Cranford
Miss Jenkyns felt this as a personal affront, in a way of which the
Captain had not dreamed. Epistolary writing she and her friends
considered as her _forte_. Many a copy of many a letter have I seen
written and corrected on the slate, before she “seized the half-hour
just previous to post-time to assure” her friends of this or of that;
and Dr Johnson was, as she said, her model in these compositions. She
drew herself up with dignity, and only replied to Captain Brown’s last
remark by saying, with marked emphasis on every syllable, “I prefer Dr
Johnson to Mr Boz.”
It is said—I won’t vouch for the fact—that Captain Brown was heard to
say, _sotto voce_, “D—n Dr Johnson!” If he did, he was penitent
afterwards, as he showed by going to stand near Miss Jenkyns’ arm-chair,
and endeavouring to beguile her into conversation on some more pleasing
subject. But she was inexorable. The next day she made the remark I
have mentioned about Miss Jessie’s dimples.
CHAPTER II.
THE CAPTAIN
IT was impossible to live a month at Cranford and not know the daily
habits of each resident; and long before my visit was ended I knew much
concerning the whole Brown trio. There was nothing new to be discovered
respecting their poverty; for they had spoken simply and openly about
that from the very first. They made no mystery of the necessity for
their being economical. All that remained to be discovered was the
Captain’s infinite kindness of heart, and the various modes in which,
unconsciously to himself, he manifested it. Some little anecdotes were
talked about for some time after they occurred. As we did not read
much, and as all the ladies were pretty well suited with servants, there
was a dearth of subjects for conversation. We therefore discussed the
circumstance of the Captain taking a poor old woman’s dinner out of her
hands one very slippery Sunday. He had met her returning from the
bakehouse as he came from church, and noticed her precarious footing;
and, with the grave dignity with which he did everything, he relieved
her of her burden, and steered along the street by her side, carrying
her baked mutton and potatoes safely home. This was thought very
eccentric; and it was rather expected that he would pay a round of
calls, on the Monday morning, to explain and apologise to the Cranford
sense of propriety: but he did no such thing: and then it was decided
that he was ashamed, and was keeping out of sight. In a kindly pity for
him, we began to say, “After all, the Sunday morning’s occurrence showed
great goodness of heart,” and it was resolved that he should be
comforted on his next appearance amongst us; but, lo! he came down upon
us, untouched by any sense of shame, speaking loud and bass as ever, his
head thrown back, his wig as jaunty and well-curled as usual, and we
were obliged to conclude he had forgotten all about Sunday.
Miss Pole and Miss Jessie Brown had set up a kind of intimacy on the
strength of the Shetland wool and the new knitting stitches; so it
happened that when I went to visit Miss Pole I saw more of the Browns
than I had done while staying with Miss Jenkyns, who had never got over
what she called Captain Brown’s disparaging remarks upon Dr Johnson as a
writer of light and agreeable fiction. I found that Miss Brown was
seriously ill of some lingering, incurable complaint, the pain
occasioned by which gave the uneasy expression to her face that I had
taken for unmitigated crossness. Cross, too, she was at times, when the
nervous irritability occasioned by her disease became past endurance.
Miss Jessie bore with her at these times, even more patiently than she
did with the bitter self-upbraidings by which they were invariably
succeeded. Miss Brown used to accuse herself, not merely of hasty and
irritable temper, but also of being the cause why her father and sister
were obliged to pinch, in order to allow her the small luxuries which
were necessaries in her condition. She would so fain have made
sacrifices for them, and have lightened their cares, that the original
generosity of her disposition added acerbity to her temper. All this
was borne by Miss Jessie and her father with more than placidity—with
absolute tenderness. I forgave Miss Jessie her singing out of tune, and
her juvenility of dress, when I saw her at home. I came to perceive
that Captain Brown’s dark Brutus wig and padded coat (alas! too often
threadbare) were remnants of the military smartness of his youth, which
he now wore unconsciously. He was a man of infinite resources, gained
in his barrack experience. As he confessed, no one could black his
boots to please him except himself; but, indeed, he was not above saving
the little maid-servant’s labours in every way—knowing, most likely,
that his daughter’s illness made the place a hard one.
He endeavoured to make peace with Miss Jenkyns soon after the memorable
dispute I have named, by a present of a wooden fire-shovel (his own
making), having heard her say how much the grating of an iron one
annoyed her. She received the present with cool gratitude, and thanked
him formally. When he was gone, she bade me put it away in the
lumber-room; feeling, probably, that no present from a man who preferred
Mr Boz to Dr Johnson could be less jarring than an iron fire-shovel.
Such was the state of things when I left Cranford and went to Drumble.
