August 18, 2025 • 26 mins
In this captivating novella by the renowned Elizabeth Gaskell, we delve into the life and memories of the aristocratic Lady Ludlow, as narrated by her young charge, Margaret Dawson. Lady Ludlow embodies the resistance of the old English gentry to embrace social reform and technological advancements, including education for the less fortunate and a more lenient approach to religion. Through her reflections on friends from the tumultuous times of the French Revolution, she seeks to protect and mentor the many young ladies under her care. [Summary by Rosie]
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Chapter ten of My Lady Ludlow by Elizabeth Gaskell. This
is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
LibriVox dot org. Recording by Rosie. My Lady Ludlow by
Elizabeth Gasquell, Chapter ten. The next morning, Miss Galindo made
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her appearance, and, by some mistake unusual to my Lady's
well trained servants, was shown into the room where I
was trying to walk, for a certain amount of exercise
was prescribed for me painful, although the exertion had become
She brought a little basket along with her, and while
the footman was gone to inquire my Lady's wishes for
I don't think that Lady Ludlow expected Miss Galindo so
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soon to assume her clerkship, nor indeed had mister Horner
any work of any kind ready for his new assistant
to do. She launched out into conversation with me. It
was a sudden summons, my dear. However, as I have
often said to myself ever since an occasion long ago,
if Lady Ludlow ever honors me by asking for my
right hand I'll cut it off and wrap the stump
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up so tidily she shall never find out it bleeds.
But if I had had a little more time, I
could have mended my pens better. You see, I have
had to set up pretty late to get these sleeves made.
And she took out of her basket a pail of
brown Holland over sleeves, very much such as a grocer's
apprentice wears. And I had only time to make seven
or eight pens out of some quills Farmer Thompson gave
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me last autumn. As for ink, I'm thankful to say
that's always ready. An ounce of steel filings, an ounce
of nutgall and a pint of water tea if you're extravagant,
which thank Heaven I'm not. Put all in a bottle
and hang it up behind the house door so that
the hole gets a good shaking every time you slam
it too. And even if you are in a passion
and bang it, as Sally and I often do, it
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is all the better for it. And there's my ink
ready for use, ready to write my lady's will with
if need be. Oh, miss Galindo said, I don't talk,
so my lady's will, and she's not dead yet, and
if she were, what would be the use of talking
of making her will? Now, if you are Sally, I
should say answer me that you goose, But as you
are a relation of my lady's, I must be civil
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and only say I can't think how you can talk
so like a fool, to be sure, poor thing you
are lame. I do not know how long she would
have gone on, but my lady came in, and I
realized from my duty of entertaining Miss Galindo, made my
limping way into the next room to tell the truth.
I was rather afraid of Miss Galindo's tongue, for I
never know what she would say next. After a while,
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my lady came and began to look in the bureau
for something, and as she looked, she said, I think
mister Horner must have made some mistake when he said
he had so much work that he almost required a clerk.
For this morning he cannot find anything for Miss Glindo
to do. And there she is sitting with her pen
behind her ear, waiting for something to write. I am
come to find her my mother's letters, for I should
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like to have a fair copy made of them. Oh,
here they are. Don't trouble yourself, my dear child. When
my lady returned again, she sat down and began to
talk of mister Gray. Miss Galindo said she saw him
going to hold a prayer meeting in a cottage. Now
that really makes me unhappy. It is so like what
mister Wesley used to do in my younger days, and
since then we have had rebellion in the American colonies
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and the French Revolution. You may depend upon it, my dear.
Making religion an education common, vulgarizing them as it were,
is a bad thing for a nation. A man who
hears prayers read in the cottage where he has just
supped on bread and bacon forgets the respect due to
a church. He begins to think that one place is
as good as another, and by and by that one
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person is as good as another. And after that I
always find that people begin to talk of their rights
instead of thinking of their duties. I wish mister Gray
had been more tractable and had left well alone. What
do you think I heard this morning? Why that the
home Hill estate, which niches into the Hanbury property, was
bought by a Baptist baker from Birmingham, a Baptist speaker,
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I exclaimed, I had never seen a dissenter to my knowledge,
but having always heard of them spoken of with horror,
I looked upon them almost as if they were rhinoceroses.
I wanted to see a live dissenter, I believe, and
yet I wished it were over. I was almost surprised
when I heard that any of them were engaged in
such peaceful occupations as baking. Yes, so, mister Horner tells
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me a mister Lamb, I believe. But at any rate
he is a Baptist and has been in trade. What
with his schismatism in mister Gray's methodism, I am afraid
all the primitive character of this place will vanish. From
what I could hear, mister Gray seemed to be taking
his own way, at any rate, more than he had
done when he first came to the village, when his
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natural timidity had made him defer to my lady and
seek her consent and sanction before embarking in any new plan.
But newness was a quality Lady Ludlow especially disliked, even
in the fashions of dress and furniture. She clung to
the old to the modes which had prevailed when she
was young. And though she had a deep personal regard
for Queen Charlotte, to whom, as I have already said,
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she had been made of honor, yet there was a
tinge of Jacobitism about her, such as made her extremely
dislike to hear Prince Charles Edward called the young pretender,
as many loyal people did in those days, and made
her fond of telling of the thorn tree in my
Lord's Park in Scotland, which had been planted by Bonnie
Queen Mary herself, and before which every guest in the
cattle of Monkshaven was expected to stand bareheaded out of
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respect to the memory of misfortunes of the Royal planter.
We might play at cards, if we so chose, on
a Sunday, at least I suppose we might, for my
lady and Mister Mountford used to do so often when
I first went. But we must neither play cards, nor
read nor sew on the fifth of November and on
the thirtieth of January, but must go to church and
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meditate all the rest of the day. And very hard
work meditating was. I would far rather have scoured a room.
