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CRANFORD
CRANFORD ELIZABETH CLEGHORN GASKELL The Cranford ladies have only an occasional little quarrel
spirited out in a few peppery words and angry jerks of the head;
just enough to prevent the even tenor of their lives from becoming
too flat. Their dress is very independent of fashion; as they
observe "What does it signify how we dress here at Cranford where
everybody knows us?" And if they go from home their reason is
equally cogent "What does it signify how we dress here where
nobody knows us?" The materials of their clothes are in general
good and plain and most of them are nearly as scrupulous as Miss
Tyler of cleanly memory; but I will answer for it the last gigot
the last tight and scanty petticoat in wear in England was seen in
Cranford--and seen without a smile.
I can testify to a magnificent family red silk umbrella under
which a gentle little spinster left alone of many brothers and
sisters used to patter to church on rainy days. Have you any red
silk umbrellas in London? We had a tradition of the first that had
ever been seen in Cranford; and the little boys mobbed it and
called it "a stick in petticoats." It might have been the very red
silk one I have described held by a strong father over a troop of
little ones; the poor little lady--the survivor of all--could
scarcely carry it.
Then there were rules and regulations for visiting and calls; and
they were announced to any young people who might be staying in the
town with all the solemnity with which the old Manx laws were read
once a year on the Tinwald Mount.
"Our friends have sent to inquire how you are after your journey
to-night my dear" (fifteen miles in a gentleman's carriage); "they
will give you some rest to-morrow but the next day I have no
doubt they will call; so be at liberty after twelve--from twelve
to three are our calling hours."
Then after they had called -
"It is the third day; I dare say your mamma has told you my dear
never to let more than three days elapse between receiving a call
and returning it; and also that you are never to stay longer than
a quarter of an hour."
"But am I to look at my watch? How am I to find out when a quarter
of an hour has passed?"
"You must keep thinking about the time my dear and not allow
yourself to forget it in conversation."
As everybody had this rule in their minds whether they received or
paid a call of course no absorbing subject was ever spoken about.
We kept ourselves to short sentences of small talk and were
punctual to our time.
I imagine that a few of the gentlefolks of Cranford were poor and
had some difficulty in making both ends meet; but they were like
the Spartans and concealed their smart under a smiling face. We
none of us spoke of money because that subject savoured of
commerce and trade and though some might be poor we were all
aristocratic. The Cranfordians had that kindly esprit de corps
which made them overlook all deficiencies in success when some
among them tried to conceal their poverty. When Mrs Forrester for
instance gave a party in her baby-house of a dwelling and the
little maiden disturbed the ladies on the sofa by a request that
she might get the tea-tray out from underneath everyone took this
novel proceeding as the most natural thing in the world and talked
on about household forms and ceremonies as if we all believed that
our hostess had a regular servants' hall second table with
housekeeper and steward instead of the one little charity-school
maiden whose short ruddy arms could never have been strong enough
to carry the tray upstairs if she had not been assisted in private
by her mistress who now sat in state pretending not to know what
cakes were sent up though she knew and we knew and she knew that
we knew and we knew that she knew that we knew she had been busy
all the morning making tea-bread and sponge-cakes.
There were one or two consequences arising from this general but
unacknowledged poverty and this very much acknowledged gentility
which were not amiss and which might be introduced into many
circles of society to their great improvement. For instance the
inhabitants of Cranford kept early hours and clattered home in
their pattens under the guidance of a lantern-bearer about nine
o'clock at night; and the whole town was abed and asleep by half-
past ten. Moreover it was considered "vulgar" (a tremendous word
in Cranford) to give anything expensive in the way of eatable or
drinkable at the evening entertainments. Wafer bread-and-butter
and sponge-biscuits were all that the Honourable Mrs Jamieson gave;
and she was sister-in-law to the late Earl of Glenmire although
she did practise such "elegant economy."
"Elegant economy!" How naturally one falls back into the
phraseology of Cranford! There economy was always "elegant" and
money-spending always "vulgar and ostentatious"; a sort of sour-
grapeism which made us very peaceful and satisfied. I never shall
forget the dismay felt when a certain Captain Brown came to live at
Cranford and openly spoke about his being poor--not in a whisper
to an intimate friend the doors and windows being previously
closed but in the public street! in a loud military voice!
alleging his poverty as a reason for not taking a particular house.
