The Carbonels

CHAPTER EIGHT. MARY'S APPROACH.

"The chaise was stayed,

But yet was not allowed

To drive up to the door, lest all

Should say that she was proud."

Cowper.

Dr Fogram was true to his word, and made his appearance at the Long Vacation. The Carbonels, to whom little eager Sophia had been added a day or two previously, first saw him at Downhill Church, where he made a most dignified appearance, in a very full surplice, with his Doctor of Divinity's red hood over it. The clerk, small, grey-haired, and consequential, bustled up to open the pulpit door for him, and he preached, in a fine, sonorous voice, a very learned sermon, that might have been meant for his undergraduates at Oxford.

It was the day for afternoon service at Uphill, so the sisters had to hurry away to eat their luncheon in haste, and then to introduce Sophy to the Sunday School, where she was to teach a class of small ones, a matter of amazing importance and ecstasy.

She was a damsel of thirteen, in a white frock and cape, a pink sash, pink kerchief round her neck, pink satin ribbons tying down her broad Leghorn hat over her ears, in what was called gipsy fashion. She had rosy cheeks, blue, good-natured eyes, and shining, light-brown curls all round her head. Her appearance in the school was quite as memorable to the children as Dr Fogram's could be to their elders, and the little ones were so engaged in looking at her that they quite forgot to be naughty, except that Billy Mole, in curiosity to know what anything so glossy and shining could be, pinched the end of her sash, and left the grimy mark of his little hot hands on it, which caused Maitland the maid, who had charge of her toilette, to declare that such things always came of going among "they nasty, dirty little brats."

Dr Fogram rode over on a plump, shining, black horse, followed by a well-equipped groom. He dismounted, and gave his horse to the man when he overtook the Carbonel party on the way up the hill.

"Captain Carbonel, I believe," said he, touching his hat, almost a shovel. "Will you do me the honour to introduce me to the ladies," and to them he uncovered with the grand formal politeness which even then was becoming rather old-fashioned, and which they returned with curtsies, Sophia's, being fresh from the dancing-master, the most perfect of all.

"I understand," said he, "that I am greatly indebted to you for pains taken with this unfortunate parish."

"We have been trying to do what we could," said Mrs Carbonel, to whom this was chiefly addressed.

"It is a great kindness," he replied, "and I hope the people may show themselves sensible of your exertions, but hitherto all endeavours for their benefit have been thrown away."

Dora could not help wondering what the exertions were!

After the service he joined the family again, and said that he thought the appearance of the poor-and especially of the children-and their behaviour much improved, and he had no doubt it was owing to the gentle and beneficent influence of the ladies, to whom he bowed.

In fact, the children had been much engaged in staring, though whether he or Sophy were the prime attraction, might be doubtful. At any rate, Master Pucklechurch's rod had only once descended. Moreover, two neat sun-bonnets of lilac print adorned two heads, and the frocks looked as if they were sometimes washed.

Captain Carbonel said he hoped to have some conversation with the President about the parish; and he responded that he hoped to do himself the honour of calling the next day. After which he mounted his horse and rode off.

The three sisters waited and watched as if their whole fate depended on the morning's conference but nothing was seen of the President till after luncheon, when he rode up, attended by his groom as before. To their great disappointment, he would talk of nothing but the beauty of the country, and of the voices of Lablache and Sonntag, or the like, which he evidently considered the proper subjects for ladies; and it was not till he had spent the quarter of an hour, fit for a visit of ceremony, on these topics that he asked Captain Carbonel to allow him a little conversation with him.

They shut themselves into the captain's little `den,' which was something between a gun-room and a library, with the rectory books going round two sides of the room, Edmund's sword, pistols, and spurs hanging over the mantelpiece, and his guns, shot-belts, powder-horn, and fishing-rods on hooks on the wall. No noise was heard for more than an hour, during which Dora fumed, Mary cut off the dead roses, and Sophia was withheld from peeping.

At last they came out-the horses had been brought to the door-the President bowed to the ladies, mounted, and rode off, while Edmund came across the lawn; and they all clustered round him.

"Well," said he, "we have fared better than we expected. Dr Fogram has long been regretting the state of the parish."

"Why did he do nothing?" broke in Dora.

