On this page
-
Text (1)
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
fate makes me pity her the more for its being her own fault . Yet it makes me not the less resolved to bring her to account for her inexplicable aggression on Yseult ; inexplicable , unless it was provoked by Yseult's inexorable simplicity . Yseult is indeed the exact reverse of Giulia . Her simplicity might pass for indifference , for a laisser aller to the humour of the hour , if the directness of her mind did not make her always respond to any call upon it ; and the power both of her understanding and of her heart is seen exactly in proportion to the demand upon them . In this simple directness , she reminds me of Sidney more than any man whom I have known ; but it is a quality more common in woman than in man .
My indignation , both for Giulia herself and for Yseult , made me unyielding . Giulia went even so far as to press my hand to her heart , with many pretty glances ; telling me that I ought not to importune her for any reason except that she was jealous of me . I told her that she should not escape by inciting in me a presumptuousness which had become impossible . Then she seemed really hurt , if not angry ; sat down sullenly ; and confessed that there was a " practical reason" for her declining to know Yseult or to be seen in relation with her . " Giulia , " I cried , " sei tu che me lo dici ?"
"Oh , yes ! " she said , with an expression of real spite , " you can change tongue when you wish to lead me off my own path ! But if you hunt me down I shall turn upon you . " She continued , doggedly— " I refused to know your Mrs . Edwardes because she is not a proper acquaintance . " " But why—tell me why ? " At last she yielded , and said that it was because there had been some scandalous gossip about Mrs . Edwardes . Respecting whom ? I asked . " You need not inquire , " she said . I persevered ; and she said , sulkily , that the rumour pointed at myself ! I did not expect that ; though , of course , I have seen too much ever more to be surprised . But I still pressed Giulia for a further reason : ' " How is it , " I said , " that on such grounds you could refuse to know a woman like Yseult Edwardes : and above all how can you avow such a
reason to me F " " She has taught you at all events to be ungenerous . " " She has taught me nothing but to be more stedfast than ever to truth , of word and act . I am not ungenerous to you , Giulia ; quite the reverse : I only call upon you to be worthy of yourself . Why , in presence of the memory of Asti , why in the very room with Rivers—for I saw him therewhy speak to me in such a strain ? Is it worse to be suspected than to do ? Or do you condemn yourself ?"
" I condemn no one . But at least there is respect due to appearances . One must , you know , do as others do ; and those who openly defy the world are outlaws , and cannot expect that all should consent to share their fate . If they will be lost , why should we weakly suffer ourselves to be dragged after ?" " Appearances ! tribute to ( Anarch Custom ! ' Do you , then , the wife of Sidney , turn renegade to his memory ?"
She burst into tears—good , hearty , genuine tears ; and leaning on my shoulder , only said— " I am very foolish , and very miserable . " There was no answering that . I consoled her without much difficulty ; for she knew that , through nil her caprices and inconsistencies , I had never doubted her heart . She easily allows herself the luxury of a penitent reconciliation . I consented to spend the rest of the day at Werneth ' s , and this morning she has sent me over a letter which she has written before breakfast , for me to
take to Yseult , confessing her idle discourtesy , and asking for Yseult ' s forgiveness and friendship . It is nobly written , not ordy with all her literary skill , but with expressions of a feeling that must have been felt not fancied . How admirable Julia is , when she is not under the eye of the world : how she sinks below mediocrity when she thinks that eye is upon her . How vulgar whoa she takes her stand upon mi escoeheon to which she was not born ; how much above all escocheons when she takes her place in the circle of true . Art !
As I was going up to my bed-room , last night , I met on the stairs a young woman , who seems to be one of the servants , and who screamed at the . sight of me in such ji way : is to draw around us Audley and all the family . The poor girl staggered , and would have fallen , if 1 had not taught her , und recognised her as the servant who had been so recently dismissed from the Johnson ' s , and I suppose she feared that 1 might cause her to lose her new place ; but , of course , her fear was vain . After various dramatic ; groupings over the fainting form of the girl , she revived , and we attained our several rooms . The tenor with which she
regarded me was unaccountable ; still more so , a sort of general consternation in some of the family group , partly explained , perhaps , by the fact which Mrs . Audley told me , that the girl was come to be wet-nurse to Mrs . Ashwcll , the eldest daughter , and it might be feared that the baby would sulfer . So here is this poor girl , being poor , condemned to neglect her own child , and to become the hireling mother for thut of a stranger ; that stranger ,
probably , " civilized" into an incapacity for being a complete mother to her own offspring f However , it is a point of redemption , that the necessity of the over-cultivated rich provides an asylum for the poor outcast . Does moral character go with the milk of nurture V If so , the fact might account for the plebeian aspects and tastes of many of our Knglish nobility and gentry . Yesterday , I went with Wcroeth to the neighbouring town of Brinksway —a concentrated offshoot of Manchester . We went over a factory , in
