_A MORNING AT BRENTWOOD_.
Brentwood was a comfortable house to stay in for visitors who never
wanted a moment's repose. Lady Angleby lived in the midst of her
guests--must have their interest, their sympathy in all her occupations,
and she was never without a press of work and correspondence. Bessie
Fairfax by noon next day felt herself weary without having done anything
but listen with folded hands to tedious dissertations on matters
political and social that had no interest for her. Since ten o'clock Mr.
Cecil Burleigh and Mr. Fairfax had withdrawn themselves, and were gone
into Norminster, and Miss Burleigh sat, a patient victim, with two dark
hollows under her eyes--bearing up with a smile while ready to sink
with fatigue. The gentlemen did not return to luncheon, but a caller
dropped in--a clergyman, Mr. Jones; and Miss Burleigh took the
opportunity of his entrance to vanish, making a sign to Miss Fairfax to
come too. They went into the garden, where they were met by a vivacious,
pretty old lady, Miss Hague, a former governess of Miss Burleigh, who
now acted as assistant secretary to Lady Angleby.
"Your enemy, Mr. Jones, is in the drawing-room with my aunt," Miss
Burleigh told her. "Quite by chance--he was not asked."
"Oh, let him stay. It is a study to see him amble about her ladyship
with the airs and graces of a favorite, and then to witness his
condescension to inferior persons like me," said Miss Hague. "I'll go to
your room, Mary, and take off my bonnet."
"Do, dear. We have only just escaped into the fresh air, and are making
the most of our liberty."
Miss Hague lodged within a stone's throw of Brentwood, and Lady Angleby
was good in bidding her go to luncheon whenever she felt disposed. She
was disposed as seldom as courtesy allowed, for, though very poor, she
was a gentlewoman of independent spirit, and her ladyship sometimes
forgot it. She was engaged seeking some report amongst her papers when
Miss Hague entered, but she gave her a nod of welcome. Mr. Jones said,
"Ah, Miss Hague," with superior affability, and luncheon was announced.
Lady Angleby had to give and hear opinions on a variety of subjects
while they were at table. Middle-class female education Mr. Jones had
not gone into. He listened and was instructed, and supposed that it
might easily be made better; nevertheless, he had observed that the best
taught amongst his candidates for confirmation came from the shopkeeping
class, where the parents still gave their children religious lessons at
home. Then ladies of refined habits and delicate feelings as mistresses
of elementary schools--that was a new idea to him. A certain robustness
seemed, perhaps, more desirable; teaching a crowd of imperfectly washed
little boys and girls was not fancy-work; also he believed that
essential propriety existed to the full as much amongst the young women
now engaged as amongst young ladies. If the object was to create a class
of rural school-mistresses who would take social rank with the curate,
he thought it a mistake; a school-mistress ought not to be above
drinking her cup of tea in a tidy cottage with the parents of her
pupils: he should prefer a capable young woman in a clean holland apron
with pockets, and no gloves, to any poor young lady of genteel tastes
who would expect to associate on equal terms with his wife and
daughters. Then, cookery for the poor. Here Mr. Jones fell inadvertently
into a trap. He said that the chief want amongst the poor was something
to cook: there was very little spending in twelve shillings a week, or
even in fifteen and eighteen, with a family to house, clothe, and feed.
Lady Angleby held a quite opposite view. She said that a helpless
thriftlessness was at the root of the matter. She had printed and
largely distributed a little book of receipts, for which many people had
thanked her. Mr. Jones knew the little book, and had heard his wife say
that Lady Angleby's receipt for stewed rabbits was well enough, but that
her receipt for hares stewed with onions was hares spoilt; and where
were poor people to get hares unless they went out poaching?
"I assure your ladyship that agrimony tea is still drunk amongst our
widows, and an ounce of shop-tea is kept for home-coming sons and
daughters grown proud in service. They gather the herb in the autumn,
and dry it in bunches for the winter's use. And many is the laborer who
lets his children swallow the lion's share of his Sunday bit of meat
because the wife says it makes them strong, and children have not the
sense not to want all they see. Any economical reform amongst the
extravagant classes that would leave more and better food within reach
of the hard-working classes would be highly beneficial to both.