"I suppose he has much on his hands; and, I am afraid, my poor old uncle was a hindrance, for he really seemed like a man who had got rid of an incubus when he found that we were willing to do what we could. Then it seems that he was disappointed in Ashley Selby. He thought that, being an inhabitant of the place, the young man would be interested in the people, and make his sisters useful."

"They!" exclaimed Dora. "They are such fine ladies, who think about nothing but Almack's, are afraid of the dirt, and of catching all sorts of disorders at the cottages."

"I can hardly get Dora to be moderately civil to them," said Mary.

"Yes," said Edmund, "parental influence has been strong. The mother fears for health, the father for his game, and the children have grown up to think poachers and their families almost beyond the pale of humanity. It has been too much for this young man, who simply acquiesced in the way in which he was bred. However, this will come to an end, for the present holder of the family living has had a paralytic stroke, and wants him to come and assist. I fully believe that he may do much better away from home habits, especially under a good incumbent."

"And what is to happen to us?" inquired Mary.

"Dr Fogram says that he will send us one of the Fellows of his college-a young man full of zeal, who is eager for parochial work, and has been taking duty at a parish some miles from Oxford. He thinks we shall be satisfied with the change."

"As if we were the people to be satisfied," cried Dora. "Just confess, Edmund, that the old gentleman did not think the place worth attending to, till educated gentlefolk came to live in it."

"Say, rather, that he really did not know the deficiencies," said the captain, "till they were brought before him."

"Then he ought," muttered Dora.

"Judge not," whispered Mary, who was a reverent person.

"And the school?" resumed Dora. "Was he aware of any deficiency there?"

"He was very glad to hear that you had begun keeping school, and will contribute to a better arrangement for the week-day school, assist in pensioning off Dame Verdon, if needful, and in obtaining a better person."

Dora and Sophy each gave a little caper, and squeezed one another's hands.

"He is quite disposed to be liberal," continued Edmund; "and I am sure we shall find him no impediment."

"I don't think the school is going on now," said Mary. "Lizzie Verdon came for some broth, and said Granny was bad in bed. I asked whether she had had the doctor, and she stared and said no, but Dame Spurrell had got her some `yarbs.'"

For in those days the union doctor was not an institution. Large tracts of country would contract with some apothecary to attend their sick; but he was generally a busy man, with his hands full of paying patients, and there was nobody to keep him up to his work among the poor, if he could have done it, which he really could not. The poor themselves knew that it was in vain to apply to him, or if he came once in a serious case, to expect any attention; and they preferred to depend on the woman clever in "yarbs," on the white witch, or, in favoured villages, on the lady bountiful or the clergyman and his wife; and in simple cases these latter were quite efficient, keeping a family medicine-chest and a book on household medicine.

Mrs Carbonel had rooted out her mother's book, replenished her chest, and had cured two or three children who had been eating unripe apples, and greatly benefited Mole with infusions of Jesuit's bark in a large jug, the same thing as quinine, only more cumbrously and domestically prepared. But most of the Uphill people had the surest confidence in Dame Spurrell and her remedies, some of which were very curious; for Mrs Carbonel found a child who had fits wearing, in a bag, a pinch of black hair from the cross on the back of a jackass; and once, when she objected to a dirty mark on the throat of Susan Pucklechurch, she was told it was left by a rasher of bacon put on to cure a sore throat.

The symptoms were sometimes curious as she now found when she went to inquire after Dame Verdon, who, Lizzie informed her, had her heart hanging by only one string, and when that gave way, she would not be here.

For the present, however, she was in bed, under a quilt made of coloured cloth scraps; but however it might be with her heart-strings, she did not seem likely to get up again. It was hay time, and it appeared that no one did come to school in hay and harvest seasons, so that there was time to consider what could be done. Dr Fogram was invited to dinner to hold consultation with the ladies, whom the captain would not leave to any conclusion as to the schools.

There were no such things as trained masters and mistresses in those days; the National Society had only been in existence eleven years, and Government had not taken up the matter at all. Educated and religious people had, however, come to the conclusion that it would be well to help all the village children to know their faith and duty, and to read their Bibles; and the good work of Mrs Hannah More and Mrs Trimmer were examples that had begun to be followed, now that the one was in extreme old age, and the other in her grave. The Carbonel family had been bred up to such work, and all of them knew a good deal more about it than the President, whose studies had been chiefly in Greek plays, and whose tasks had been dealing with young men and the college estates. His conscience as a clergyman was a good deal stirred by the condition of his parish, and he was really thankful to those who would take up the matter, as well as ready to assist with his purse.

