This poem was written by Mrs. Gaskell in collaboration with her husband, and is her first published work. Writing to Mary Howitt in 1838, she says: “We once thought oftryingto write sketches among the poor,ratherin the manner of Crabbe (now don’t think this presumptuous), but in a more seeing-beauty spirit; and one—the only one—was published inBlackwood, January, 1837. But I suppose we spoke our plan near a dog rose, for it never went any further.” The poem is interesting, as it foreshadows Mrs. Gaskell’s sympathetic insight into the lives of the poor, and is a worthy prelude to her first novel, for the character of “Mary” is based on the same original as “Old Alice” inMary Barton.
This poem was written by Mrs. Gaskell in collaboration with her husband, and is her first published work. Writing to Mary Howitt in 1838, she says: “We once thought oftryingto write sketches among the poor,ratherin the manner of Crabbe (now don’t think this presumptuous), but in a more seeing-beauty spirit; and one—the only one—was published inBlackwood, January, 1837. But I suppose we spoke our plan near a dog rose, for it never went any further.” The poem is interesting, as it foreshadows Mrs. Gaskell’s sympathetic insight into the lives of the poor, and is a worthy prelude to her first novel, for the character of “Mary” is based on the same original as “Old Alice” inMary Barton.
Inchildhood’s days, I do remember meOf one dark house behind an old elm tree,By gloomy streets surrounded, where the flowerBrought from the fresher air, scarce for an hourRetained its fragrant scent; yet men lived there,Yea, and in happiness; the mind doth clearIn most dense airs its own bright atmosphere.But in the house of which I spake there dweltOne by whom all the weight of smoke was felt.She had o’erstepped the bound ’twixt youth and ageA single, not a lonely, woman, sageAnd thoughtful ever, yet most truly kind:Without the natural ties, she sought to bindHearts unto hers, with gentle, useful love,Prompt at each change in sympathy to move.And so she gained the affection, which she prizedFrom every living thing, howe’er despised—A call upon her tenderness whene’erThe friends around her had a grief to share;And, if in joy the kind one they forgot,She still rejoiced, and more was wanted not.Said I not truly, she was not alone,Though none at evening shared her clean hearthstone?To some she might prosaic seem, but meShe always charmed with daily poesy.Felt in her every action, never heard,E’en as the mate of some sweet singing-bird,That mute and still broods on her treasure-nest,Her heart’s fond hope hid deep within her breast.In all her quiet duties, one dear thoughtKept ever true and constant sway, not broughtBefore the world, but garnered all the moreFor being to herself a secret store.Whene’er she heard of country homes, a smileCame brightening o’er her serious face the while;She knew not that it came, yet in her heartA hope leaped up, of which that smile was part.She thought the time might come, e’er yet the bowlWere broken at the fountain, when her soulMight listen to its yearnings, unreprovedBy thought of failure to the cause she loved;When she might leave the close and noisy street,And once again her childhood’s home might greet.It was a pleasant place, that early home!The brook went singing by, leaving its foamAmong the flags and blue forget-me-not;And in a nook, above that shelter’d spot,For ages stood a gnarlèd hawthorn-tree;And if you pass’d in spring-time, you might seeThe knotted trunk all coronal’d with flowers,That every breeze shook down in fragrant showers;The earnest bees in odorous cells did lie,Hymning their thanks with murmuring melody;The evening sun shone brightly on the green,And seem’d to linger on the lonely scene.And, if to others Mary’s early nestShow’d poor and homely, to her loving breastA charm lay hidden in the very stainsWhich time and weather left; the old dim panes,The grey rough moss, the house-leek, you might seeWere chronicled in childhood’s memory;And in her dreams she wander’d far and wideAmong the hills, her sister at her side—That sister slept beneath a grassy tombEre time had robbed her of her first sweet bloom.O Sleep! thou bringest back our childhood’s heart,Ere yet the dew exhale, the hope depart;Thou callest up the lost ones, sorrow’d o’erTill sorrow’s self hath lost her tearful power;Thine is the fairy-land, where shadows dwell,Evoked in dreams by some strange hidden spell.But Day and Waking have their dreams, O Sleep,When Hope and Memory their fond watches keep;And such o’er Mary held supremest sway,When kindly labours task’d her hands all day.Employ’d her hands, her thoughts roam’d far and free,Till sense call’d down to calm reality.A few short weeks, and then, unbound the chainsWhich held her to another’s woes or pains,Farewell to dusky streets and shrouded skies,Her treasur’d home should bless her yearning eyes,And fair as in the days of childish gleeEach grassy nook and wooded haunt should be.Yet ever, as one sorrow pass’d away,Another call’d the tender one to stay,And, where so late she shared the bright glad mirth,The phantom Grief sat cowering at the hearth.So days and weeks pass’d on and grew to years,Unwept by Mary, save for others’ tears.As a fond nurse, that from the mother’s breastLulls the tired infant to its quiet rest,First stills each sound, then lets the curtain fallTo cast a dim and sleepy light o’er all,So age grew gently o’er each wearied senseA deepening shade to smooth the parting hence.Each cherish’d accent, each familiar toneFell from her daily music, one by one;Still her attentive looks could rightly guessWhat moving lips by sound could not express,O’er each loved face next came a filmy veil,And shine and shadow from her sight did fail.And, last of all, the solemn change they sawDepriving Death of half its regal awe;The mind sank down to childishness, and they,Relying on her counsel day by day(As some lone wanderer, from his home afar,Takes for his guide some fix’d and well-known star,Till clouds come wafting o’er its trembling light,And leave him wilder’d in the pathless night),Sought her changed face with strange uncertain gaze,Still praying her to lead them through the maze.They pitied her lone fate, and deemed it sad;Yet as in early childhood she was glad;No sense had she of change, or loss of thought,With those around her no communion sought;Scarce knew she of her being. Fancy wildHad placed her in her father’s house a child;It was her mother sang her to her rest;The lark awoke her, springing from his nest;The bees sang cheerily the live long day,Lurking ’mid flowers wherever she did play;The Sabbath bells rang as in years gone by,Swelling and falling on the soft wind’s sigh;Her little sisters knelt with her in prayer,And nightly did her father’s blessing share;So, wrapt in glad imaginings, her lifeStole on with all her sweet young memories rife.I often think (if by this mortal lightWe e’er can read another’s lot aright),That for her loving heart a blessing came,Unseen by many, clouded by a name;And all the outward fading from the worldWas like the flower at night, when it has furledIts golden leaves, and lapped them round its heart,To nestle closer in its sweetest part.Yes! angel voices called her childhood back,Blotting out life with its dim sorrowy track;Her secret wish was ever known in heaven,And so in mystery was the answer given.In sadness many mourned her latter years,But blessing shone behind that mist of tears,And, as the child she deemed herself, she liesIn gentle slumber, till the dead shall rise.