The ladies of Cranford were already rather moaning over the
invasion of their territories by a man and a gentleman. He was a
half-pay captain and had obtained some situation on a neighbouring
railroad which had been vehemently petitioned against by the
little town; and if in addition to his masculine gender and his
connection with the obnoxious railroad he was so brazen as to talk
of being poor--why then indeed he must be sent to Coventry.
Death was as true and as common as poverty; yet people never spoke
about that loud out in the streets. It was a word not to be
mentioned to ears polite. We had tacitly agreed to ignore that any
with whom we associated on terms of visiting equality could ever be
prevented by poverty from doing anything that they wished. If we
walked to or from a party it was because the night was SO fine or
the air SO refreshing not because sedan-chairs were expensive. If
we wore prints instead of summer silks it was because we
preferred a washing material; and so on till we blinded ourselves
to the vulgar fact that we were all of us people of very moderate
means. Of course then we did not know what to make of a man who
could speak of poverty as if it was not a disgrace. Yet somehow
Captain Brown made himself respected in Cranford and was called
upon in spite of all resolutions to the contrary. I was surprised
to hear his opinions quoted as authority at a visit which I paid to
Cranford about a year after he had settled in the town. My own
friends had been among the bitterest opponents of any proposal to
visit the Captain and his daughters only twelve months before; and
now he was even admitted in the tabooed hours before twelve. True
it was to discover the cause of a smoking chimney before the fire
was lighted; but still Captain Brown walked upstairs nothing
daunted spoke in a voice too large for the room and joked quite
in the way of a tame man about the house. He had been blind to all
the small slights and omissions of trivial ceremonies with which
he had been received. He had been friendly though the Cranford
ladies had been cool; he had answered small sarcastic compliments
in good faith; and with his manly frankness had overpowered all the
shrinking which met him as a man who was not ashamed to be poor.
And at last his excellent masculine common sense and his
facility in devising expedients to overcome domestic dilemmas had
gained him an extraordinary place as authority among the Cranford
ladies. He himself went on in his course as unaware of his
popularity as he had been of the reverse; and I am sure he was
startled one day when he found his advice so highly esteemed as to
make some counsel which he had given in jest to be taken in sober
serious earnest.
It was on this subject: An old lady had an Alderney cow which she
looked upon as a daughter. You could not pay the short quarter of
an hour call without being told of the wonderful milk or wonderful
intelligence of this animal. The whole town knew and kindly
regarded Miss Betsy Barker's Alderney; therefore great was the
sympathy and regret when in an unguarded moment the poor cow
tumbled into a lime-pit. She moaned so loudly that she was soon
heard and rescued; but meanwhile the poor beast had lost most of
her hair and came out looking naked cold and miserable in a
bare skin. Everybody pitied the animal though a few could not
restrain their smiles at her droll appearance. Miss Betsy Barker
absolutely cried with sorrow and dismay; and it was said she
thought of trying a bath of oil. This remedy perhaps was
recommended by some one of the number whose advice she asked; but
the proposal if ever it was made was knocked on the head by
Captain Brown's decided "Get her a flannel waistcoat and flannel
drawers ma'am if you wish to keep her alive. But my advice is
kill the poor creature at once."
Miss Betsy Barker dried her eyes and thanked the Captain heartily;
she set to work and by-and-by all the town turned out to see the
Alderney meekly going to her pasture clad in dark grey flannel. I
have watched her myself many a time. Do you ever see cows dressed
in grey flannel in London?
Captain Brown had taken a small house on the outskirts of the town
where he lived with his two daughters. He must have been upwards
of sixty at the time of the first visit I paid to Cranford after I
had left it as a residence. But he had a wiry well-trained
elastic figure a stiff military throw-back of his head and a
springing step which made him appear much younger than he was.