That was the reason, I suppose why a passive life
was seen to be better disciplined for me than an
active one. But I am wandering away from my lady
and her dislike to all innovation. Now it seemed to me,
as far as I heard, that mister Gray was full
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of nothing but new things, and that what he first
did was to attack all our established institutions, both in
the village and the parish, and also in the nation.
To be sure, I heard of his ways of going
on principally from Miss Galindo, who was apt to speak
more strongly than accurately. There he goes, she said, clucking
up the children just like an old hen, and trying
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to teach them about their salvation and their souls. And
I don't know what things that it is just blasphemy
to speak about out of church. And he potters old
people about reading their Bibles. I am sure, I don't
want to speak disrespectfully about the holy scriptures. But I
found old job Horton busy reading his Bible yesterday. Says
I what are you reading and where did you get it?
And who gave it to you? So he made answer
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that he was reading Susannah and the Elders, for that
he had read Belle and the Dragon till he could
pretty much near say it off by heart, and they
were two as pretty story as ever he had read,
and that it was a caution to him what bad
old chaps there were in the world. Now, as job
is bedridden, I don't think he is likely to meet
with the elders. And I say that I think repeating
his creed, the Commandments, and the Lord's Prayer, and maybe
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throwing in a verse of the Psalms if he wanted
a bit of change would have done him far more
good than his pretty stories, as he called them. And
what's the next thing our young parson does? Why he
tries to make us all feel pitiful for the black
slaves and leaves little pictures of negroes about with the
question printed below? Am I not a man and a brother?
Just as if I was to be hail fellow, well
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met with every negro footman? They do say he takes
no sugar in his tea because he thinks he sees
spots of blood in it. Now I call that superstition.
The next day it was a still worse story. Well,
my dear, and how are you My lady sent me
in to sit a bit with you while mister Horner
looks out for some papers for me to copy between ourselves.
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Mister Stewart Horner does not like having me for a clerk.
It is all very well he does not, for if
he were decently civil to me, I might want a chaperone.
You know now, poor missus Horner is dead. This was
one of miss Galindo's grim jokes. As it is, I
try to make him forget I'm a woman. I do
everything as shipshape as a masculine man clerk. I see
he can't find a fault, writing good spelling, correct sums
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all right, And then he squints up at me with
the tail of his eye and looks glummer than ever,
just because I'm a woman. As if I could help that,
I have gone good lengths to set his mind at ease.
I have stuck my pen behind my ear. I have
made him a bow instead of a curtsey. I have
whistled not a tune. I can't pipe up that, Nay,
if you won't tell my lady, I don't mind telling
you that I have said confounded and downs, I can't
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get any farther. For all that mister Horner won't forget.
I am a lady, and so I am not half
the use I might be. And if it were not
to please my lady Ludlow, mister Horner and his books
might go hang. See how natural that came out. And
there is an order for a dozen night caps for
a bride, and I am so afraid I shan't have
time to do them. Worst of all, there's mister Gray
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taking advantage of my absence to seduce Sallie. To seduce Sallie,
mister Gray, pooh, pooh, child, there's many a kind of seduction.
Mister Gray is seducing Sallie to want to go to church.
There has he been twice at my house while I
have been away in the mornings, talking to Sallie about
the state of her soul and that sort of thing.
But when I found the meat all roasted to a cinder,
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I said, come, Sallie, let's have no more praying when
beef is down at the fire. Pray at six o'clock
in the morning at nine at night, and I won't
hinder you. So she sauced me and said something about
Martha and Mary, implying that because she had let the
beef get so overdone that I declare I could hardly
find a bit for Nancy Pole's sick grandchild. She had
chosen the better part. I was very much put about
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I own, and perhaps you'll be shocked at what I said. Indeed,
I don't know if it was right myself, but I
told her I had a soul as well as she,
and if it was to be saved by my sitting
still and thinking about salvation and never doing my duty,
I thought I had as good a right as she
had to be merry and save my soul. So that
afternoon I sat quite still, and it was really a
comfort for I am often too busy, I know, to
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pray as I ought. There is first one person wanting me,
and then another, and the house and the food, and
the neighbors to see after. So when tea time comes,
there enters my maid with her hump on her back
and her soul to be saved. Please, ma'am, did you
order the pound of butter? No, Sallie, I said, shaking
my head. This morning I did not go round by
Hale's farm, and this afternoon I have been employed in
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spiritual things. Now our Salie likes tea and bread and
butter above everything, and dry bread was not to her taste.
I'm thankful, said the impudent hussy, that you have taken
a turn towards godliness. It will be my prayers. I
trust that's given it you. I was determined not to
give her an opening towards the carnal's subject of butter,
so she lingered, still longing to ask leave to run
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for it. But I gave her none, and munched my
dry bread myself, thinking what a famous cake I could
make for little ben Pole with the bit of butter
we were saving. And when Sallie had had her butterless
tea and was in none of the best tempers because
Martha had not bethought herself of the butter, I just
quietly said, now, Sallie tomorrow will try to hash that
beef well, and to remember the butter, and to work
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out our salvation all the same time. For I don't
see why it can't all be done as God has
set us to do it all. But I heard her
at it again about Mary and Martha, and I have
no doubt that mister Gray will teach her to consider
me a lost sheep. I had heard so many little
speeches about mister Gray from one person or another, all
speaking against him as a mischief maker, a setter up
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of new doctrines and of a fanciful standard of life.
And you may be sure that where Lady Ludlow led,
missus Medlicott and Adams were certain to follow, each in
their different ways, showing the influence my lady had over them.
That I believe I had grown to consider him as
a very instrument of evil, and to expect to perceive
in his face marks of his presumption and arrogance and
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impertinent interference. It was now many weeks since I had
seen him, and when he was one morning shown into
the blue drawing room into which I had been removed
for a change, I was quite surprised to see how
innocent and awkward a young man he appeared, confused even
more than I was at our unexpected tete a tete.