Inchildhood’s days, I do remember meOf one dark house behind an old elm tree,By gloomy streets surrounded, where the flowerBrought from the fresher air, scarce for an hourRetained its fragrant scent; yet men lived there,Yea, and in happiness; the mind doth clearIn most dense airs its own bright atmosphere.But in the house of which I spake there dweltOne by whom all the weight of smoke was felt.She had o’erstepped the bound ’twixt youth and ageA single, not a lonely, woman, sageAnd thoughtful ever, yet most truly kind:Without the natural ties, she sought to bindHearts unto hers, with gentle, useful love,Prompt at each change in sympathy to move.And so she gained the affection, which she prizedFrom every living thing, howe’er despised—A call upon her tenderness whene’erThe friends around her had a grief to share;And, if in joy the kind one they forgot,She still rejoiced, and more was wanted not.Said I not truly, she was not alone,Though none at evening shared her clean hearthstone?To some she might prosaic seem, but meShe always charmed with daily poesy.Felt in her every action, never heard,E’en as the mate of some sweet singing-bird,That mute and still broods on her treasure-nest,Her heart’s fond hope hid deep within her breast.In all her quiet duties, one dear thoughtKept ever true and constant sway, not broughtBefore the world, but garnered all the moreFor being to herself a secret store.Whene’er she heard of country homes, a smileCame brightening o’er her serious face the while;She knew not that it came, yet in her heartA hope leaped up, of which that smile was part.She thought the time might come, e’er yet the bowlWere broken at the fountain, when her soulMight listen to its yearnings, unreprovedBy thought of failure to the cause she loved;When she might leave the close and noisy street,And once again her childhood’s home might greet.It was a pleasant place, that early home!The brook went singing by, leaving its foamAmong the flags and blue forget-me-not;And in a nook, above that shelter’d spot,For ages stood a gnarlèd hawthorn-tree;And if you pass’d in spring-time, you might seeThe knotted trunk all coronal’d with flowers,That every breeze shook down in fragrant showers;The earnest bees in odorous cells did lie,Hymning their thanks with murmuring melody;The evening sun shone brightly on the green,And seem’d to linger on the lonely scene.And, if to others Mary’s early nestShow’d poor and homely, to her loving breastA charm lay hidden in the very stainsWhich time and weather left; the old dim panes,The grey rough moss, the house-leek, you might seeWere chronicled in childhood’s memory;And in her dreams she wander’d far and wideAmong the hills, her sister at her side—That sister slept beneath a grassy tombEre time had robbed her of her first sweet bloom.O Sleep! thou bringest back our childhood’s heart,Ere yet the dew exhale, the hope depart;Thou callest up the lost ones, sorrow’d o’erTill sorrow’s self hath lost her tearful power;Thine is the fairy-land, where shadows dwell,Evoked in dreams by some strange hidden spell.But Day and Waking have their dreams, O Sleep,When Hope and Memory their fond watches keep;And such o’er Mary held supremest sway,When kindly labours task’d her hands all day.Employ’d her hands, her thoughts roam’d far and free,Till sense call’d down to calm reality.A few short weeks, and then, unbound the chainsWhich held her to another’s woes or pains,Farewell to dusky streets and shrouded skies,Her treasur’d home should bless her yearning eyes,And fair as in the days of childish gleeEach grassy nook and wooded haunt should be.Yet ever, as one sorrow pass’d away,Another call’d the tender one to stay,And, where so late she shared the bright glad mirth,The phantom Grief sat cowering at the hearth.So days and weeks pass’d on and grew to years,Unwept by Mary, save for others’ tears.As a fond nurse, that from the mother’s breastLulls the tired infant to its quiet rest,First stills each sound, then lets the curtain fallTo cast a dim and sleepy light o’er all,So age grew gently o’er each wearied senseA deepening shade to smooth the parting hence.Each cherish’d accent, each familiar toneFell from her daily music, one by one;Still her attentive looks could rightly guessWhat moving lips by sound could not express,O’er each loved face next came a filmy veil,And shine and shadow from her sight did fail.And, last of all, the solemn change they sawDepriving Death of half its regal awe;The mind sank down to childishness, and they,Relying on her counsel day by day(As some lone wanderer, from his home afar,Takes for his guide some fix’d and well-known star,Till clouds come wafting o’er its trembling light,And leave him wilder’d in the pathless night),Sought her changed face with strange uncertain gaze,Still praying her to lead them through the maze.They pitied her lone fate, and deemed it sad;Yet as in early childhood she was glad;No sense had she of change, or loss of thought,With those around her no communion sought;Scarce knew she of her being. Fancy wildHad placed her in her father’s house a child;It was her mother sang her to her rest;The lark awoke her, springing from his nest;The bees sang cheerily the live long day,Lurking ’mid flowers wherever she did play;The Sabbath bells rang as in years gone by,Swelling and falling on the soft wind’s sigh;Her little sisters knelt with her in prayer,And nightly did her father’s blessing share;So, wrapt in glad imaginings, her lifeStole on with all her sweet young memories rife.I often think (if by this mortal lightWe e’er can read another’s lot aright),That for her loving heart a blessing came,Unseen by many, clouded by a name;And all the outward fading from the worldWas like the flower at night, when it has furledIts golden leaves, and lapped them round its heart,To nestle closer in its sweetest part.Yes! angel voices called her childhood back,Blotting out life with its dim sorrowy track;Her secret wish was ever known in heaven,And so in mystery was the answer given.In sadness many mourned her latter years,But blessing shone behind that mist of tears,And, as the child she deemed herself, she liesIn gentle slumber, till the dead shall rise.
