse from her
official objurgatory to one of fondness or of friendly converse. “Never
mind! Mother’s done her ironing now. She’s going to put the ironing
things away.”
“Munny, I tould ’ike to do into de barn to Tommy, to see de whittawd.”
“No, no, no; Totty ’ud get her feet wet,” said Mrs. Poyser, carrying
away her iron. “Run into the dairy and see cousin Hetty make the
butter.”
“I tould ’ike a bit o’ pum-take,” rejoined Totty, who seemed to be
provided with several relays of requests; at the same time, taking the
opportunity of her momentary leisure to put her fingers into a bowl of
starch, and drag it down so as to empty the contents with tolerable
completeness on to the ironing sheet.
“Did ever anybody see the like?” screamed Mrs. Poyser, running towards
the table when her eye had fallen on the blue stream. “The child’s
allays i’ mischief if your back’s turned a minute. What shall I do to
you, you naughty, naughty gell?”
Totty, however, had descended from her chair with great swiftness, and
was already in retreat towards the dairy with a sort of waddling run,
and an amount of fat on the nape of her neck which made her look like
the metamorphosis of a white suckling pig.
The starch having been wiped up by Molly’s help, and the ironing
apparatus put by, Mrs. Poyser took up her knitting which always lay
ready at hand, and was the work she liked best, because she could carry
it on automatically as she walked to and fro. But now she came and sat
down opposite Dinah, whom she looked at in a meditative way, as she
knitted her grey worsted stocking.
“You look th’ image o’ your Aunt Judith, Dinah, when you sit a-sewing.
I could almost fancy it was thirty years back, and I was a little gell
at home, looking at Judith as she sat at her work, after she’d done the
house up; only it was a little cottage, Father’s was, and not a big
rambling house as gets dirty i’ one corner as fast as you clean it in
another—but for all that, I could fancy you was your Aunt Judith, only
her hair was a deal darker than yours, and she was stouter and broader
i’ the shoulders. Judith and me allays hung together, though she had
such queer ways, but your mother and her never could agree. Ah, your
mother little thought as she’d have a daughter just cut out after the
very pattern o’ Judith, and leave her an orphan, too, for Judith to
take care on, and bring up with a spoon when _she_ was in the graveyard
at Stoniton. I allays said that o’ Judith, as she’d bear a pound weight
any day to save anybody else carrying a ounce. And she was just the
same from the first o’ my remembering her; it made no difference in
her, as I could see, when she took to the Methodists, only she talked a
bit different and wore a different sort o’ cap; but she’d never in her
life spent a penny on herself more than keeping herself decent.”
“She was a blessed woman,” said Dinah; “God had given her a loving,
self-forgetting nature, and He perfected it by grace. And she was very
fond of you too, Aunt Rachel. I often heard her talk of you in the same
sort of way. When she had that bad illness, and I was only eleven years
old, she used to say, ‘You’ll have a friend on earth in your Aunt
Rachel, if I’m taken from you, for she has a kind heart,’ and I’m sure
I’ve found it so.”
“I don’t know how, child; anybody ’ud be cunning to do anything for
you, I think; you’re like the birds o’ th’ air, and live nobody knows
how. I’d ha’ been glad to behave to you like a mother’s sister, if
you’d come and live i’ this country where there’s some shelter and
victual for man and beast, and folks don’t live on the naked hills,
like poultry a-scratching on a gravel bank. And then you might get
married to some decent man, and there’d be plenty ready to have you, if
you’d only leave off that preaching, as is ten times worse than
anything your Aunt Judith ever did. And even if you’d marry Seth Bede,
as is a poor wool-gathering Methodist and’s never like to have a penny
beforehand, I know your uncle ’ud help you with a pig, and very like a
cow, for he’s allays been good-natur’d to my kin, for all they’re poor,
and made ’em welcome to the house; and ’ud do for you, I’ll be bound,
as much as ever he’d do for Hetty, though she’s his own niece. And
there’s linen in the house as I could well spare you, for I’ve got lots
o’ sheeting and table-clothing, and towelling, as isn’t made up.
There’s a piece o’ sheeting I could give you as that squinting Kitty
spun—she was a rare girl to spin, for all she squinted, and the
children couldn’t abide her; and, you know, the spinning’s going on
constant, and there’s new linen wove twice as fast as the old wears
out. But where’s the use o’ talking, if ye wonna be persuaded, and
settle down like any other woman in her senses, i’stead o’ wearing
yourself out with walking and preaching, and giving away every penny
you get, so as you’ve nothing saved against sickness; and all the
things you’ve got i’ the world, I verily believe, ’ud go into a bundle
no bigger nor a double cheese. And all because you’ve got notions i’
your head about religion more nor what’s i’ the Catechism and the
Prayer-book.”