He looked thinner, his eyes more eager, his expression more anxious,
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and his color came and went more than it had
done when I had seen him last. I tried to
make a little conversation, as I was, to my own surprise,
more at my ease than he was, but his thoughts
were evidently too much preoccupied for him to do more
than answer me with monosyllables. Presently, my lady came in.
Mister Gray twitched and colored more than ever, but plunged
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into the middle of his subject at once, My Lady,
I cannot answer it to my conscience. If I allow
the children of this village to go on any longer,
the little heathens that they are, I must do something
to alter their condition. I am quite aware that your
ladyship disapproves of many of the plans which have suggested
themselves to me, But nevertheless, I must do something, and
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I am come now to your ladyship to ask, respectfully
but firmly, what you would advise me to do. His
eyes were dilated, and I could almost have said they
were full of tears with his eagerness. But I am
sure he is a bad plan. To remind people of
decided opinions which they have once expressed, if you wish
them to modify those opinions. Now, mister Gray had done
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this with my lady, And though I do not mean
to say she was obstinate, yet she was not one
to retract. She was silent for a moment or two before,
she replied, you ask me to suggest a remedy for
an evil of the existence of which I am not conscious?
Was her answer, very coldly, very gently given in mister
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Mountford's time, I heard no such complaints. Whenever I see
the village children, and they are not unfrequent visitors at
this house. On one pretext or another, they are well
and decently behaved. Oh, Madam, you cannot judge, he broke in.
They are trained to respect you in word. Indeed, you
are the highest they ever look up to. They have
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no notion of a higher Nay, mister Gray, said my lady, smiling.
They are as loyally disposed as any children can be.
They come up here every fourth of June and drink
His Majesty's health and have buns, And as Margaret Dawson
can testify, they take a great and respectful interest in
all the pictures I can show them of the royal family.
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But Madam, I think of something higher than any earthly dignities.
My lady colored at the mistake she had made, for
she herself was truly pious. Yet when she resumed the subject,
it seemed to me as if her tone was a
little sharper than before. Such want of reverence is I
should say the clergyman's fault. You must excuse me, mister Gray,
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if I speak plainly, my ladyship, I want plain speaking.
I myself and not accustomed to these ceremonies and forms,
which are I suppose, the etiquette in your ladyship's rank
of life, and which seemed to head you in from
any power of mind to touch you. Among those with
whom I have passed my life, hitherto it has been
the custom to speak plainly out what we have felt earnestly.
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So instead of meeting any apology from your ladyship for
straightforward speaking, I will meet what you say at once
and admit that it is the clergyman's fault in a
great measure when the children of his parish swear and curse,
and are brutal and ignorant of all saving grace, nay
some of them, of the very name of God. And
because this guilt of mine, as the clergyman of this parish,
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lies heavy on my soul, and every day leads but
from bad to worse, till I am utterly bewildered how
to do good to children who escape from me as
if I were a monster, and who are growing up
to be men fit for and capable of any crime.
But those requiring wit or sense, I come to you,
who seem to me all powerful as far as material
power goes. For your ladyship only knows the surface of things,
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and barely that that pass in your village. To help
me with advice and such outward help as you can give.
Mister Gray had stood up and sat down once or
twice while he had been speaking in an agitated, nervous
kind of way, and now he was interrupted by a
violent fit of coughing, after which he trembled all over.
My lady rang for a glass of water and looked
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much distressed. Mister Gray said, she, I am sure you
are not well, and that makes you exaggerate childish faults
into positive evils. It is always the case with us
when we are not strong in health. I hear of
your exerting yourself in every direction. You overwork yourself, and
the consequence is that you imagine us all worse people
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than we are. And my lady smiled very kindly and
pleasantly at him as he sat a little panting, a
little flushed, trying to recover his breath. I am sure
that now they were brought face to face, she had
quite forgotten all the offense she had taken at his
doings when she heard of them from others. And indeed
it was enough to soften any one's heart to see
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that young olmas most boyish face looking in such anxiety
and distress. Oh my lady, what shall I do? He asked,
as soon as he could recover breath, and with such
an air of humility that I am sure no one
who had seen it could ever have thought him conceded again,
the evil of this world is too strong for me.
I can do so little. It is all in vain.
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It was only to day and again the cough and
agitation returned. My dear mister Gray, said my lady the
day before. I could never have believed she could have
called him, My dear, you must take the advice of
an old woman about yourself. You are not fit to
do anything just now, but attend to your own health,
rest and see a doctor. But indeed I will take
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care of that, And when you are pretty strong again,
you will find that you have been magnifying evils to yourself.
But my lady, I cannot rest. The evils do exist,
and the burden of their continuance lies on my shoulders.
I have no place to gather the children together in
that I may teach them the things necessary to salvation.
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The rooms in my own house are too small, but
I have tried them. I have money of my own,
and as your ladyship knows, I tried to get a
piece of leasehold property on which to build a schoolhouse
at my own expense. Your ladyship's lawyer comes forward at
your instructions to enforce some old feudal right by which
no building is allowed on leasehold property without the sanction
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of the lady of the manor. It may be all
very true, but it was a cruel thing to do.
That is, if your Ladyship had known, which I am
sure you do not, the real moral and spiritual state
of my poor parishioners. And now I come to you
to know what I am to do. Rest. I cannot
rest while children whom I could possibly save are being
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left in their ignorance, their blasphemy, their uncleanness, their cruelty.
It is known through the village that your Ladyship disapproves
of my efforts, and opposes all my plans if you
think them wrong, foolish, ill digested. I have been a student,
living in a car, knowledge and eskewing all society but
that of pious men, until now. I may not judge
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for the best in my ignorance of this sinful human nature.