Inchildhood’s days, I do remember me
Of one dark house behind an old elm tree,
By gloomy streets surrounded, where the flower
Brought from the fresher air, scarce for an hour
Retained its fragrant scent; yet men lived there,
Yea, and in happiness; the mind doth clear
In most dense airs its own bright atmosphere.
But in the house of which I spake there dwelt
One by whom all the weight of smoke was felt.
She had o’erstepped the bound ’twixt youth and age
A single, not a lonely, woman, sage
And thoughtful ever, yet most truly kind:
Without the natural ties, she sought to bind
Hearts unto hers, with gentle, useful love,
Prompt at each change in sympathy to move.
And so she gained the affection, which she prized
From every living thing, howe’er despised—
A call upon her tenderness whene’er
The friends around her had a grief to share;
And, if in joy the kind one they forgot,
She still rejoiced, and more was wanted not.
Said I not truly, she was not alone,
Though none at evening shared her clean hearthstone?
To some she might prosaic seem, but me
She always charmed with daily poesy.
Felt in her every action, never heard,
E’en as the mate of some sweet singing-bird,
That mute and still broods on her treasure-nest,
Her heart’s fond hope hid deep within her breast.
In all her quiet duties, one dear thought
Kept ever true and constant sway, not brought
Before the world, but garnered all the more
For being to herself a secret store.
Whene’er she heard of country homes, a smile
Came brightening o’er her serious face the while;
She knew not that it came, yet in her heart
A hope leaped up, of which that smile was part.
She thought the time might come, e’er yet the bowl
Were broken at the fountain, when her soul
Might listen to its yearnings, unreproved
By thought of failure to the cause she loved;
When she might leave the close and noisy street,
And once again her childhood’s home might greet.
It was a pleasant place, that early home!
The brook went singing by, leaving its foam
Among the flags and blue forget-me-not;
And in a nook, above that shelter’d spot,
For ages stood a gnarlèd hawthorn-tree;
And if you pass’d in spring-time, you might see
The knotted trunk all coronal’d with flowers,
That every breeze shook down in fragrant showers;
The earnest bees in odorous cells did lie,
Hymning their thanks with murmuring melody;
The evening sun shone brightly on the green,
And seem’d to linger on the lonely scene.
And, if to others Mary’s early nest
Show’d poor and homely, to her loving breast
A charm lay hidden in the very stains
Which time and weather left; the old dim panes,
The grey rough moss, the house-leek, you might see
Were chronicled in childhood’s memory;
And in her dreams she wander’d far and wide
Among the hills, her sister at her side—
That sister slept beneath a grassy tomb
Ere time had robbed her of her first sweet bloom.
O Sleep! thou bringest back our childhood’s heart,
Ere yet the dew exhale, the hope depart;
Thou callest up the lost ones, sorrow’d o’er
Till sorrow’s self hath lost her tearful power;
Thine is the fairy-land, where shadows dwell,
Evoked in dreams by some strange hidden spell.
But Day and Waking have their dreams, O Sleep,
When Hope and Memory their fond watches keep;
And such o’er Mary held supremest sway,
When kindly labours task’d her hands all day.
Employ’d her hands, her thoughts roam’d far and free,
Till sense call’d down to calm reality.
A few short weeks, and then, unbound the chains
Which held her to another’s woes or pains,
Farewell to dusky streets and shrouded skies,
Her treasur’d home should bless her yearning eyes,
And fair as in the days of childish glee
Each grassy nook and wooded haunt should be.
Yet ever, as one sorrow pass’d away,
Another call’d the tender one to stay,
And, where so late she shared the bright glad mirth,
The phantom Grief sat cowering at the hearth.
So days and weeks pass’d on and grew to years,
Unwept by Mary, save for others’ tears.
As a fond nurse, that from the mother’s breast
Lulls the tired infant to its quiet rest,
First stills each sound, then lets the curtain fall
To cast a dim and sleepy light o’er all,
So age grew gently o’er each wearied sense
A deepening shade to smooth the parting hence.
Each cherish’d accent, each familiar tone
Fell from her daily music, one by one;
Still her attentive looks could rightly guess
What moving lips by sound could not express,
O’er each loved face next came a filmy veil,
And shine and shadow from her sight did fail.
And, last of all, the solemn change they saw
Depriving Death of half its regal awe;
The mind sank down to childishness, and they,
Relying on her counsel day by day
(As some lone wanderer, from his home afar,
Takes for his guide some fix’d and well-known star,
Till clouds come wafting o’er its trembling light,
And leave him wilder’d in the pathless night),
Sought her changed face with strange uncertain gaze,
Still praying her to lead them through the maze.
They pitied her lone fate, and deemed it sad;
Yet as in early childhood she was glad;
No sense had she of change, or loss of thought,
With those around her no communion sought;
Scarce knew she of her being. Fancy wild
Had placed her in her father’s house a child;
It was her mother sang her to her rest;
The lark awoke her, springing from his nest;
The bees sang cheerily the live long day,
Lurking ’mid flowers wherever she did play;
The Sabbath bells rang as in years gone by,
Swelling and falling on the soft wind’s sigh;
Her little sisters knelt with her in prayer,
And nightly did her father’s blessing share;
So, wrapt in glad imaginings, her life
Stole on with all her sweet young memories rife.