“But not more than what’s in the Bible, Aunt,” said Dinah.
“Yes, and the Bible too, for that matter,” Mrs. Poyser rejoined, rather
sharply; “else why shouldn’t them as know best what’s in the Bible—the
parsons and people as have got nothing to do but learn it—do the same
as you do? But, for the matter o’ that, if everybody was to do like
you, the world must come to a standstill; for if everybody tried to do
without house and home, and with poor eating and drinking, and was
allays talking as we must despise the things o’ the world as you say, I
should like to know where the pick o’ the stock, and the corn, and the
best new-milk cheeses ’ud have to go. Everybody ’ud be wanting bread
made o’ tail ends and everybody ’ud be running after everybody else to
preach to ’em, istead o’ bringing up their families, and laying by
against a bad harvest. It stands to sense as that can’t be the right
religion.”
“Nay, dear aunt, you never heard me say that all people are called to
forsake their work and their families. It’s quite right the land should
be ploughed and sowed, and the precious corn stored, and the things of
this life cared for, and right that people should rejoice in their
families, and provide for them, so that this is done in the fear of the
Lord, and that they are not unmindful of the soul’s wants while they
are caring for the body. We can all be servants of God wherever our lot
is cast, but He gives us different sorts of work, according as He fits
us for it and calls us to it. I can no more help spending my life in
trying to do what I can for the souls of others, than you could help
running if you heard little Totty crying at the other end of the house;
the voice would go to your heart, you would think the dear child was in
trouble or in danger, and you couldn’t rest without running to help her
and comfort her.”
“Ah,” said Mrs. Poyser, rising and walking towards the door, “I know it
’ud be just the same if I was to talk to you for hours. You’d make me
the same answer, at th’ end. I might as well talk to the running brook
and tell it to stan’ still.”
The causeway outside the kitchen door was dry enough now for Mrs.
Poyser to stand there quite pleasantly and see what was going on in the
yard, the grey worsted stocking making a steady progress in her hands
all the while. But she had not been standing there more than five
minutes before she came in again, and said to Dinah, in rather a
flurried, awe-stricken tone, “If there isn’t Captain Donnithorne and
Mr. Irwine a-coming into the yard! I’ll lay my life they’re come to
speak about your preaching on the Green, Dinah; it’s you must answer
’em, for I’m dumb. I’ve said enough a’ready about your bringing such
disgrace upo’ your uncle’s family. I wouldn’t ha’ minded if you’d been
Mr. Poyser’s own niece—folks must put up wi’ their own kin, as they put
up wi’ their own noses—it’s their own flesh and blood. But to think of
a niece o’ mine being cause o’ my husband’s being turned out of his
farm, and me brought him no fortin but my savin’s——”
“Nay, dear Aunt Rachel,” said Dinah gently, “you’ve no cause for such
fears. I’ve strong assurance that no evil will happen to you and my
uncle and the children from anything I’ve done. I didn’t preach without
direction.”
“Direction! I know very well what you mean by direction,” said Mrs.
Poyser, knitting in a rapid and agitated manner. “When there’s a bigger
maggot than usual in your head you call it ‘direction’; and then
nothing can stir you—you look like the statty o’ the outside o’
Treddles’on church, a-starin’ and a-smilin’ whether it’s fair weather
or foul. I hanna common patience with you.”
By this time the two gentlemen had reached the palings and had got down
from their horses: it was plain they meant to come in. Mrs. Poyser
advanced to the door to meet them, curtsying low and trembling between
anger with Dinah and anxiety to conduct herself with perfect propriety
on the occasion. For in those days the keenest of bucolic minds felt a
whispering awe at the sight of the gentry, such as of old men felt when
they stood on tiptoe to watch the gods passing by in tall human shape.
“Well, Mrs. Poyser, how are you after this stormy morning?” said Mr.
Irwine, with his stately cordiality. “Our feet are quite dry; we shall
not soil your beautiful floor.”
“Oh, sir, don’t mention it,” said Mrs. Poyser. “Will you and the
captain please to walk into the parlour?”
“No, indeed, thank you, Mrs. Poyser,” said the captain, looking eagerly
round the kitchen, as if his eye were seeking something it could not
find. “I delight in your kitchen. I think it is the most charming room
I know. I should like every farmer’s wife to come and look at it for a
pattern.”
“Oh, you’re pleased to say so, sir. Pray take a seat,” said Mrs.