Tell me of better plans and wiser projects for accomplishing
my end, But do not bid me rest with Satan
encompassing me round and stealing souls away. Mister Gray said,
my lady, there may be some truth in what you
have said. I do not deny it, though I think
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in your present state of indisposition and excitement you exaggerated much.
I believe nay. The experience of a pretty long life
has convinced me that education is a bad thing if
given indiscriminately. It unfits the lower orders for their duties,
the duties to which they are called by God, of
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submission to those placed in authority over them, of contentment
with that state of life to which it has pleased
God to call them, and of ordering themselves lowly and
reverently to all their betters. I have made this conviction
of mine tolerably evident to you, and I have expressed
distinctly in my disapprobation of some of your ideas. You
may imagine then, that I was not well pleased when
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I found that you had taken a rude or more
of Farmer Hale's land and were laying the foundations of
a schoolhouse. You had done this without asking for my permission, which,
as Farmer Hale's liege lady, ought to have been obtained
legally as well as asked for out of courtesy. I
put a stop to what I believe to be calculated
to do harm to a village, to a population in which,
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to say the least of it, I may be disposed
to take as much interest as you do. How can
reading and writing and the multiplication table, if you choose
to go so far, prevent blasphemy and uncleanness and cruelty. Really,
mister Gray, I hardly like to express myself so strongly
on the subject in your present state of health as
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I should do at any other time. It seems to
me that books do little character much, and character is
not formed from books. I do not think of character.
I think of souls. I must get some hold upon
these children, or what will become of them in the
next world. I must be found to have some power
beyond what they have and which they are rendered capable
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of appreciating, before they will listen to me. At present,
physical force is all they look up to, and I
have none. Nay, mister Gray, by your own admission, they
look up to me. They would not do anything your
Ladyship disliked if it was likely to come to your knowledge.
But if they could conceal it from you. The knowledge
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of your dislike to a particular line of conduct would
never make them cease from pursuing it. Mister Gray, surprise
in her air, and some little indignation. They and their
fathers have lived on the Hanbury lands for generations. I
cannot help it, Madam. I am telling you the truth,
whether you believe it or not. There was a pause.
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My lady looked perplexed and somewhat ruffled mister Gray, as
though hopeless and wearied out. Then my lady said he
at last, rising as he spoke. You can suggest nothing
to ameliorate the state of things which I do assure
you does exist on your lands and among your tenants.
Surely you will not object to my using Farmer Hale's
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great barn every sabbath he will allow me the use
of it, if your Ladyship will grant your permission. You
are not fit for any extra work at present, and
indeed he had been coughing very much all through the conversation.
Give me time to consider it. Tell me what you
wish to teach. You will be able to take care
of your health and grow stronger while I consider it.
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Shall not be the worse for you if you leave
it in my hands for a time. My lady spoke
very kindly, but he was in too excited a state
to recognize the kindness. While the idea of delay was
evidently a sore irritation. I heard him say, and I
have so little time in which to do my work. Lord,
lay not this sin to my charge. But my lady
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was speaking to the old butler, for whom, at her
sign I had rung the bell some little time before.
Now she turned round, mister Gray, I find I have
some bottles of Malmsey, of the vintage of seventeen hundred
and seventy eight. Yet left Malmsey, as perhaps you know,
used to be considered a specific for coughs arising from weakness.
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You must permit me to send you half a dozen bottles,
and depend upon it you will take a more cheerful
view of life and its duties before you have finished them,
especially if you will be so kind as to see
doctor Trevor, who is coming to see me in the
course of the week. By the time you are strong
enough to work, I will try and find some means
of preventing the children from using such bad language and
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otherwise annoying you. My lady. It is the sin and
not the annoyance. I wish I could make you understand.
He spoke with some impatience. Poor fellow, he was too weak, in,
exhausted and nervous. I am perfectly well. I can set
to work tomorrow. I will do anything not to be
oppressed with the thoughts of how little I am doing.
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I do not want your wine. Liberty to act in
the manner I think right will do me far more good.
But it is of no use. It is preordained that
I am to be nothing but a comberer of the ground.
I beg your ladyship's pardon for this call. He stood
up and then turned dizzy. My lady looked on, deeply
hurt and not a little offended. He held out his
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hand to her, and I could see that she had
a little hesitation before she took it. He then saw me,
I almost think for the first time, and put out
his hand once more, drew it back as if undecided,
put it out again, and finally took hold of mine
for an instant in his damp, listless hand, and was gone.
Lady Ludlow was dissatisfied with both him and herself. I
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was sure, indeed, I was dissatisfied with the result of
the interview myself. But my lady was not one to
speak out her feelings on the subject, nor was I
one to forget myself and begin on a topic which
she did not begin. She came to me and was
very tender with me, so tender that that and the
thoughts of mister Gray's sick, hopeless, disappointed look nearly made
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me cry. You are tired, little one, said my lady.
Go and lie down in my room and hear what
Medlicott and I can decide upon in the way of
strengthening dainties for that poor young man who was killing
himself with his over sensitive conscientiousness. Oh, my lady, said I,
and then stopped. Well, what asked she if you would
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but let him have Farmer Hale's barn at once. It
would do him more good than all Pooh Pooh child.