I often think (if by this mortal light
We e’er can read another’s lot aright),
That for her loving heart a blessing came,
Unseen by many, clouded by a name;
And all the outward fading from the world
Was like the flower at night, when it has furled
Its golden leaves, and lapped them round its heart,
To nestle closer in its sweetest part.
Yes! angel voices called her childhood back,
Blotting out life with its dim sorrowy track;
Her secret wish was ever known in heaven,
And so in mystery was the answer given.
In sadness many mourned her latter years,
But blessing shone behind that mist of tears,
And, as the child she deemed herself, she lies
In gentle slumber, till the dead shall rise.
From W. Howitt’sVisits to Remarkable Places, 1840
This account of a visit to Clopton House, written in 1838, is Mrs. Gaskell’s first separate contribution to literature. It took the form of a letter addressed to William Howitt, after reading hisVisits to Remarkable Places, and was included in hisVisit to Stratford-on-Avon, published in 1840. The Mr. and Mrs. W⸺ mentioned here are Mr. and Mrs. Wyatt. The oil-painting of Charlotte Clopton “with paly gold hair” now hangs on the staircase of Clopton House.
This account of a visit to Clopton House, written in 1838, is Mrs. Gaskell’s first separate contribution to literature. It took the form of a letter addressed to William Howitt, after reading hisVisits to Remarkable Places, and was included in hisVisit to Stratford-on-Avon, published in 1840. The Mr. and Mrs. W⸺ mentioned here are Mr. and Mrs. Wyatt. The oil-painting of Charlotte Clopton “with paly gold hair” now hangs on the staircase of Clopton House.
I wonderif you know Clopton Hall, about a mile from Stratford-on-Avon. Will you allow me to tell you of a very happy day I once spent there? I was at school in the neighbourhood, and one of my schoolfellows was the daughter of a Mr. W⸺, who then lived at Clopton. Mrs. W⸺ asked a party of the girls to go and spend a long afternoon, and we set off one beautiful autumn day, full of delight and wonder respecting the place we were going to see. We passed through desolate half-cultivated fields, till we came within sight of the house—a large, heavy, compact, square brick building, of that deep, dead red almost approaching to purple. In front was a large formal court, with the massy pillars surmounted with two grimmonsters; but the walls of the court were broken down, and the grass grew as rank and wild within the enclosure as in the raised avenue walk down which we had come. The flowers were tangled with nettles, and it was only as we approached the house that we saw the single yellow rose and the Austrian briar trained into something like order round the deep-set diamond-paned windows. We trooped into the hall, with its tesselated marble floor, hung round with strange portraits of people who had been in their graves two hundred years at least; yet the colours were so fresh, and in some instances they were so life-like, that looking merely at the faces, I almost fancied the originals might be sitting in the parlour beyond. More completely to carry us back, as it were, to the days of the civil wars, there was a sort of military map hung up, well finished with pen and ink, shewing the stations of the respective armies, and with old-fashioned writing beneath, the names of the principal towns, setting forth the strength of the garrison, etc. In this hall we were met by our kind hostess, and told we might ramble where we liked, in the house or out of the house, taking care to be in the ‘recessed parlour’ by tea-time. I preferred to wander up the wide shelving oak staircase, with its massy balustrade all crumbling and worm-eaten. The family then residing at the hall did not occupy one-half—no, not one-third of the rooms; and the old-fashioned furniture was undisturbed in the greater part of them. In one of the bed-rooms (said to be haunted), and which, with its close pent-up atmosphere and the long shadows of evening creeping on, gave me an ‘eerie’ feeling, hung a portrait so singularly beautiful! a sweet-looking girl, with paly gold hair combed back from her forehead and falling in wavy ringlets on her neck, and with eyes that ‘looked like violets filled withdew,’ for there was the glittering of unshed tears before their deep dark blue—and that was the likeness of Charlotte Clopton, about whom there was so fearful a legend told at Stratford church. In the time of some epidemic, the sweating-sickness or the plague, this young girl had sickened, and to all appearance died. She was buried with fearful haste in the vaults of Clopton chapel, attached to Stratford church, but the sickness was not stayed. In a few days another of the Cloptons died, and him they bore to the ancestral vault; but as they descended the gloomy stairs, they saw by the torchlight, Charlotte Clopton in her grave-clothes leaning against the wall; and when they looked nearer, she was indeed dead, but not before, in the agonies of despair and hunger, she had bitten a piece from her white, round shoulder! Of course, she hadwalkedever since. This was ‘Charlotte’s chamber,’ and beyond Charlotte’s chamber was a state-chamber carpeted with the dust of many years, and darkened by the creepers which had covered up the windows, and even forced themselves in luxuriant daring through the broken panes. Beyond, again, there was an old Catholic chapel, with a chaplain’s room, which had been walled up and forgotten till within the last few years. I went in on my hands and knees, for the entrance was very low. I recollect little in the chapel; but in the chaplain’s room were old, and I should think rare, editions of many books, mostly folios. A large yellow-paper copy of Dryden’s ‘All for Love, or the World Well Lost,’ date 1686, caught my eye, and is the only one I particularly remember. Every here and there, as I wandered, I came upon a fresh branch of a staircase, and so numerous were the crooked, half-lighted passages, that I wondered if I could find my way back again. There was a curious carved old chest in oneof these passages, and with girlish curiosity I tried to open it; but the lid was too heavy, till I persuaded one of my companions to help me, and when it was opened, what do you think we saw?—BONES!—but whether human, whether the remains of the lost bride, we did not stay to see, but ran off in partly feigned and partly real terror.
The last of these deserted rooms that I remember, the last, the most deserted, and the saddest was the Nursery—a nursery without children, without singing voices, without merry chiming footsteps! A nursery hung round with its once inhabitants, bold, gallant boys, and fair, arch-looking girls, and one or two nurses with round, fat babies in their arms. Who were they all? What was their lot in life? Sunshine, or storm? or had they been ‘loved by the gods, and died young?’ The very echoes knew not. Behind the house, in a hollow now wild, damp, and overgrown with elder-bushes, was a well called Margaret’s Well, for there had a maiden of the house of that name drowned herself.