Poyser, relieved a little by this compliment and the captain’s evident
good-humour, but still glancing anxiously at Mr. Irwine, who, she saw,
was looking at Dinah and advancing towards her.
“Poyser is not at home, is he?” said Captain Donnithorne, seating
himself where he could see along the short passage to the open
dairy-door.
“No, sir, he isn’t; he’s gone to Rosseter to see Mr. West, the factor,
about the wool. But there’s Father i’ the barn, sir, if he’d be of any
use.”
“No, thank you; I’ll just look at the whelps and leave a message about
them with your shepherd. I must come another day and see your husband;
I want to have a consultation with him about horses. Do you know when
he’s likely to be at liberty?”
“Why, sir, you can hardly miss him, except it’s o’ Treddles’on
market-day—that’s of a Friday, you know. For if he’s anywhere on the
farm we can send for him in a minute. If we’d got rid o’ the
Scantlands, we should have no outlying fields; and I should be glad of
it, for if ever anything happens, he’s sure to be gone to the
Scantlands. Things allays happen so contrairy, if they’ve a chance; and
it’s an unnat’ral thing to have one bit o’ your farm in one county and
all the rest in another.”
“Ah, the Scantlands would go much better with Choyce’s farm, especially
as he wants dairyland and you’ve got plenty. I think yours is the
prettiest farm on the estate, though; and do you know, Mrs. Poyser, if
I were going to marry and settle, I should be tempted to turn you out,
and do up this fine old house, and turn farmer myself.”
“Oh, sir,” said Mrs. Poyser, rather alarmed, “you wouldn’t like it at
all. As for farming, it’s putting money into your pocket wi’ your right
hand and fetching it out wi’ your left. As fur as I can see, it’s
raising victual for other folks and just getting a mouthful for
yourself and your children as you go along. Not as you’d be like a poor
man as wants to get his bread—you could afford to lose as much money as
you liked i’ farming—but it’s poor fun losing money, I should think,
though I understan’ it’s what the great folks i’ London play at more
than anything. For my husband heard at market as Lord Dacey’s eldest
son had lost thousands upo’ thousands to the Prince o’ Wales, and they
said my lady was going to pawn her jewels to pay for him. But you know
more about that than I do, sir. But, as for farming, sir, I canna think
as you’d like it; and this house—the draughts in it are enough to cut
you through, and it’s my opinion the floors upstairs are very rotten,
and the rats i’ the cellar are beyond anything.”
“Why, that’s a terrible picture, Mrs. Poyser. I think I should be doing
you a service to turn you out of such a place. But there’s no chance of
that. I’m not likely to settle for the next twenty years, till I’m a
stout gentleman of forty; and my grandfather would never consent to
part with such good tenants as you.”
“Well, sir, if he thinks so well o’ Mr. Poyser for a tenant I wish you
could put in a word for him to allow us some new gates for the Five
closes, for my husband’s been asking and asking till he’s tired, and to
think o’ what he’s done for the farm, and’s never had a penny allowed
him, be the times bad or good. And as I’ve said to my husband often and
often, I’m sure if the captain had anything to do with it, it wouldn’t
be so. Not as I wish to speak disrespectful o’ them as have got the
power i’ their hands, but it’s more than flesh and blood ’ull bear
sometimes, to be toiling and striving, and up early and down late, and
hardly sleeping a wink when you lie down for thinking as the cheese may
swell, or the cows may slip their calf, or the wheat may grow green
again i’ the sheaf—and after all, at th’ end o’ the year, it’s like as
if you’d been cooking a feast and had got the smell of it for your
pains.”
Mrs. Poyser, once launched into conversation, always sailed along
without any check from her preliminary awe of the gentry. The
confidence she felt in her own powers of exposition was a motive force
that overcame all resistance.
“I’m afraid I should only do harm instead of good, if I were to speak
about the gates, Mrs. Poyser,” said the captain, “though I assure you
there’s no man on the estate I would sooner say a word for than your
husband. I know his farm is in better order than any other within ten
miles of us; and as for the kitchen,” he added, smiling, “I don’t
believe there’s one in the kingdom to beat it. By the by, I’ve never
seen your dairy: I must see your dairy, Mrs. Poyser.”
“Indeed, sir, it’s not fit for you to go in, for Hetty’s in the middle
o’ making the butter, for the churning was thrown late, and I’m quite
ashamed.” This Mrs. Poyser said blushing, and believing that the
captain was really interested in her milk-pans, and would adjust his
opinion of her to the appearance of her dairy.
“Oh, I’ve no doubt it’s in capital order. Take me in,” said the
captain, himself leading the way, while Mrs. Poyser followed.