Though I don't think she was displeased. He is not
fit for more work. Just now, I shall go and
write for doctor Trevor. And for the next half hour
we did nothing but arrange physical comforts and cures for
poor mister Gray. At the end of the time, Missus
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Medlicott said, has your ladyship heard that Harry Gregson has
fallen from a tree and broken his thigh bone and
is like to be a cripple for life? Harry Gregson,
that black eyed lad who read my letter that all
comes from over education. End of Chapter ten. Recording by
Rosy
Chapter ten of My Lady Ludlow by Elizabeth Gaskell. This
is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
LibriVox dot org. Recording by Rosie. My Lady Ludlow by
Elizabeth Gasquell, Chapter ten. The next morning, Miss Galindo made
(00:22):
her appearance, and, by some mistake unusual to my Lady's
well trained servants, was shown into the room where I
was trying to walk, for a certain amount of exercise
was prescribed for me painful, although the exertion had become
She brought a little basket along with her, and while
the footman was gone to inquire my Lady's wishes for
I don't think that Lady Ludlow expected Miss Galindo so
(00:43):
soon to assume her clerkship, nor indeed had mister Horner
any work of any kind ready for his new assistant
to do. She launched out into conversation with me. It
was a sudden summons, my dear. However, as I have
often said to myself ever since an occasion long ago,
if Lady Ludlow ever honors me by asking for my
right hand I'll cut it off and wrap the stump
(01:05):
up so tidily she shall never find out it bleeds.
But if I had had a little more time, I
could have mended my pens better. You see, I have
had to set up pretty late to get these sleeves made.
And she took out of her basket a pail of
brown Holland over sleeves, very much such as a grocer's
apprentice wears. And I had only time to make seven
or eight pens out of some quills Farmer Thompson gave
(01:27):
me last autumn. As for ink, I'm thankful to say
that's always ready. An ounce of steel filings, an ounce
of nutgall and a pint of water tea if you're extravagant,
which thank Heaven I'm not. Put all in a bottle
and hang it up behind the house door so that
the hole gets a good shaking every time you slam
it too. And even if you are in a passion
and bang it, as Sally and I often do, it
(01:48):
is all the better for it. And there's my ink
ready for use, ready to write my lady's will with
if need be. Oh, miss Galindo said, I don't talk,
so my lady's will, and she's not dead yet, and
if she were, what would be the use of talking
of making her will? Now, if you are Sally, I
should say answer me that you goose, But as you
are a relation of my lady's, I must be civil
(02:10):
and only say I can't think how you can talk
so like a fool, to be sure, poor thing you
are lame. I do not know how long she would
have gone on, but my lady came in, and I
realized from my duty of entertaining Miss Galindo, made my
limping way into the next room to tell the truth.
I was rather afraid of Miss Galindo's tongue, for I
never know what she would say next. After a while,
(02:33):
my lady came and began to look in the bureau
for something, and as she looked, she said, I think
mister Horner must have made some mistake when he said
he had so much work that he almost required a clerk.
For this morning he cannot find anything for Miss Glindo
to do. And there she is sitting with her pen
behind her ear, waiting for something to write. I am
come to find her my mother's letters, for I should
(02:54):
like to have a fair copy made of them. Oh,
here they are. Don't trouble yourself, my dear child. When
my lady returned again, she sat down and began to
talk of mister Gray. Miss Galindo said she saw him
going to hold a prayer meeting in a cottage. Now
that really makes me unhappy. It is so like what
mister Wesley used to do in my younger days, and
since then we have had rebellion in the American colonies
(03:16):
and the French Revolution. You may depend upon it, my dear.
Making religion an education common, vulgarizing them as it were,
is a bad thing for a nation. A man who
hears prayers read in the cottage where he has just
supped on bread and bacon forgets the respect due to
a church. He begins to think that one place is
as good as another, and by and by that one
(03:37):
person is as good as another. And after that I
always find that people begin to talk of their rights
instead of thinking of their duties. I wish mister Gray
had been more tractable and had left well alone. What
do you think I heard this morning? Why that the
home Hill estate, which niches into the Hanbury property, was
bought by a Baptist baker from Birmingham, a Baptist speaker,
(04:00):
I exclaimed, I had never seen a dissenter to my knowledge,
but having always heard of them spoken of with horror,
I looked upon them almost as if they were rhinoceroses.
I wanted to see a live dissenter, I believe, and
yet I wished it were over. I was almost surprised
when I heard that any of them were engaged in
such peaceful occupations as baking. Yes, so, mister Horner tells
(04:22):
me a mister Lamb, I believe. But at any rate
he is a Baptist and has been in trade. What
with his schismatism in mister Gray's methodism, I am afraid
all the primitive character of this place will vanish. From
what I could hear, mister Gray seemed to be taking
his own way, at any rate, more than he had
done when he first came to the village, when his
(04:42):
natural timidity had made him defer to my lady and
seek her consent and sanction before embarking in any new plan.
But newness was a quality Lady Ludlow especially disliked, even
in the fashions of dress and furniture. She clung to
the old to the modes which had prevailed when she
was young. And though she had a deep personal regard
for Queen Charlotte, to whom, as I have already said,
(05:04):
she had been made of honor, yet there was a
tinge of Jacobitism about her, such as made her extremely
dislike to hear Prince Charles Edward called the young pretender,
as many loyal people did in those days, and made
her fond of telling of the thorn tree in my
Lord's Park in Scotland, which had been planted by Bonnie
Queen Mary herself, and before which every guest in the
cattle of Monkshaven was expected to stand bareheaded out of
(05:27):
respect to the memory of misfortunes of the Royal planter.
We might play at cards, if we so chose, on
a Sunday, at least I suppose we might, for my
lady and Mister Mountford used to do so often when
I first went. But we must neither play cards, nor
read nor sew on the fifth of November and on
the thirtieth of January, but must go to church and
(05:48):
meditate all the rest of the day. And very hard
work meditating was. I would far rather have scoured a room.
That was the reason, I suppose why a passive life
was seen to be better disciplined for me than an
active one. But I am wandering away from my lady
and her dislike to all innovation. Now it seemed to me,
as far as I heard, that mister Gray was full
(06:08):
of nothing but new things, and that what he first
did was to attack all our established institutions, both in
the village and the parish, and also in the nation.