I tried to obtain any information I could as to the family of Clopton of Clopton. They had been decaying ever since the civil wars; had for a generation or two been unable to live in the old house of their fathers, but had toiled in London, or abroad, for a livelihood; and the last of the old family, a bachelor, eccentric, miserly, old, and of most filthy habits, if report said true, had died at Clopton Hall but a few months before, a sort of boarder in Mr. W⸺’s family. He was buried in the gorgeous chapel of the Cloptons in Stratford Church, where you see the banners waving, and the armour hung over one or two splendid monuments. Mr. W⸺ had been the old man’s solicitor, and completely in his confidence, and to him he left the estate, encumbered and in badcondition. A year or two afterwards, the heir-at-law, a very distant relation living in Ireland, claimed and obtained the estate, on the plea of undue influence, if not of forgery, on Mr. W⸺’s part; and the last I heard of our kind entertainers on that day was that they were outlawed, and living at Brussels.
From “Modern Greek Songs,”Household Words, 1854
Mrs. Gaskell was a keen student of popular customs and traditions, and several of her articles prove how observant and delightfully inquisitive she always was, where an opportunity of investigating any tradition or custom presented itself.
Mrs. Gaskell was a keen student of popular customs and traditions, and several of her articles prove how observant and delightfully inquisitive she always was, where an opportunity of investigating any tradition or custom presented itself.
Nowlet us hear about the marriage-songs. Life seems like an opera amongst the modern Greeks; all emotions, all events, require the relief of singing. But a marriage is a singing time among human beings as well as birds. Among the Greeks the youth of both sexes are kept apart, and do not meet excepting on the occasion of some public feast, when the young Greek makes choice of his bride, and asks her parents for their consent. If they give it, all is arranged for the betrothal; but the young people are not allowed to see each other again until that event. There are parts of Greece where the young man is allowed to declare his passion himself to the object of it. Not in words, however, does he breathe his tender suit. He tries to meet with her in some path, or other place in which he may throw her an apple or a flower. If the former missile be chosen, one can only hope thatthe young lady is apt at catching, as a blow from a moderately hard apple is rather too violent a token of love. After this apple or flower throwing, his only chance of meeting with his love is at the fountain; to which all Greek maidens go to draw water, as Rebekah went, of old, to the well.
The ceremony of betrothal is very simple. On an appointed evening, the relations of the lovers meet together in the presence of a priest, either at the house of the father of the future husband, or at that of the parents of the bride elect. After the marriage contract is signed, two young girls bring in the affianced maiden—who is covered all over with a veil—and present her to her lover, who takes her by the hand, and leads her up to the priest. They exchange rings before him, and he gives them his blessing. The bride then retires; but all the rest of the company remain, and spend the day in merry-making and drinking the health of the young couple. The interval between the betrothal and the marriage may be but a few hours; it may be months and it may be years; but, whatever the length of time, the lovers must never meet again until the wedding day comes. Three or four days before that time, the father or mother of the bride send round their notes of invitation; each of which is accompanied by the present of a bottle of wine. The answers come in with even more substantial accompaniments. Those who have great pleasure in accepting, send a present with their reply; the most frequent is a ram or lamb dressed up with ribands and flowers; but the poorest send their quarter of mutton as their contribution to the wedding-feast.
The eve of the marriage, or rather during the night, the friends on each side go to deck out the bride and groom for the approaching ceremony. The bridegroom is shaved by his paranymph or groom’s man,in a very grave and dignified manner, in the presence of all the young ladies invited. Fancy the attitude of the bridegroom, anxious and motionless under the hands of his unpractised barber, his nose held lightly up between a finger and thumb, while a crowd of young girls look gravely on at the graceful operation! The bride is decked, for her part, by her young companions; who dress her in white, and cover her all over with a long veil made of the finest stuff. Early the next morning the young man and all his friends come forth, like a bridegroom out of his chamber, to seek the bride, and carry her off from her father’s house. Then she, in songs as ancient as the ruins of the old temples that lie around her, sings her sorrowful farewell to the father who has cared for her and protected her hitherto; to the mother who has borne her and cherished her; to the companions of her maidenhood; to her early home; to the fountain whence she daily fetched water; to the trees which shaded her childish play; and every now and then she gives way to natural tears; then, according to immemorial usage, the paranymph turns to the glad yet sympathetic procession and says in a sentence which has become proverbial on such occasions—“Let her alone! she weeps!” To which she must make answer, “Lead me away, but let me weep!” After thecortègehas borne the bride to the house of her husband, the whole party adjourn to church, where the religious ceremony is performed. Then they return to the dwelling of the bridegroom, where they all sit down and feast; except the bride, who remains veiled, standing alone, until the middle of the banquet, when the paranymph draws near, unlooses the veil, which falls down, and she stands blushing, exposed to the eyes of all the guests. The next day is given up to the performance of dances peculiar toa wedding. The third day the relations and friends meet all together, and lead the bride to the fountain, from the waters of which she fills a new earthen vessel; and into which she throws various provisions. They afterwards dance in circles round the fountain.
From “Company Manners,”Household Words, 1854
This article gives an insight into the remark which has often been made, “if anybody in Manchester knew howtenir un salonit was certainly Mrs. Gaskell”; she studied and practised the art of entertaining to perfection.
This article gives an insight into the remark which has often been made, “if anybody in Manchester knew howtenir un salonit was certainly Mrs. Gaskell”; she studied and practised the art of entertaining to perfection.
Madame de Sabléhad all the requisites which enabled hertenir un salonwith honour to herself and pleasure to her friends.