So it was settled that Mrs Carbonel should write about a widow at her old home, who had once been a servant in the family. She was known to be a good religious person, who could read, and write, and cast accounts quite well enough for any possibly advanced scholars, as well as being a beautiful needlewoman. An old friend went to see her, explain the situation to her, and ascertain if she were willing to undertake the school for twenty pounds a year, and what the children could pay.

A cottage belonging to Captain Carbonel might have a room added to it to receive the scholars, by the end of harvest, by which time they might be got together, and Mrs Verdon was to be induced to resign by a pension of half-a-crown a week, a sum then supposed to be ample, and which, indeed, was so for her wants, which were much less than in these days. Captain Carbonel looked over the cottage, and worked out an estimate of the cost with old Hewlett, whose notions of paper work were of the kind shown in his Midsummer bill.

+===========================+=========+=====+ | |shillings|pence| +--------------+-----+---+ |1 ooden barrer a oodnt soot| 9| 6| +--------------+-----+---+ |1 ooden barrer a ood soot | 9| 6| +===========================+=========+=====+

The result of the calculations, conjectural and otherwise, was this.

"Mary, look here. This is an expensive year, and if we do the thing this year, we must put off making the drive through the fields-your approach, madam."

Mary came and looked at his figures. "How will it be after harvest?" she said.

"Harvest is an inappreciable quantity, especially to novices," he said. "If you believe Farmer Goodenough, the finest weather will not save me from finding myself out of pocket."

"Farmer Goodenough is an old croaker, after his kind," said Mary.

"It won't do to reckon thereupon. I must be secure of capital enough to fall back upon. Think it over well, Mary, and answer me to-morrow; and you had better say nothing to your sisters till your own mind is made up. I own that I should be very glad of the road. It would save us and old Major a good deal, to say nothing of our friends' bones."

"Do you mean that you wish it, Edmund?"

"I wish to leave it entirely to you."

Dora and Sophy had gone across the fields, a four miles' walk to Poppleby, and were to be brought home in the evening, and Mary was left to wander about the old road and the field-path, and meditate on the ruts and quagmires that would beset the way in the winter, and shut them up from visiting, perhaps even from church. Besides, there were appearances!

There was an old gentleman, a far-away connection of Edmund's, who had been in the navy, and now lived at Poppleby, and went about collecting all the chatter to be heard in one house, and retailing it all in another, and he thought himself licensed to tell Edmund and Mary everything personal. One thing was-

"My dear fellow, you should really put a check on your wife's Methodistical ways!"

"I didn't know she had any."

"I have been told, on good authority, that she has a meeting every Sunday in the wash-house."

Edmund laughed. "A dozen children for Sunday School, with the President's full consent."

"It won't do, Edmund. You'll find it won't do! Why, old Selby told me she was a pretty creature, only just like your good pious ladies, running into all the dirtiest cottages."

And to Mary it was, "Let me give you a hint, my dear Mrs Carbonel. The Duchess saw you in Poppleby, and asked who you were, and she said she would like to visit you, if you did not live in such a hole."

"I don't think I want her," said Mary.

"Now, my dear, don't you be foolish! It would be so much to Edmund's advantage! He was in the same regiment with Lord Henry, and you might have the best society in the county, if only you would make your new drive! Why, even Lady Hartman says she can't take her horses again through that lane, or into the farm court. Miss Yates said it was quite disgusting."

Mary Carbonel might laugh. She did not care for her own dignity, but she did for Edmund's; and though she had been amused at Lady Hartman's four horses entangled in the narrow sweep, and did not quite believe old Captain Caiger, the lady herself had been very charming, and Mary did not like to cut her husband and sisters off from the pleasantest houses in the country.

But the words, "Love not the world," came up into her mind, and the battle ended by her saying to her husband-

"Don't let us have the ap_proach this year, dear Edmund. I don't want it to be Mary's re_proach."

"You are quite sure? In spite of Caiger?"

"Indeed I am; though I am afraid it is asking you to give up something."

"Not while I have my merry faces at home, Mary. And indeed, little woman, I am glad of your decision. It is right."

"I am so glad!"