To be sure, I heard of his ways of going
on principally from Miss Galindo, who was apt to speak
more strongly than accurately. There he goes, she said, clucking
up the children just like an old hen, and trying
(06:29):
to teach them about their salvation and their souls. And
I don't know what things that it is just blasphemy
to speak about out of church. And he potters old
people about reading their Bibles. I am sure, I don't
want to speak disrespectfully about the holy scriptures. But I
found old job Horton busy reading his Bible yesterday. Says
I what are you reading and where did you get it?
And who gave it to you? So he made answer
(06:52):
that he was reading Susannah and the Elders, for that
he had read Belle and the Dragon till he could
pretty much near say it off by heart, and they
were two as pretty story as ever he had read,
and that it was a caution to him what bad
old chaps there were in the world. Now, as job
is bedridden, I don't think he is likely to meet
with the elders. And I say that I think repeating
his creed, the Commandments, and the Lord's Prayer, and maybe
(07:15):
throwing in a verse of the Psalms if he wanted
a bit of change would have done him far more
good than his pretty stories, as he called them. And
what's the next thing our young parson does? Why he
tries to make us all feel pitiful for the black
slaves and leaves little pictures of negroes about with the
question printed below? Am I not a man and a brother?
Just as if I was to be hail fellow, well
(07:35):
met with every negro footman? They do say he takes
no sugar in his tea because he thinks he sees
spots of blood in it. Now I call that superstition.
The next day it was a still worse story. Well,
my dear, and how are you My lady sent me
in to sit a bit with you while mister Horner
looks out for some papers for me to copy between ourselves.
(07:57):
Mister Stewart Horner does not like having me for a clerk.
It is all very well he does not, for if
he were decently civil to me, I might want a chaperone.
You know now, poor missus Horner is dead. This was
one of miss Galindo's grim jokes. As it is, I
try to make him forget I'm a woman. I do
everything as shipshape as a masculine man clerk. I see
he can't find a fault, writing good spelling, correct sums
(08:19):
all right, And then he squints up at me with
the tail of his eye and looks glummer than ever,
just because I'm a woman. As if I could help that,
I have gone good lengths to set his mind at ease.
I have stuck my pen behind my ear. I have
made him a bow instead of a curtsey. I have
whistled not a tune. I can't pipe up that, Nay,
if you won't tell my lady, I don't mind telling
you that I have said confounded and downs, I can't
(08:43):
get any farther. For all that mister Horner won't forget.
I am a lady, and so I am not half
the use I might be. And if it were not
to please my lady Ludlow, mister Horner and his books
might go hang. See how natural that came out. And
there is an order for a dozen night caps for
a bride, and I am so afraid I shan't have
time to do them. Worst of all, there's mister Gray
(09:03):
taking advantage of my absence to seduce Sallie. To seduce Sallie,
mister Gray, pooh, pooh, child, there's many a kind of seduction.
Mister Gray is seducing Sallie to want to go to church.
There has he been twice at my house while I
have been away in the mornings, talking to Sallie about
the state of her soul and that sort of thing.
But when I found the meat all roasted to a cinder,
(09:25):
I said, come, Sallie, let's have no more praying when
beef is down at the fire. Pray at six o'clock
in the morning at nine at night, and I won't
hinder you. So she sauced me and said something about
Martha and Mary, implying that because she had let the
beef get so overdone that I declare I could hardly
find a bit for Nancy Pole's sick grandchild. She had
chosen the better part. I was very much put about
(09:47):
I own, and perhaps you'll be shocked at what I said. Indeed,
I don't know if it was right myself, but I
told her I had a soul as well as she,
and if it was to be saved by my sitting
still and thinking about salvation and never doing my duty,
I thought I had as good a right as she
had to be merry and save my soul. So that
afternoon I sat quite still, and it was really a
comfort for I am often too busy, I know, to
(10:08):
pray as I ought. There is first one person wanting me,
and then another, and the house and the food, and
the neighbors to see after. So when tea time comes,
there enters my maid with her hump on her back
and her soul to be saved. Please, ma'am, did you
order the pound of butter? No, Sallie, I said, shaking
my head. This morning I did not go round by
Hale's farm, and this afternoon I have been employed in
(10:30):
spiritual things. Now our Salie likes tea and bread and
butter above everything, and dry bread was not to her taste.
I'm thankful, said the impudent hussy, that you have taken
a turn towards godliness. It will be my prayers. I
trust that's given it you. I was determined not to
give her an opening towards the carnal's subject of butter,
so she lingered, still longing to ask leave to run
(10:53):
for it. But I gave her none, and munched my
dry bread myself, thinking what a famous cake I could
make for little ben Pole with the bit of butter
we were saving. And when Sallie had had her butterless
tea and was in none of the best tempers because
Martha had not bethought herself of the butter, I just
quietly said, now, Sallie tomorrow will try to hash that
beef well, and to remember the butter, and to work
(11:14):
out our salvation all the same time. For I don't
see why it can't all be done as God has
set us to do it all. But I heard her
at it again about Mary and Martha, and I have
no doubt that mister Gray will teach her to consider
me a lost sheep. I had heard so many little
speeches about mister Gray from one person or another, all
speaking against him as a mischief maker, a setter up
(11:36):
of new doctrines and of a fanciful standard of life.
And you may be sure that where Lady Ludlow led,
missus Medlicott and Adams were certain to follow, each in
their different ways, showing the influence my lady had over them.
That I believe I had grown to consider him as
a very instrument of evil, and to expect to perceive
in his face marks of his presumption and arrogance and
(11:57):
impertinent interference. It was now many weeks since I had
seen him, and when he was one morning shown into
the blue drawing room into which I had been removed
for a change, I was quite surprised to see how
innocent and awkward a young man he appeared, confused even
more than I was at our unexpected tete a tete.
He looked thinner, his eyes more eager, his expression more anxious,
(12:19):
and his color came and went more than it had
done when I had seen him last. I tried to
make a little conversation, as I was, to my own surprise,
more at my ease than he was, but his thoughts
were evidently too much preoccupied for him to do more
than answer me with monosyllables. Presently, my lady came in.