Apart from this crowning accomplishment, the good French lady seems to have been commonplace enough. She was well-born, well-bred, and the company she kept must have made her tolerably intelligent. She was married to a dull husband, and doubtless had her small flirtations after she early became a widow; M. Cousin hints at them, but they were never scandalous or prominently before the public. Past middle life, she took to the process of “making her salvation,” and inclined to the Port-Royalists. She was given to liking dainty things to eat, in spite of her Jansenism. She had a female friend that she quarrelled with, off and on, during her life. And (to wind up something like Lady O’Looney, of famous memory) she knew howtenir un salon. M. Cousin tells us that she was remarkable in no one thing or quality, and attributes to that single, simple fact the success of her life.
Now, since I have read these memoirs of Madame de Sablé, I have thought much and deeply thereupon. At first, I was inclined to laugh at the extreme importance which was attached to this art of “receiving company”—no, that translation will not do!—“holding a drawing-room” is even worse, because that implies the state and reserve of royalty;—shall we call it the art of “Sabléing”? But when I thought of my experience in English society—of the evenings dreaded before they came, and sighed over in recollection, because they were so ineffably dull—I saw that, to Sablé well, did require, as M. Cousin implied, the union of many excellent qualities and not-to-be-disputed little graces. I asked some French people if they could give me the recipe, for it seemed most likely to be traditional, if not still extant in their nation. I offer to you their ideas, fragmentary though they be, and then I will tell you some of my own; at last, perhaps, with the addition of yours, oh most worthy readers! we may discover the lost art of Sabléing.
Said the French lady: “A woman to be successful in Sabléing must be past youth, yet not past the power of attracting. She must do this by her sweet and gracious manners, and quick, ready tact in perceiving those who have not had their share of attention, or leading the conversation away from any subject which may give pain to any one present.” “Those rules hold good in England,” said I. My friend went on: “She should never be prominent in anything; she should keep silence as long as anyone else will talk; but, when conversation flags, she should throw herself into the breach with thesame spirit with which I notice that the young ladies of the house, where a ball is given, stand quietly by till the dancers are tired, and then spring into the arena, to carry on the spirit and the music till the others are ready to begin again.”
“But,” said the French gentleman, “even at this time, when subjects for conversation are wanted, she should rather suggest than enlarge—ask questions rather than give her own opinions.”
“To be sure,” said the lady. “Madame Récamier, whose salons were the most perfect of this century, always withheld her opinions on books, or men, or measures, until all around her had given theirs; then she, as it were, collected and harmonised them, saying a kind thing here, and a gentle thing there, and speaking ever with her own quiet sense, till people the most oppressed learnt to understand each other’s point of view, which it is a great thing for opponents to do.”
“Then the number of the people whom you receive is another consideration. I should say not less than twelve or more than twenty,” continued the gentleman. “The evenings should be appointed—say weekly—fortnightly at the beginning of January, which is our season. Fix an early hour for opening the room. People are caught then in their freshness, before they become exhausted by other parties.”
The lady spoke: “For my part, I prefer catching my friends after they have left the grander balls or receptions. One hears then the remarks, the wit, the reason, and the satire which they had been storing up during the evening of imposed silence or of ceremonious speaking.”
“A little good-humoured satire is a very agreeable sauce,” replied the gentleman, “but it must be good-humoured,and the listeners must be good-humoured; above all, the conversation must be general, and not the chat, chat, chat up in a corner, by which the English so often distinguish themselves. You do not go into society to exchange secrets with your intimate friends; you go to render yourselves agreeable to everyone present, and to help all to pass a happy evening.”
“Strangers should not be admitted,” said the lady, taking up the strain. “They would not start fair with the others; they would be ignorant of the allusions that refer to conversations on the previous evenings; they would not understand the—what shall I call it—slang? I mean those expressions having relation to past occurrences, or bygone witticisms common to all those who are in the habit of meeting.”
“Madame de Duras and Madame Récamier never made advances to any stranger. Theirsalonswere the best that Paris has known in this generation. All who wished to be admitted had to wait and prove their fitness by being agreeable elsewhere: to earn their diploma, as it were, among the circle of these ladies’ acquaintances; and, at last, it was a high favour to be received by them.”
“They missed the society of many celebrities by adhering so strictly to this unspoken rule,” said the gentleman.
“Bah!” said the lady. “Celebrities! what has one to do with them in society? As celebrities, they are simply bores. Because a man has discovered a planet, it does not follow that he can converse agreeably, even on his own subjects; often people are drained dry by one action or expression of their lives—drained dry for all the purposes of a ‘salon.’ The writer of books, for instance, cannot afford totalk twenty pages for nothing, so he is either profoundly silent, or else he gives you the mere rinsings of his mind. I am speaking now of him as a mere celebrity, and justifying the wisdom of the ladies we were speaking of, in not seeking after such people; indeed, in being rather shy of them. Some of their friends were the most celebrated people of their day, but they were received in their old capacity of agreeable men; a higher character, by far. Then,” said she, turning to me, “I believe that you English spoil the perfection of conversation by having your rooms brilliantly lighted for an evening, the charm of which depends on what one hears, as for an evening when youth and beauty are to display themselves among flowers and festoons, and every kind of pretty ornament. I would never have a room affect people as being dark on their first entrance into it; but there is a kind of moonlight as compared to sunlight, in which people talk more freely and naturally; where shy people will enter upon a conversation without a dread of every change of colour or involuntary movement being seen—just as we are always more confidential over a fire than anywhere else—as women talk most openly in the dimly-lighted bedroom at curling-time.”
“Away with your shy people,” said the gentleman. “Persons who are self-conscious, thinking of an involuntary redness or paleness, an unbecoming movement of the countenance, more than the subject of which they are talking, should not go into society at all. But, because women are so much more liable to this nervous weakness than men, the preponderance of people in a salon should always be on the side of the men.”
I do not think I gained more hints as to the lost art from my French friends. Let us see if myown experience in England can furnish any more ideas.