I had, however, several correspondents, who kept me _au fait_ as to the
proceedings of the dear little town. There was Miss Pole, who was
becoming as much absorbed in crochet as she had been once in knitting,
and the burden of whose letter was something like, “But don’t you forget
the white worsted at Flint’s” of the old song; for at the end of every
sentence of news came a fresh direction as to some crochet commission
which I was to execute for her. Miss Matilda Jenkyns (who did not mind
being called Miss Matty, when Miss Jenkyns was not by) wrote nice, kind,
rambling letters, now and then venturing into an opinion of her own; but
suddenly pulling herself up, and either begging me not to name what she
had said, as Deborah thought differently, and _she_ knew, or else
putting in a postscript to the effect that, since writing the above, she
had been talking over the subject with Deborah, and was quite convinced
that, etc.—(here probably followed a recantation of every opinion she
had given in the letter). Then came Miss Jenkyns—Debōrah, as she liked
Miss Matty to call her, her father having once said that the Hebrew name
ought to be so pronounced. I secretly think she took the Hebrew
prophetess for a model in character; and, indeed, she was not unlike the
stern prophetess in some ways, making allowance, of course, for modern
customs and difference in dress. Miss Jenkyns wore a cravat, and a
little bonnet like a jockey-cap, and altogether had the appearance of a
strong-minded woman; although she would have despised the modern idea of
women being equal to men. Equal, indeed! she knew they were superior.
But to return to her letters. Everything in them was stately and grand
like herself. I have been looking them over (dear Miss Jenkyns, how I
honoured her!) and I will give an extract, more especially because it
relates to our friend Captain Brown:—
“The Honourable Mrs Jamieson has only just quitted me; and, in the
course of conversation, she communicated to me the intelligence that she
had yesterday received a call from her revered husband’s quondam friend,
Lord Mauleverer. You will not easily conjecture what brought his
lordship within the precincts of our little town. It was to see Captain
Brown, with whom, it appears, his lordship was acquainted in the ‘plumed
wars,’ and who had the privilege of averting destruction from his
lordship’s head when some great peril was impending over it, off the
misnomered Cape of Good Hope. You know our friend the Honourable Mrs
Jamieson’s deficiency in the spirit of innocent curiosity, and you will
therefore not be so much surprised when I tell you she was quite unable
to disclose to me the exact nature of the peril in question. I was
anxious, I confess, to ascertain in what manner Captain Brown, with his
limited establishment, could receive so distinguished a guest; and I
discovered that his lordship retired to rest, and, let us hope, to
refreshing slumbers, at the Angel Hotel; but shared the Brunonian meals
during the two days that he honoured Cranford with his august presence.
Mrs Johnson, our civil butcher’s wife, informs me that Miss Jessie
purchased a leg of lamb; but, besides this, I can hear of no preparation
whatever to give a suitable reception to so distinguished a visitor.
Perhaps they entertained him with ‘the feast of reason and the flow of
soul’; and to us, who are acquainted with Captain Brown’s sad want of
relish for ‘the pure wells of English undefiled,’ it may be matter for
congratulation that he has had the opportunity of improving his taste by
holding converse with an elegant and refined member of the British
aristocracy. But from some mundane failings who is altogether free?”
Miss Pole and Miss Matty wrote to me by the same post. Such a piece of
news as Lord Mauleverer’s visit was not to be lost on the Cranford
letter-writers: they made the most of it. Miss Matty humbly apologised
for writing at the same time as her sister, who was so much more capable
than she to describe the honour done to Cranford; but in spite of a
little bad spelling, Miss Matty’s account gave me the best idea of the
commotion occasioned by his lordship’s visit, after it had occurred;
for, except the people at the Angel, the Browns, Mrs Jamieson, and a
little lad his lordship had sworn at for driving a dirty hoop against
the aristocratic legs, I could not hear of any one with whom his
lordship had held conversation.
My next visit to Cranford was in the summer. There had been neither
births, deaths, nor marriages since I was there last. Everybody lived
in the same house, and wore pretty nearly the same well-preserved,
old-fashioned clothes. The greatest event was, that Miss Jenkyns had
purchased a new carpet for the drawing-room. Oh, the busy work Miss
Matty and I had in chasing the sunbeams, as they fell in an afternoon
right down on this carpet through the blindless window! We spread
newspapers over the places and sat down to our book or our work; and,
lo! in a quarter of an hour the sun had moved, and was blazing away on a
fresh spot; and down again we went on our knees to alter the position of
the newspapers. We were very busy, too, one whole morning, before Miss
Jenkyns gave her party, in following her directions, and in cutting out
and stitching together pieces of newspaper so as to form little paths to
every chair set for the expected visitors, lest their shoes might dirty
or defile the purity of the carpet. Do you make paper paths for every
guest to walk upon in London?
Captain Brown and Miss Jenkyns were not very cordial to each other. The
literary dispute, of which I had seen the beginning, was a “raw,” the
slightest touch on which made them wince. It was the only difference of
opinion they had ever had; but that difference was enough. Miss Jenkyns
could not refrain from talking at Captain Brown; and, though he did not
reply, he drummed with his fingers, which action she felt and resented
as very disparaging to Dr Johnson. He was rather ostentatious in his
preference of the writings of Mr Boz; would walk through the streets so
absorbed in them that he all but ran against Miss Jenkyns; and though
his apologies were earnest and sincere, and though he did not, in fact,
do more than startle her and himself, she owned to me she had rather he
had knocked her down, if he had only been reading a higher style of