Mister Gray twitched and colored more than ever, but plunged
(12:41):
into the middle of his subject at once, My Lady,
I cannot answer it to my conscience. If I allow
the children of this village to go on any longer,
the little heathens that they are, I must do something
to alter their condition. I am quite aware that your
ladyship disapproves of many of the plans which have suggested
themselves to me, But nevertheless, I must do something, and
(13:03):
I am come now to your ladyship to ask, respectfully
but firmly, what you would advise me to do. His
eyes were dilated, and I could almost have said they
were full of tears with his eagerness. But I am
sure he is a bad plan. To remind people of
decided opinions which they have once expressed, if you wish
them to modify those opinions. Now, mister Gray had done
(13:23):
this with my lady, And though I do not mean
to say she was obstinate, yet she was not one
to retract. She was silent for a moment or two before,
she replied, you ask me to suggest a remedy for
an evil of the existence of which I am not conscious?
Was her answer, very coldly, very gently given in mister
(13:43):
Mountford's time, I heard no such complaints. Whenever I see
the village children, and they are not unfrequent visitors at
this house. On one pretext or another, they are well
and decently behaved. Oh, Madam, you cannot judge, he broke in.
They are trained to respect you in word. Indeed, you
are the highest they ever look up to. They have
(14:04):
no notion of a higher Nay, mister Gray, said my lady, smiling.
They are as loyally disposed as any children can be.
They come up here every fourth of June and drink
His Majesty's health and have buns, And as Margaret Dawson
can testify, they take a great and respectful interest in
all the pictures I can show them of the royal family.
(14:25):
But Madam, I think of something higher than any earthly dignities.
My lady colored at the mistake she had made, for
she herself was truly pious. Yet when she resumed the subject,
it seemed to me as if her tone was a
little sharper than before. Such want of reverence is I
should say the clergyman's fault. You must excuse me, mister Gray,
(14:47):
if I speak plainly, my ladyship, I want plain speaking.
I myself and not accustomed to these ceremonies and forms,
which are I suppose, the etiquette in your ladyship's rank
of life, and which seemed to head you in from
any power of mind to touch you. Among those with
whom I have passed my life, hitherto it has been
the custom to speak plainly out what we have felt earnestly.
(15:10):
So instead of meeting any apology from your ladyship for
straightforward speaking, I will meet what you say at once
and admit that it is the clergyman's fault in a
great measure when the children of his parish swear and curse,
and are brutal and ignorant of all saving grace, nay
some of them, of the very name of God. And
because this guilt of mine, as the clergyman of this parish,
(15:32):
lies heavy on my soul, and every day leads but
from bad to worse, till I am utterly bewildered how
to do good to children who escape from me as
if I were a monster, and who are growing up
to be men fit for and capable of any crime.
But those requiring wit or sense, I come to you,
who seem to me all powerful as far as material
power goes. For your ladyship only knows the surface of things,
(15:55):
and barely that that pass in your village. To help
me with advice and such outward help as you can give.
Mister Gray had stood up and sat down once or
twice while he had been speaking in an agitated, nervous
kind of way, and now he was interrupted by a
violent fit of coughing, after which he trembled all over.
My lady rang for a glass of water and looked
(16:17):
much distressed. Mister Gray said, she, I am sure you
are not well, and that makes you exaggerate childish faults
into positive evils. It is always the case with us
when we are not strong in health. I hear of
your exerting yourself in every direction. You overwork yourself, and
the consequence is that you imagine us all worse people
(16:38):
than we are. And my lady smiled very kindly and
pleasantly at him as he sat a little panting, a
little flushed, trying to recover his breath. I am sure
that now they were brought face to face, she had
quite forgotten all the offense she had taken at his
doings when she heard of them from others. And indeed
it was enough to soften any one's heart to see
(16:59):
that young olmas most boyish face looking in such anxiety
and distress. Oh my lady, what shall I do? He asked,
as soon as he could recover breath, and with such
an air of humility that I am sure no one
who had seen it could ever have thought him conceded again,
the evil of this world is too strong for me.
I can do so little. It is all in vain.
(17:20):
It was only to day and again the cough and
agitation returned. My dear mister Gray, said my lady the
day before. I could never have believed she could have
called him, My dear, you must take the advice of
an old woman about yourself. You are not fit to
do anything just now, but attend to your own health,
rest and see a doctor. But indeed I will take
(17:41):
care of that, And when you are pretty strong again,
you will find that you have been magnifying evils to yourself.
But my lady, I cannot rest. The evils do exist,
and the burden of their continuance lies on my shoulders.
I have no place to gather the children together in
that I may teach them the things necessary to salvation.
(18:01):
The rooms in my own house are too small, but
I have tried them. I have money of my own,
and as your ladyship knows, I tried to get a
piece of leasehold property on which to build a schoolhouse
at my own expense. Your ladyship's lawyer comes forward at
your instructions to enforce some old feudal right by which
no building is allowed on leasehold property without the sanction
(18:23):
of the lady of the manor. It may be all
very true, but it was a cruel thing to do.
That is, if your Ladyship had known, which I am
sure you do not, the real moral and spiritual state
of my poor parishioners. And now I come to you
to know what I am to do. Rest. I cannot
rest while children whom I could possibly save are being
(18:43):
left in their ignorance, their blasphemy, their uncleanness, their cruelty.
It is known through the village that your Ladyship disapproves
of my efforts, and opposes all my plans if you
think them wrong, foolish, ill digested. I have been a student,
living in a car, knowledge and eskewing all society but
that of pious men, until now. I may not judge
(19:05):
for the best in my ignorance of this sinful human nature.