First, let us take the preparations to be made before our house, our room, or our lodgings can be made to receive society. Of course, I am not meaning the preparations needed for dancing or musical evenings. I am taking those parties which have pleasant conversation and happy social intercourse for their affirmed intention. They may be dinners, suppers, tea—I don’t care what they are called, provided their end is defined. If your friends have not dined, and it suits you to give them a dinner, in the name of Lucullus, let them dine; but take care that there shall be something besides the mere food and wine to make their fattening agreeable at the time and pleasant to remember, otherwise you had better pack up for each his portions of the dainty dish, and send it separately, in hot-water trays, so that he can eat comfortably behind a door, like Sancho Panza, and have done with it. And yet I don’t see why we should be like ascetics; I fancy there is a grace of preparation, a sort of festive trumpet call, that is right and proper to distinguish the day on which we receive our friends from common days, unmarked by such white stones. The thought and care we take for them to set before them of our best, may imply some self-denial on our less fortunate days. I have been in houses where all, from the scullion-maid upward, worked double tides gladly, because “Master’s friends” were coming; and every thing must be nice, and good, and all the rooms must look bright, and clean, and pretty. And, as “a merry heart goes all the way,” preparations made in this welcoming, hospitable spirit, never seem to tire anyone half so much as where servants instinctively feel that it has been said in the parlour, “We musthave so-and-so,” or “Oh, dear! we have never had the so-and-so’s.” Yes, I like a little pomp, and luxury, and stateliness, to mark our happy days of receiving friends as a festival; but I do not think I would throw my power of procuring luxuries solely into the eating and drinking line.
My friends would probably be surprised (some wear caps, and some wigs) if I provided them with garlands of flowers, after the manner of the ancient Greeks; but, put flowers on the table (none of your shams, wax or otherwise; I prefer an honest wayside root of primroses, in a common vase of white ware, to the grandest bunch of stiff rustling artificial rarities in a silver épergne). A flower or two by the side of each person’s plate would not be out of the way, as to expense, and would be a very agreeable, pretty piece of mute welcome. Cooks and scullion-maids, acting in the sympathetic spirit I have described, would do their very best, from boiling the potatoes well, to sending in all the dishes in the best possible order. I think I would have every imaginary dinner sent up on the “original” Mr. Walker’s plan; each dish separately, hot and hot. I have an idea that, when I go to live in Utopia (not before next Christmas), I will have a kind of hot-water sideboard, such as I think I have seen in great houses, and that nothing shall appear on the table but what is pleasant to the eye. However simple the food, I would do it and my friends (and may I not add the Giver?) the respect of presenting it at table as well-cooked, as eatable, as wholesome as my poor means allowed; and to this end rather than to a variety of dishes, would I direct my care. We have no associations with beef and mutton; geese may remind us of the Capitol, and peacocks of Juno; a pigeon-pie, of the simplicity of Venus’ doves, but who thinksof the leafy covert which has been her home in life, when he sees a roasted hare? Now, flowers as an ornament do lead our thoughts away from their present beauty and fragrance. I am almost sure Madame de Sablé had flowers in her salon; and, as she was fond of dainties herself, I can fancy her smooth benevolence of character, taking delight in some personal preparations made in the morning for the anticipated friends of the evening. I can fancy her stewing sweetbreads in a silver saucepan, or dressing salad with her delicate, plump, white hands—not that I ever saw a silver saucepan. I was formerly ignorant enough to think that they were only used in the Sleeping Beauty’s kitchen, or in the preparations for the marriage of Ricquet-with-the-Tuft; but I have been assured that there are such things, and that they impart a most delicate flavour, or no flavour to the victuals cooked therein; so I assert again, Madame de Sablé cooked sweetbreads for her friends in a silver saucepan; but never to fatigue herself with those previous labours. She knew the true taste of her friends too well; they cared for her, firstly, as an element in their agreeable evening—the silver saucepan in which they were all to meet; the oil in which their several ingredients were to be softened of what was harsh or discordant—very secondary would be their interest in her sweetbreads.
“Of sweetbreads they’ll get mony an ane,Of Sablé ne’er anither.”
“Of sweetbreads they’ll get mony an ane,Of Sablé ne’er anither.”
“Of sweetbreads they’ll get mony an ane,
Of Sablé ne’er anither.”
From “Company Manners,”Household Words, 1854
I heard, or read, lately, that we make a great mistake in furnishing our reception-rooms with all the light and delicate colours, the profusion of ornament, and flecked and spotted chintzes, if we wish to show off the human face and figure; that our ancestors and the great painters knew better, with their somewhat sombre and heavy-tinted backgrounds, relieving, or throwing out into full relief, the rounded figure and the delicate peach-like complexion.
I fancy Madame de Sablé’s salon was furnished with deep warm soberness of tone; lighted up by flowers, and happy animated people, in a brilliancy of dress which would be lost nowadays against our satin walls and flower-bestrewn carpets, and gilding, gilding everywhere. Then, somehow, conversation must have flowed naturally into sense or nonsense, as the case might be. People must have gone to her house well prepared for either lot. It might be that wit would come uppermost, sparkling, crackling, leaping, calling out echoes all around; or the same people might talk with all their might and wisdom, on some grave and important subject of the day, in that manner which we have got into the way of calling “earnest,” but which term has struck me as being slightly flavoured by cant, ever since I heard of an “earnest uncle.” At any rate, whether grave or gay, people did not go up to Madame de Sablé’s salons with a set purpose of being either the one or the other. They were carried away by the subject of the conversation, by the humour of the moment. I have visited a good deal among a set of people who piqued themselves on being rational. We havetalked what they called sense, but what I call platitudes, till I have longed, like Southey, in the “Doctor,” to come out with some interminable nonsensical word (Aballibogibouganorribo was his, I think) as a relief for my despair at not being able to think of anything more that was sensible. It would have done me good to have said it, and I could have started afresh on the rational tack. But I never did. I sank into inane silence, which I hope was taken for wisdom. One of this set paid a relation of mine a profound compliment, for so she meant it to be: “Oh, Miss F.; you are so trite!” But as it is not in everyone’s power to be rational, and “trite,” at all times and in all places, discharging our sense at a given place, like water from a fireman’s hose; and as some of us are cisterns rather than fountains, and may have our stores exhausted, why is it not more general to call in other aids to conversation, in order to enable us to pass an agreeable evening?