Sometimes I wish we could return to that sumptuary law of Queen
Elizabeth which commanded the rich to eat fish and fast from flesh-meat
certain days of the week." Here Mr. Jones too abruptly paused. Lady
Angleby had grown exceedingly red in the face; Bessie Fairfax had grown
rosy too, with suppressed reflections on the prize-stature to which her
hostess had attained in sixty years of high feeding. Queen Elizabeth's
pious fast might have been kept by her with much advantage to her
figure.
Poor Mr. Jones had confused himself as well as Lady Angleby, but the
return to the drawing-room created an opportune diversion. He took up an
illustrated paper with a scene from a new play, and after studying it
for a few minutes began to denounce the amusements of the gay world in
the tone of a man who has known nothing of them, but has let his
imagination run into very queer illusions. This passed harmless. Nobody
was concerned to defend the actor's vocation where nobody followed it;
but Mr. Jones was next so ill-advised as to turn to Miss Hague, and say
with a supercilious air that since they last met he had been trying to
read a novel, which he mentioned by name--a masterpiece of modern
fiction--and really he could not see the good of such works. Miss Hague
and he had disagreed on this subject before. She was an inveterate
novel-reader, and claimed kindred with a star of chief magnitude in the
profession, and to speak lightly of light literature in her presence
always brought her out warmly and vigorously in defence and praise of
it.
"No good in such works, Mr. Jones!" cried she. "My hair is gray, and
this is a solemn fact: for the conduct of life I have found far more
counsel and comfort in novels than in sermons, in week-day books than in
Sunday preachers!"
There was a startled silence. Miss Burleigh extended a gentle hand to
stop the impetuous old lady, but the words were spoken, and she could
only intervene as moderator: "Novels show us ourselves at a distance, as
it were. I think they are good both for instruction and reproof. The
best of them are but the Scripture parables in modern masquerade. Here
is one--the Prodigal Son of the nineteenth century, going out into the
world, wasting his substance with riotous living, suffering, repenting,
returning, and rejoiced over."
"Our Lord made people think: I am not aware that novels make people
think," said Mr. Jones with cool contempt.
"Apply your mind to the study of either of these books--Mr. Thackeray's
or George Eliot's--and you will not find all its powers too much for
their appreciation," said Miss Hague.
Mr. Jones made a slight grimace: "Pray excuse the comparison, Miss
Hague, but you remind me of a groom of mine whom I sent up to the Great
Exhibition. When he came home again all he had to say was, 'Oh, sir, the
saddlery was beautiful!'"
"Nothing like leather!" laughed Lady Angleby.
"He showed his wit--he spoke of what he understood," said Miss Hague.
"You undertake to despise light literature, of which avowedly you know
nothing. Tell me: of the little books and tracts that you circulate,
which are the most popular?"
"The tales and stories; they are thumbed and blackened when the serious
pages are left unread," Mr. Jones admitted.
"It is the same with the higher-class periodicals that come to us from
D'Oyley's library," said Lady Angleby, pointing to the brown, buff,
orange, green, and purple magazines that furnished her round-table. "The
novels are well read, so are the social essays and the bits of gossiping
biography; but dry chapters of exploration, science, discovery, and
politics are tasted, and no more: the first page or two may be opened,
and the rest as often as not are uncut. And as they come to Brentwood,
so, but for myself, they would go away. The young people prefer the
stories, and with rare exceptions it is the same with their elders. The
fact is worth considering. A puff of secular air, to blow away the vapor
of sanctity in which the clergy envelop themselves, might be salutary at
intervals. All fresh air is a tonic."
Mr. Jones repeated his slight grimace, and said, "Will Miss Hague be so
kind as to tell me what a sermon ought to be? I will sit at her feet
with all humility."
"With arrogant humility!--with the pride that apes humility," cried Miss
Hague with cheerful irreverence. "I don't pretend to teach you
sermon-making: I only tell you that, such as sermons mostly are,
precious little help or comfort can be derived from them."