Tell me of better plans and wiser projects for accomplishing
my end, But do not bid me rest with Satan
encompassing me round and stealing souls away. Mister Gray said,
my lady, there may be some truth in what you
have said. I do not deny it, though I think
(19:27):
in your present state of indisposition and excitement you exaggerated much.
I believe nay. The experience of a pretty long life
has convinced me that education is a bad thing if
given indiscriminately. It unfits the lower orders for their duties,
the duties to which they are called by God, of
(19:47):
submission to those placed in authority over them, of contentment
with that state of life to which it has pleased
God to call them, and of ordering themselves lowly and
reverently to all their betters. I have made this conviction
of mine tolerably evident to you, and I have expressed
distinctly in my disapprobation of some of your ideas. You
may imagine then, that I was not well pleased when
(20:10):
I found that you had taken a rude or more
of Farmer Hale's land and were laying the foundations of
a schoolhouse. You had done this without asking for my permission, which,
as Farmer Hale's liege lady, ought to have been obtained
legally as well as asked for out of courtesy. I
put a stop to what I believe to be calculated
to do harm to a village, to a population in which,
(20:33):
to say the least of it, I may be disposed
to take as much interest as you do. How can
reading and writing and the multiplication table, if you choose
to go so far, prevent blasphemy and uncleanness and cruelty. Really,
mister Gray, I hardly like to express myself so strongly
on the subject in your present state of health as
(20:53):
I should do at any other time. It seems to
me that books do little character much, and character is
not formed from books. I do not think of character.
I think of souls. I must get some hold upon
these children, or what will become of them in the
next world. I must be found to have some power
beyond what they have and which they are rendered capable
(21:16):
of appreciating, before they will listen to me. At present,
physical force is all they look up to, and I
have none. Nay, mister Gray, by your own admission, they
look up to me. They would not do anything your
Ladyship disliked if it was likely to come to your knowledge.
But if they could conceal it from you. The knowledge
(21:37):
of your dislike to a particular line of conduct would
never make them cease from pursuing it. Mister Gray, surprise
in her air, and some little indignation. They and their
fathers have lived on the Hanbury lands for generations. I
cannot help it, Madam. I am telling you the truth,
whether you believe it or not. There was a pause.
(21:58):
My lady looked perplexed and somewhat ruffled mister Gray, as
though hopeless and wearied out. Then my lady said he
at last, rising as he spoke. You can suggest nothing
to ameliorate the state of things which I do assure
you does exist on your lands and among your tenants.
Surely you will not object to my using Farmer Hale's
(22:20):
great barn every sabbath he will allow me the use
of it, if your Ladyship will grant your permission. You
are not fit for any extra work at present, and
indeed he had been coughing very much all through the conversation.
Give me time to consider it. Tell me what you
wish to teach. You will be able to take care
of your health and grow stronger while I consider it.
(22:42):
Shall not be the worse for you if you leave
it in my hands for a time. My lady spoke
very kindly, but he was in too excited a state
to recognize the kindness. While the idea of delay was
evidently a sore irritation. I heard him say, and I
have so little time in which to do my work. Lord,
lay not this sin to my charge. But my lady
(23:05):
was speaking to the old butler, for whom, at her
sign I had rung the bell some little time before.
Now she turned round, mister Gray, I find I have
some bottles of Malmsey, of the vintage of seventeen hundred
and seventy eight. Yet left Malmsey, as perhaps you know,
used to be considered a specific for coughs arising from weakness.
(23:27):
You must permit me to send you half a dozen bottles,
and depend upon it you will take a more cheerful
view of life and its duties before you have finished them,
especially if you will be so kind as to see
doctor Trevor, who is coming to see me in the
course of the week. By the time you are strong
enough to work, I will try and find some means
of preventing the children from using such bad language and
(23:48):
otherwise annoying you. My lady. It is the sin and
not the annoyance. I wish I could make you understand.
He spoke with some impatience. Poor fellow, he was too weak, in,
exhausted and nervous. I am perfectly well. I can set
to work tomorrow. I will do anything not to be
oppressed with the thoughts of how little I am doing.
(24:09):
I do not want your wine. Liberty to act in
the manner I think right will do me far more good.
But it is of no use. It is preordained that
I am to be nothing but a comberer of the ground.
I beg your ladyship's pardon for this call. He stood
up and then turned dizzy. My lady looked on, deeply
hurt and not a little offended. He held out his
(24:32):
hand to her, and I could see that she had
a little hesitation before she took it. He then saw me,
I almost think for the first time, and put out
his hand once more, drew it back as if undecided,
put it out again, and finally took hold of mine
for an instant in his damp, listless hand, and was gone.
Lady Ludlow was dissatisfied with both him and herself. I
(24:54):
was sure, indeed, I was dissatisfied with the result of
the interview myself. But my lady was not one to
speak out her feelings on the subject, nor was I
one to forget myself and begin on a topic which
she did not begin. She came to me and was
very tender with me, so tender that that and the
thoughts of mister Gray's sick, hopeless, disappointed look nearly made
(25:16):
me cry. You are tired, little one, said my lady.
Go and lie down in my room and hear what
Medlicott and I can decide upon in the way of
strengthening dainties for that poor young man who was killing
himself with his over sensitive conscientiousness. Oh, my lady, said I,
and then stopped. Well, what asked she if you would
(25:38):
but let him have Farmer Hale's barn at once. It
would do him more good than all Pooh Pooh child.
Though I don't think she was displeased. He is not
fit for more work. Just now, I shall go and
write for doctor Trevor. And for the next half hour
we did nothing but arrange physical comforts and cures for
poor mister Gray. At the end of the time, Missus
(26:00):
Medlicott said, has your ladyship heard that Harry Gregson has
fallen from a tree and broken his thigh bone and
is like to be a cripple for life? Harry Gregson,
that black eyed lad who read my letter that all
comes from over education. End of Chapter ten. Recording by
Rosy
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