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    Saiffimt M & ¥&«&»®Hiffi* Ir. October 26...

    £ or his acuteness i _# business ; and even that is a sympathy . Not his mother ; a kind , loving soul , who knows what affection is , and who sets about her duty towards her son with an active assiduity far above resignation Not his third sister — the only person in the house of whom he respects ; a great girl of nineteen , who looks like a gipsy foundling intruded into the family , and who seems feared by them all . But his other sisters have the sickly family affection which they ought ; and with his maiden cousin he is evidently a spoiled pet—ap object of admiration for a sort of daring repute as a rout and swashbuckler , representative of

    modern chivalry and adumbration of the Lovelace region of life , moving in which womanhood , neglected by a jog-trot world , is at least appreciated by the attentions of Tarquinism . To those fearful regions , divided from respectable life by the great brazen wall of Gog _apd _IVJagog , the " gent . " is privileged to travel ; and neglected womanhood humbly wonders why the spirit of Lovelace needs go abroad to find its victims ; wonders modestly and in unasking secresy , and contents itself with ministering to the decorous repose of the traveller when he comes back again through those terrible brazen gates pf Gog and Magog .

    " We are settling down into our ordinary ways / ' and I am growing familiar with the routine of an English middle-class home . It is not exactly the same with the one In which I passed my first Sunday . Johnson is not so rich , or rather , in English phrase , which reserves the word rich for great wealth , he is not so " well off'' as Mr . Dowding , but he is still in very comfortable circumstances ; he is a tea-dealer and grocer . He lives over his own shop , which Dowding would not do , scarcely to save himself from ruin . The family rise early for London , and the breakfasttable is generally surrounded by half-past eight o ' clock . The scrupulous cleanliness is one of the first things to strike the new comer . I am not _sijre

    how far it is superficial pr not ; I have suspicions ; but Edwardes , who confesses that English cleanliness used to reside chiefly in clothes and furniture , and face and hands , avers that now it is much better ; and I can testify to the vigorous freshness of the third daughter , Margaret , who comes into the room almost wet from the bath ; but then she is regarded with alarm for her daring and energy , especially by her faded eldest sister and cousin . The tablecloth , the plates , the cutlery , the silver , the " teathings , " though plain , are resplendent . The bread cuts as white and smooth as crema di burro , so that ope can scarcely fancy it to be wheat . Margaret laughed at me for thinking it so ; but Johnson , who is sore on

    the subject of deception in trade , declared that he did not believe in the stories about adulteration ; and Mrs . Johnson frowned at me in a motherly way not to continue the subject . Johnson unfolds the wet Times j invariably offers it to me ; when I decline , asks me to excuse him ; and plunges into it , occasionally reading scraps out loud . He always looks to see what Kossuth is doing , and then glances at the police news . The English are very fond of the police department in their paper , and always profess not to be so ; except a few , who bravely brave the smiles of others in declaring that they are fond of it . The adventures of the dissolute , the reckless , and the wretched , furnish spice for the day of the respectable .

    Soon after breakfast Mr . Johnson disappears , and the young ladies go to their avocations . They " practise" in turns , which means that they study playing the piano-forte ; an instrument you find in almost every house . What this is done for I cannot well learn . They scarcely ever become very proficient ; very few can master their natural or conventional shyness enough to show even what they have learned to do before others ; and most of them , so far as I can find _oqt , drop ipusic after marriage , with other " illusions . " However , the Miss Johnsons " practise" after breakfast ; the younger girls then undergo some kind of teaching from their eldest sister ; " For now that Sophy has grown up , " says Mrs . Johnson ,

    < wc can do without a governess , though Sophy herself , and indeed Jane , had the best of governesses . " To what effect , I cannot discover ; they learned French , but they never will say a word qf the language , and I am too courteous to put them to the test of reading it . They cannot " play , " which in England always means sounding "tbe piano , " as they cull it . They cannot sing ; one must avoid historical allusions if one would-spare them moments of painful awkwardness . I do not see that they know much more than the women of your own country , though the time spent in " education" is vast . Why ? you will ask . Because the English , coerced hy custom , think much more of " the name of thc thing" than of attaining

    the thing itself . To master historical _knowledge , or to grasp the spirit of " rt , as little enters the mind of an Englishman for his daughters as killing 11 man enters thc son ' s mind when he " learns to fence . " The one thing they do seem to learn to some extent is precisely that over which they _spend least time , and that is dancing . But when the time for a ball or a dance comes—the English make a distinction between the two—they do 'lot dance . At least , so they tell me , for I have not yet seen any dancing _, hey all tell me that " no one dances now , it is vulgar ; they just walk

    throug h it . " Throughout the morning needlework fills up the interstices ; u it seems to mo that Miss Sclby , the cousin , never docs anything else , except , " dress for dinner . " Mrs . Johnson is occasionally absorbed in a << m . sultation with thc cook , who announces the butcher , " or " the baker . " fhe tray" breaks thc morning with bread umHmtter and water , Johnson "" locking a little cupboard and taking a _glasfe of wine for himself , always ottering one to me , and one to " my dear . ' / 1 only observed her take it once , ami then her eyes looked red . Red eyes arc not an unfrequent ornament of the ladies , especially those m _/ rc " in mezzo del cumin ; " but

