Cranford Page #5

Cranford is an episodic novel by the English writer Elizabeth Gaskell. It first appeared in instalments in the magazine Household Words, then was published with minor revisions as a book with the title Cranford in 1853.

• Novel

								

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
literature.  The poor, brave Captain! he looked older, and more worn, and
his clothes were very threadbare.  But he seemed as bright and cheerful
as ever, unless he was asked about his daughter’s health.

“She suffers a great deal, and she must suffer more: we do what we can to
alleviate her pain;—God’s will be done!”  He took off his hat at these
last words.  I found, from Miss Matty, that everything had been done, in
fact.  A medical man, of high repute in that country neighbourhood, had
been sent for, and every injunction he had given was attended to,
regardless of expense.  Miss Matty was sure they denied themselves many
things in order to make the invalid comfortable; but they never spoke
about it; and as for Miss Jessie!—“I really think she’s an angel,” said
poor Miss Matty, quite overcome.  “To see her way of bearing with Miss
Brown’s crossness, and the bright face she puts on after she’s been
sitting up a whole night and scolded above half of it, is quite
beautiful.  Yet she looks as neat and as ready to welcome the Captain at
breakfast-time as if she had been asleep in the Queen’s bed all night.
My dear! you could never laugh at her prim little curls or her pink bows
again if you saw her as I have done.”  I could only feel very penitent,
and greet Miss Jessie with double respect when I met her next.  She
looked faded and pinched; and her lips began to quiver, as if she was
very weak, when she spoke of her sister.  But she brightened, and sent
back the tears that were glittering in her pretty eyes, as she said—

“But, to be sure, what a town Cranford is for kindness!  I don’t suppose
any one has a better dinner than usual cooked but the best part of all
comes in a little covered basin for my sister.  The poor people will
leave their earliest vegetables at our door for her.  They speak short
and gruff, as if they were ashamed of it: but I am sure it often goes to
my heart to see their thoughtfulness.”  The tears now came back and
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