Silas Marner
them also a reason for staying to see the rustic beauty’s toilette. And
it was really a pleasure—from the first opening of the bandbox, where
everything smelt of lavender and rose-leaves, to the clasping of the
small coral necklace that fitted closely round her little white neck.
Everything belonging to Miss Nancy was of delicate purity and
nattiness: not a crease was where it had no business to be, not a bit
of her linen professed whiteness without fulfilling its profession; the
very pins on her pincushion were stuck in after a pattern from which
she was careful to allow no aberration; and as for her own person, it
gave the same idea of perfect unvarying neatness as the body of a
little bird. It is true that her light-brown hair was cropped behind
like a boy’s, and was dressed in front in a number of flat rings, that
lay quite away from her face; but there was no sort of coiffure that
could make Miss Nancy’s cheek and neck look otherwise than pretty; and
when at last she stood complete in her silvery twilled silk, her lace
tucker, her coral necklace, and coral ear-drops, the Miss Gunns could
see nothing to criticise except her hands, which bore the traces of
butter-making, cheese-crushing, and even still coarser work. But Miss
Nancy was not ashamed of that, for even while she was dressing she
narrated to her aunt how she and Priscilla had packed their boxes
yesterday, because this morning was baking morning, and since they were
leaving home, it was desirable to make a good supply of meat-pies for
the kitchen; and as she concluded this judicious remark, she turned to
the Miss Gunns that she might not commit the rudeness of not including
them in the conversation. The Miss Gunns smiled stiffly, and thought
what a pity it was that these rich country people, who could afford to
buy such good clothes (really Miss Nancy’s lace and silk were very
costly), should be brought up in utter ignorance and vulgarity. She
actually said “mate” for “meat,” “’appen” for “perhaps,” and “oss” for
“horse,” which, to young ladies living in good Lytherly society, who
habitually said ’orse, even in domestic privacy, and only said ’appen
on the right occasions, was necessarily shocking. Miss Nancy, indeed,
had never been to any school higher than Dame Tedman’s: her
acquaintance with profane literature hardly went beyond the rhymes she
had worked in her large sampler under the lamb and the shepherdess; and
in order to balance an account, she was obliged to effect her
subtraction by removing visible metallic shillings and sixpences from a
visible metallic total. There is hardly a servant-maid in these days
who is not better informed than Miss Nancy; yet she had the essential
attributes of a lady—high veracity, delicate honour in her dealings,
deference to others, and refined personal habits,—and lest these should
not suffice to convince grammatical fair ones that her feelings can at
all resemble theirs, I will add that she was slightly proud and
exacting, and as constant in her affection towards a baseless opinion
as towards an erring lover.
The anxiety about sister Priscilla, which had grown rather active by
the time the coral necklace was clasped, was happily ended by the
entrance of that cheerful-looking lady herself, with a face made blowsy
by cold and damp. After the first questions and greetings, she turned
to Nancy, and surveyed her from head to foot—then wheeled her round, to
ascertain that the back view was equally faultless.
“What do you think o’ _these_ gowns, aunt Osgood?” said Priscilla,
while Nancy helped her to unrobe.
“Very handsome indeed, niece,” said Mrs. Osgood, with a slight increase
of formality. She always thought niece Priscilla too rough.
“I’m obliged to have the same as Nancy, you know, for all I’m five
years older, and it makes me look yallow; for she never _will_ have
anything without I have mine just like it, because she wants us to look
like sisters. And I tell her, folks ’ull think it’s my weakness makes
me fancy as I shall look pretty in what she looks pretty in. For I _am_
ugly—there’s no denying that: I feature my father’s family. But, law! I
don’t mind, do you?” Priscilla here turned to the Miss Gunns, rattling
on in too much preoccupation with the delight of talking, to notice
that her candour was not appreciated. “The pretty uns do for
fly-catchers—they keep the men off us. I’ve no opinion o’ the men, Miss
Gunn—I don’t know what _you_ have. And as for fretting and stewing
about what _they_’ll think of you from morning till night, and making
your life uneasy about what they’re doing when they’re out o’ your
sight—as I tell Nancy, it’s a folly no woman need be guilty of, if
she’s got a good father and a good home: let her leave it to them as
have got no fortin, and can’t help themselves. As I say, Mr.
Have-your-own-way is the best husband, and the only one I’d ever
promise to obey. I know it isn’t pleasant, when you’ve been used to
living in a big way, and managing hogsheads and all that, to go and put
your nose in by somebody else’s fireside, or to sit down by yourself to
a scrag or a knuckle; but, thank God! my father’s a sober man and
likely to live; and if you’ve got a man by the chimney-corner, it
doesn’t matter if he’s childish—the business needn’t be broke up.”
The delicate process of getting her narrow gown over her head without
injury to her smooth curls, obliged Miss Priscilla to pause in this
rapid survey of life, and Mrs. Osgood seized the opportunity of rising
and saying—
“Well, niece, you’ll follow us. The Miss Gunns will like to go down.”
“Sister,” said Nancy, when they were alone, “you’ve offended the Miss
Gunns, I’m sure.”
“What have I done, child?” said Priscilla, in some alarm.
“Why, you asked them if they minded about being ugly—you’re so very
blunt.”