which everything is done by steam , from the tearing of the raw cotton to the grinding of a knife , or the throwing coals on the furnace through a " self-acting hopper . " The yarn spun , the cloth woven , were admirable ; the only part of the machinery that was unsatisfactory was the human part * I know not what appearance of activity and worn-out life indicated feeble vigour in the men ; but the sight of the women was the worst . I can hardly describe it . You see many fine ^ looking girls , mauy intelligent faces . A sort of infantile pinafore is worn by many , without much reference to age . To see women at a steady drudgery which is real hard work—to note the development of that human flower in all stages of its growth , the countenance expressing , as it most often does , a certain overwrought feeling—a
womanly tenderness over developed , conjoined with a sort of hardness and effrontery , is most painful . Before the fulness and bloom of youth are gone , a sickly thoughtfulness possesses the countenance ; then , while the face hardens , that thoughtfulness becomes sadness ; but still the sadness cannot retire within itself—it is chained to the ceaseless industry of the loom , pilloried in the eye of a world that cannot be troubled with bashfulness . Womanhood runs the gauntlet of every indignity ; and it is at once consolatory and terrible , to see that womanhood is not extinguished , but preserves some relic of its heart and feeling under that bold , sad countenance . Many of these women , Werneth told me , are murderers of their childrensome literally , others indirectly , by the neglects of hired nursing . It is better than it was before the state interfered to check their labour : but
still it is bad . I thought I could see that some of the murderers still loved their children . Perhaps I was mistaken ; for how could I tell which were the murderers , which the faithful mothers . But what a horrible state of society must that be , in which the murderer-mother and the motherly mother cannot be distinguished—in which remorse shall be undistinguishable from toil , toil downcast like remorse ! We went to the police court ; the Town Clerk all cordiality and pleasantry . There was an assault case on : several boys and girls , probably all under twenty , or about that age , were accused of an assault at a wedding-supper
in a public-house ; several other boys and girls being the prosecutors ; and more of them the witnesses . " Are you married ? " asked the Town Clerk , to a boy and girl . " Yes , sir . " " And you ? " " Yes , sir . " " And you . " Yes , they were nearly all married . They had met for festivity ; they had exchanged witticisms which I should not like to write ; a fight followed ; one girl was killed ; and two others , very delicate looking young ladies , in most becoming dresses , mutually wounded each other with tongue and fist . It was a horrid spectacle—that glimpse into the pleasures of " life" outside the factory . The Town Clerk drew it all out like a man used to the process , and justice " disposed of the case" with facile familiarity .
We dined with the Town Clerk—a most agreeable , witty , well-informed man ; who evidently returns the borough member , and takes things as they come , including two or three comfortable salaries . In the evening we went to a public meeting , to consider the non-observance of the Ten Hours Bill—an Act of Parliament to limit the hours of labour , which used to be terribly severe . The place was a large low room in a public-house . Werneth and I found the " committee" assembled , with pipe and pot of beer at hand ; and a remarkable group they were . One was a heavy man , with a handsome slow face , inclined to flush with a quick pride—an honest , sensitive , dogged , dull-witted fellow . Another , pointed out to me as the leader in 1848—a short man with flowing locks , black turning to grey , and a
musical voice , that had a ring in it peculiar to this part of the country ; a most plausible benevolent countenance , and a leering eye that overlooked nothing . Another was a gaunt glassy-eyed man , who might have been m the last stage of a consumption : he was emitting rabid sedition , and filling the aching void in his bosom with fiery brandy and water . A fourth was a lad , girlish in look and voice . But amongst the working classes , excl uded as they are from real political action , the boy assumes the political toga as soon as he earns wages . The whole scene was unpleasant . The way in which the " committee" doctored its " telling" resolutions , so as to hit the prejudices of the expected crowd ; the covert arrogance of the meeting , holding itself identical with " the people ; " the ostentatious ig norance ot
Boiling , the benevolent-faced leader of 1848 ; his complaints , always on behalf of " others , " his recital of his own sufferings under the " tyranny ol masters ; the fierce earnestness of numbers who ultimately crowded the rooin , the laughing chatting nonchalance of others , who held up their hands for the resolutions with the most attentive ; the bullying tone , " resolving not to petition but to demand rights—all these were unpleasant traits . the worst was to follow . As the meeting began to thin , Boiling took a new part , und played beggar on behalf of the " association ; " and it wa » impossible not to note the glare of rapacity in his eye as he drew to lllinsC the pence wrung from the working people . Boiling was a hand-loom business is
weaver " out of work : " but his weaving is a tradition ; his trade in meetings , committees , associations , and grievances , la better < ay ^ he used to get up a riot , now and then , to renew the life of his " & ^™^ as sticks are thrust into a fire that is going out . After the " treasurer canvthe landlord , who had already flitted about like a thrifty ghost , an w n made the best harvest from u crowd thirsty with " agitating" in a hot roo ^ In the course of the speaking , one unfortunate enthusnwt objected to p ^" tioning Parliament ; because , he said , if the working classes were all uni they need not ask , but might take their rights . A loud howl foliowed , cries of " Spy I" The working men have been so deceived by their le £ . ^ that they have no faith in each other nor in their own objects .
Untitled Article
976 THE tEA D E It . [( tattm **?* i j- — . _ . i n i ii - i '
-
-
Citation
-
Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 9, 1852, page 976, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1955/page/20/
-