Mr. Jones again made his characteristic grimace, expressive of the
contempt for secular opinion with which he was morally so well
cushioned, but he had a kind heart and refrained from crushing his poor
old opponent with too severe a rejoinder. He granted that some novels
might be harmless, and such as he would not object to see in the hands
of his daughters; but as a general rule he had a prejudice against
fiction; and as for theatres, he would have them all shut up, for he
was convinced that thousands of young men and women might date their
ruin from their first visit to a theatre: he could tell them many
anecdotes in support of his assertions. Fortunately, it was three
o'clock. The butler brought in letters by the afternoon post, and the
anecdotes had to be deferred to a more convenient season. The clergyman
took his leave.
Lady Angleby glanced through her sheaf of correspondence, and singled
out one letter. "From dear Lady Latimer," she said, and tore it open.
But as she read her countenance became exceedingly irate, and at the end
she tossed it over to Miss Hague: "There is the answer to your
application." The old lady did not raise her eyes immediately after its
perusal, and Miss Burleigh took it kindly out of her hand, saying, "Let
me see." Then Lady Angleby broke out: "I do not want anybody to teach me
what is my duty, I hope."
Miss Hague now looked up, and Bessie Fairfax's kind heart ached to see
her bright eyes glittering as she faltered, "I think it is a very kind
letter. I wish more people were of Lady Latimer's opinion. I do not wish
to enter the Governesses' Asylum: it would take me quite away from all
the places and people I am fond of. I might never see any of you again."
"How often must I tell you that it is not necessary you should go into
the asylum? You may be elected to one of the out-pensions if we can
collect votes enough. As for Lady Latimer reserving her vote for really
friendless persons, it is like her affectation of superior virtue." Lady
Angleby spoke and looked as if she were highly incensed.
Miss Hague was trembling all over, and begging that nothing more might
be said on the subject.
"But there is no time to lose," said her patroness, still more angrily.
"If you do not press on with your applications, you will be too late:
everybody will be engaged for the election in November. The voting-list
is on my writing-table--the names I know are marked. Go on with the
letters in order, and I will sign them when I return from my drive."
Miss Fairfax's face was so pitiful and inquisitive that the substance of
Lady Latimer's letter was repeated to her. It was to the effect that
Miss Hague's former pupils were of great and wealthy condition for the
most part, and that they ought not to let her appeal to public charity,
but to subscribe a sufficient pension for her amongst themselves; and
out of the respect in which she herself held her, Lady Latimer offered
five pounds annually towards it. "And I think that is right," said
Bessie warmly. "If you were my old governess, Miss Hague, I should be
only too glad to subscribe."
"Well, my dear young lady, I was your father's governess and your
uncles' until they went to a preparatory school for Eton: from
Frederick's being four years old to Geoffry's being ten, I lived at
Abbotsmead," said Miss Hague. "And here is another of my boys," she
added as the door opened and Sir Edward Lucas was announced.
"Then I will do what my father would have done had he been alive," said
Bessie. "Perhaps my uncle Laurence will too."
"What were you saying of me, dear Hoddydoddy?" asked Sir Edward, turning
to the old lady when he had paid his devoirs to the rest.
The matter being explained to him, he was eager to contribute his
fraction. "Then leave the final arrangement to me," said Lady Angleby.
"I will settle what is to be done. You need not write any more of those
letters, Miss Hague, and I trust these enthusiastic young people will
not tire of what they have undertaken. It is right, but if everybody did
what is right on such occasions there would be little use for benevolent
institutions. Sir Edward, we were going to drive into Norminster: will
you take a seat in my carriage?"
Sir Edward would be delighted; and Miss Hague, released from her
ladyship's desk, went home happy, and in the midst of doubts and fears
lest she had hurt the feelings of Mr. Jones wept the soft tears of
grateful old age that meets with unexpected kindness. The resolute
expression of her sentiments by Miss Fairfax had inspired her with
confidence, and she longed to see that young lady again. In the letter
of thanks she wrote to Lady Latimer she did not fail to mention how her
judgment and example had been supported by that young disciple; and Lady
Latimer, revolving the news with pleasure, began to think of paying a
visit to Woldshire.