“Law, did I? Well, it popped out: it’s a mercy I said no more, for I’m
a bad un to live with folks when they don’t like the truth. But as for
being ugly, look at me, child, in this silver-coloured silk—I told you
how it ’ud be—I look as yallow as a daffadil. Anybody ’ud say you
wanted to make a mawkin of me.”
“No, Priscy, don’t say so. I begged and prayed of you not to let us
have this silk if you’d like another better. I was willing to have
_your_ choice, you know I was,” said Nancy, in anxious
self-vindication.
“Nonsense, child! you know you’d set your heart on this; and reason
good, for you’re the colour o’ cream. It ’ud be fine doings for you to
dress yourself to suit _my_ skin. What I find fault with, is that
notion o’ yours as I must dress myself just like you. But you do as you
like with me—you always did, from when first you begun to walk. If you
wanted to go the field’s length, the field’s length you’d go; and there
was no whipping you, for you looked as prim and innicent as a daisy all
the while.”
“Priscy,” said Nancy, gently, as she fastened a coral necklace, exactly
like her own, round Priscilla’s neck, which was very far from being
like her own, “I’m sure I’m willing to give way as far as is right, but
who shouldn’t dress alike if it isn’t sisters? Would you have us go
about looking as if we were no kin to one another—us that have got no
mother and not another sister in the world? I’d do what was right, if I
dressed in a gown dyed with cheese-colouring; and I’d rather you’d
choose, and let me wear what pleases you.”
“There you go again! You’d come round to the same thing if one talked
to you from Saturday night till Saturday morning. It’ll be fine fun to
see how you’ll master your husband and never raise your voice above the
singing o’ the kettle all the while. I like to see the men mastered!”
“Don’t talk _so_, Priscy,” said Nancy, blushing. “You know I don’t mean
ever to be married.”
“Oh, you never mean a fiddlestick’s end!” said Priscilla, as she
arranged her discarded dress, and closed her bandbox. “Who shall _I_
have to work for when father’s gone, if you are to go and take notions
in your head and be an old maid, because some folks are no better than
they should be? I haven’t a bit o’ patience with you—sitting on an
addled egg for ever, as if there was never a fresh un in the world. One
old maid’s enough out o’ two sisters; and I shall do credit to a single
life, for God A’mighty meant me for it. Come, we can go down now. I’m
as ready as a mawkin _can_ be—there’s nothing awanting to frighten the
crows, now I’ve got my ear-droppers in.”
As the two Miss Lammeters walked into the large parlour together, any
one who did not know the character of both might certainly have
supposed that the reason why the square-shouldered, clumsy,
high-featured Priscilla wore a dress the facsimile of her pretty
sister’s, was either the mistaken vanity of the one, or the malicious
contrivance of the other in order to set off her own rare beauty. But
the good-natured self-forgetful cheeriness and common-sense of
Priscilla would soon have dissipated the one suspicion; and the modest
calm of Nancy’s speech and manners told clearly of a mind free from all
disavowed devices.
Places of honour had been kept for the Miss Lammeters near the head of
the principal tea-table in the wainscoted parlour, now looking fresh
and pleasant with handsome branches of holly, yew, and laurel, from the
abundant growths of the old garden; and Nancy felt an inward flutter,
that no firmness of purpose could prevent, when she saw Mr. Godfrey
Cass advancing to lead her to a seat between himself and Mr.
Crackenthorp, while Priscilla was called to the opposite side between
her father and the Squire. It certainly did make some difference to
Nancy that the lover she had given up was the young man of quite the
highest consequence in the parish—at home in a venerable and unique
parlour, which was the extremity of grandeur in her experience, a
parlour where _she_ might one day have been mistress, with the
consciousness that she was spoken of as “Madam Cass,” the Squire’s
wife. These circumstances exalted her inward drama in her own eyes, and
deepened the emphasis with which she declared to herself that not the
most dazzling rank should induce her to marry a man whose conduct
showed him careless of his character, but that, “love once, love
always,” was the motto of a true and pure woman, and no man should ever
have any right over her which would be a call on her to destroy the
dried flowers that she treasured, and always would treasure, for
Godfrey Cass’s sake. And Nancy was capable of keeping her word to
herself under very trying conditions. Nothing but a becoming blush
betrayed the moving thoughts that urged themselves upon her as she
accepted the seat next to Mr. Crackenthorp; for she was so
instinctively neat and adroit in all her actions, and her pretty lips
met each other with such quiet firmness, that it would have been
difficult for her to appear agitated.
It was not the rector’s practice to let a charming blush pass without
an appropriate compliment. He was not in the least lofty or
aristocratic, but simply a merry-eyed, small-featured, grey-haired man,
with his chin propped by an ample, many-creased white neckcloth which
seemed to predominate over every other point in his person, and somehow
to impress its peculiar character on his remarks; so that to have
considered his amenities apart from his cravat would have been a
severe, and perhaps a dangerous, effort of abstraction.
“Ha, Miss Nancy,” he said, turning his head within his cravat and
smiling down pleasantly upon her, “when anybody pretends this has been
a severe winter, I shall tell them I saw the roses blooming on New
Year’s Eve—eh, Godfrey, what do _you_ say?”
Godfrey made no reply, and avoided looking at Nancy very markedly; for
though these complimentary personalities were held to be in excellent