But I will come back to this presently. Only let me say that there is but one thing more tiresome than an evening when everybody tries to be profound and sensible, and that is an evening when everybody tries to be witty. I have a disagreeable sense of effort and unnaturalness at both times; but the everlasting attempt, even when it succeeds, to be clever and amusing is the worst of the two. People try to say brilliant rather than true things; they not only catch eager hold of the superficial and ridiculous in other persons and in events generally, but, from constantly looking out for subjects for jokes, and “mots,” and satire, they become possessed of a kind of sore susceptibility themselves, and are afraid of their own working selves, and dare not give way to any expression of feeling, or any nobleindignation or enthusiasm. This kind of wearying wit is far different from humour, which wells up and forces its way out irrepressibly, and calls forth smiles and laughter, but not very far apart from tears. Depend upon it, some of Madame de Sablé’s friends had been moved in a most abundant and genial measure. They knew how to narrate, too. Very simple, say you? I say, no! I believe the art of telling a story is born with some people, and these have it to perfection; but all might acquire some expertness in it, and ought to do so, before launching out into the muddled, complex, hesitating, broken, disjointed, poor, bald, accounts of events which have neither unity, nor colour, nor life, nor end in them, that one sometimes hears.
But as to the rational parties that are in truth so irrational, when all talk up to an assumed character instead of showing themselves what they really are, and so extending each other’s knowledge of the infinite and beautiful capacities of human nature—whenever I see the grave sedate faces, with their good but anxious expression, I remember how I was once, long ago, at a party like this; everyone had brought out his or her wisdom, and aired it for the good of the company; one or two had, from a sense of duty, and without any special living interest in the matter, improved us by telling us of some new scientific discovery, the details of which were all and each of them wrong, as I learnt afterwards; if they had been right, we should not have been any the wiser—and just at the pitch when any more useful information might have brought on congestion of the brain, a stranger to the town—a beautiful, audacious, but most feminine romp—proposed a game, and such a game, for us wise men of Gotham! But she (now long still and quiet after her bright life, so fullof pretty pranks) was a creature whom all who looked on loved; and with grave, hesitating astonishment we knelt round a circular table at her word of command. She made one of the circle, and producing a feather out of some sofa pillow, she told us she should blow it up into the air, and whichever of us it floated near, must puff away to keep it from falling on the table. I suspect we all looked like Keeley in the “Camp at Chobham,” and were surprised at our own obedience to this ridiculous, senseless mandate, given with a graceful imperiousness, as if it were too royal to be disputed. We knelt on, puffing away with the utmost intentness, looking like a set of elderly—
“Fools!” No, my dear sir. I was going to say elderly cherubim. But making fools of ourselves was better than making owls, as we had been doing.
From “Company Manners,”Household Words, 1854
I havesaid nothing of books. Yet I am sure that, if Madame de Sablé lived now, they would be seen in her salon as part of its natural indispensable furniture; not brought out, and strewed here and there when “company was coming,” but as habitual presences in her room, wanting which, she would want a sense of warmth and comfort and companionship. Putting out books as a sort of preparation for an evening, as a means for making it pass agreeably, is running a great risk. In the first place, books are by such people, and on such occasions, chosen more for their outside than their inside. And in the next, they are the “mere material with which wisdom(or wit) builds”; and if persons don’t know how to use the material, they will suggest nothing. I imagine Madame de Sablé would have the volumes she herself was reading, or those which, being new, contained any matter of present interest, left about, as they would naturally be. I could also fancy that her guests would not feel bound to talk continually, whether they had anything to say or not, but that there might be pauses of not unpleasant silence—a quiet darkness out of which they might be certain that the little stars would glimmer soon. I can believe that in such pauses of repose, some one might open a book, and catch on a suggestive sentence, might dash off again into a full flow of conversation. But I cannot fancy any grand preparations for what was to be said among people, each of whom brought the best dish in bringing himself; and whose own store of living, individual thought and feeling, and mother-wit, would be indefinitely better than any cut-and-dry determination to devote the evening to mutual improvement. If people are really good and wise, their goodness and their wisdom flow out unconsciously, and benefit like sunlight. So, books for reference, books for impromptu suggestion, but never books to serve for texts to a lecture. Engravings fall under something like the same rules. To some they say everything; to ignorant and unprepared minds, nothing. I remember noticing this in watching how people looked at a very valuable portfolio belonging to an acquaintance of mine, which contained engraved and authentic portraits of almost every possible person; from king and kaiser down to notorious beggars and criminals; including all the celebrated men, women, and actors, whose likenesses could be obtained. To some, this portfolio gave food for observation, meditation, and conversation. Itbrought before them every kind of human tragedy—every variety of scenery and costume and grouping in the background, thronged with figures called up by their imagination. Others took them up and laid them down, simply saying, “This is a pretty face!” “Oh, what a pair of eyebrows!” “Look at this queer dress!”
Yet, after all, having something to take up and to look at is a relief, and of use to persons who, without being self-conscious, are nervous from not being accustomed to society, O Cassandra! Remember when you, with your rich gold coins of thought, with your noble power of choice expression, were set down, and were thankful to be set down, to look at some paltry engravings, just because people did not know how to get at your ore, and you did not care a button whether they did or not, and were rather bored by their attempts, the end of which you never found out. While I, with my rattling tinselly rubbish, was thought “agreeable and an acquisition!” You would have been valued at Madame de Sablé’s, where the sympathetic and intellectual stream of conversation would have borne you and your golden fragments away with it by its soft, resistless, gentle force.
From “French Life,”Fraser’s Magazine, 1864