    Saiffimt M & ¥&«&»®Hiffi* Ir. October 26...

    it is the _rqle for others " to take no notice , and it passes off . " " A walk" before dinner is thought necessary , because it is wholesome . Then dinner , rather substantial , with beer for the drink ; a show of wine after it , all the young ladies _excepted ; a hasty dose on Johnson ' s part ; a brief interval of indolence , tea , and then needlework , till " the tray" again makes its appearance , and then bed . Such appears to me to be '' life" among the middle-class in England . I can hardly find out at what part any real life comes in . William promises to show me life when he is well again ; Miss Johnson assures me that in the winter they are " very gay , " and promises to take me to " parties . " I try to learn more from Mrs . Johnson , whose weak eyes will not let her read or work after candles are brought in , and she is glad enough of a " quiet chat . "

    From what she tells me , the Johnsons are quite a model family of their class : they have brought up their children , on the whole , very respectably —for William is beginning to grow steady , and Henry is all his parents could desire , if he could only s \ ow a little more interest in business . Sophy , it is true , is still upon their hands ; but she might have had some very good pffers ; and at all events she will know , like Sarah ( the cousin ) how to make herself contented with her lot in life . And a married life is not one so much more happy , as single persons suppose ; that illusion soon

    goes off , and very proper that it should . It is all very well for girls to talk of love , and to enjoy the happiness of youth and hope while they may , but when a woman marries , and has a family , she must come down to the realities of life ; and Sophy has been spared those trials . Fanny ( this is a daughter I have not seen ) is very happily married to a worthy man , and they are still very fond of each other ! Jane is engaged , and both the others are young . Margaret gives her parents some uneasiness , on account of her impetuous disposition ; but with care she will no doubt do as well as the rest .

    I wish I could show you the countenance of grave resignation with which good Mrs . Johnson uttered that hopeful phrase , " As well as the rest . " Although desiring to hear rather than talk , I could not help asking whether that was all that the girls had to expect in life ? Mrs . Johnson first looked at me without answering , as if she did not understand the meaning of my question ; and then , after a pause , so long that I thought she had forgotten , she said that , although no doubt I had seen much of the world , I was still comparatively young . Her eyes glanced uneasily at her daughters , as if she feared that they might hear my dangerous questions ; and indeed I feel sure that Sophy was listening . " You do not know , " said Mrs . Johnson , deprecatingly , " what it is to be a mother . " That unquestionable truth silenced me .

    Conversation flagged , and I invited the girls to music . After a fit of shyness , I discovered that they were all willing enough , only no one would begin . Then no one " could play that "—the thing proposed , whatever it was ; so I was fain to put my own rough hands to the work . I found some feeling and taste in most of them , lurking under a mass of incompetency , moral and educational . It turned out that they never intended to sing " professionally' _% —that is , completely . But gradually they warmed into praiseworthy attempts , and in Margaret I discovered a voice full and dark as the purple grape under the vine leaf .

    It seems to be thus all round—universal abnegation . I confess to you , my dear Giorgio , that I was wrong in describing the English as a moneymaking nation : I do not find them so , or they arc so no longer . They are not avaricious , at least , not generally . They attend to business , because it is the only work before them ; as a rat begins to cat thc wood of his cage to make his way . They are a most abstemious nation , except in eating and drinking ; and in that , after all , they arc thc reverse of luxurious . Cold damp mutton seems to be , as often as not , the one solace of thc Englishman ' s day , with half a pint of dark porter . They have energies and feelings , but they consent to waive them ; as for music , they have voices , which they consent to waive ; and as the nation has power , which it consents to waive . Life , with them , is one tedious waiver . Tho political

    philosophers of the day have constructed doctrines to show that this state of existence is necessary . They aver that il ; is u succexs ; although , as they confess , "there is a skeleton in every house . " Avoidance—to avoid exposure , of that skeleton , to avoid discredit , to avoid danger of every kind , to avoid all that is " disagreeable , " —is thc leading object of thc Englishman , especially in thc middle class . And as a compromise , he attains that avoidance by waiving any positive form of existence . To thc man , a youth of " life , " such as William Johnson ban tasted , anil a maturity of business —art , nature , life foregone . To the women , an alternative chance—seldom a choice—between the disappointed matronly " reality" of Mrs . Johnson , or thc faded , faint unlived life of Miss Sclby . But 1 suspect there is more than one skeleton in poor Johnson ' s house ; and more than one anxious to disclose itself .

    Last night I desired to return to Edwardes ' s , but they were all anxious to keep me u few day * longer ; and I yielded . But I went to see thc Fdwardcscs , for I began to feci the want of their . society .- As I rose to go , thc third daughter , Margaret , started from her chair , and cried , " Oh ! may I go with you ' I Do take me too . " " My ( tear . '" exehiiiued her mother , with every clement of _reprobation filing into the tone ; but Margaret pleaded with an impetuosity that overwhelmed the mother ' s passive resistance ; and with "n apology tome for her daughter ' s wihjness , Mrs . Johnson tacitly consented . Margaret hurried awav in dread of a revocation ; and issued from tin

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• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 28, 1852, page 21, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_28081852/page/21/