His eldest daughter looked almost as old as himself and betrayed
the fact that his real was more than his apparent age. Miss Brown
must have been forty; she had a sickly pained careworn expression
on her face and looked as if the gaiety of youth had long faded
out of sight. Even when young she must have been plain and hard-
featured. Miss Jessie Brown was ten years younger than her sister
and twenty shades prettier. Her face was round and dimpled. Miss
Jenkyns once said in a passion against Captain Brown (the cause of
which I will tell you presently) "that she thought it was time for
Miss Jessie to leave off her dimples and not always to be trying
to look like a child." It was true there was something childlike
in her face; and there will be I think till she dies though she
should live to a hundred. Her eyes were large blue wondering eyes
looking straight at you; her nose was unformed and snub and her
lips were red and dewy; she wore her hair too in little rows of
curls which heightened this appearance. I do not know whether she
was pretty or not; but I liked her face and so did everybody and
I do not think she could help her dimples. She had something of
her father's jauntiness of gait and manner; and any female observer
might detect a slight difference in the attire of the two sisters--
that of Miss Jessie being about two pounds per annum more expensive
than Miss Brown's. Two pounds was a large sum in Captain Brown's
annual disbursements.
Such was the impression made upon me by the Brown family when I
first saw them all together in Cranford Church. The Captain I had
met before--on the occasion of the smoky chimney which he had
cured by some simple alteration in the flue. In church he held
his double eye-glass to his eyes during the Morning Hymn and then
lifted up his head erect and sang out loud and joyfully. He made
the responses louder than the clerk--an old man with a piping
feeble voice who I think felt aggrieved at the Captain's
sonorous bass and quivered higher and higher in consequence.
On coming out of church the brisk Captain paid the most gallant
attention to his two daughters.
He nodded and smiled to his acquaintances; but he shook hands with
none until he had helped Miss Brown to unfurl her umbrella had
relieved her of her prayer-book and had waited patiently till she
with trembling nervous hands had taken up her gown to walk through
the wet roads.
I wonder what the Cranford ladies did with Captain Brown at their
parties. We had often rejoiced in former days that there was no
gentleman to be attended to and to find conversation for at the
card-parties. We had congratulated ourselves upon the snugness of
the evenings; and in our love for gentility and distaste of
mankind we had almost persuaded ourselves that to be a man was to
be "vulgar"; so that when I found my friend and hostess Miss
Jenkyns was going to have a party in my honour and that Captain
and the Miss Browns were invited I wondered much what would be the
course of the evening. Card-tables with green baize tops were
set out by daylight just as usual; it was the third week in
November so the evenings closed in about four. Candles and clean
packs of cards were arranged on each table. The fire was made up;
the neat maid-servant had received her last directions; and there
we stood dressed in our best each with a candle-lighter in our
hands ready to dart at the candles as soon as the first knock
came. Parties in Cranford were solemn festivities making the
ladies feel gravely elated as they sat together in their best
dresses. As soon as three had arrived we sat down to
"Preference" I being the unlucky fourth. The next four comers
were put down immediately to another table; and presently the tea-
trays which I had seen set out in the store-room as I passed in
the morning were placed each on the middle of a card-table. The
china was delicate egg-shell; the old-fashioned silver glittered
with polishing; but the eatables were of the slightest description.
While the trays were yet on the tables Captain and the Miss Browns
came in; and I could see that somehow or other the Captain was a
favourite with all the ladies present. Ruffled brows were
smoothed sharp voices lowered at his approach. Miss Brown looked
ill and depressed almost to gloom. Miss Jessie smiled as usual
and seemed nearly as popular as her father. He immediately and
quietly assumed the man's place in the room; attended to every
one's wants lessened the pretty maid-servant's labour by waiting
on empty cups and bread-and-butterless ladies; and yet did it all
in so easy and dignified a manner and so much as if it were a
matter of course for the strong to attend to the weak that he was
a true man throughout. He played for threepenny points with as
grave an interest as if they had been pounds; and yet in all his
attention to strangers he had an eye on his suffering daughter--
for suffering I was sure she was though to many eyes she might
only appear to be irritable. Miss Jessie could not play cards:
but she talked to the sitters-out who before her coming had been
rather inclined to be cross. She sang too to an old cracked
piano which I think had been a spinet in its youth. Miss Jessie
sang "Jock of Hazeldean" a little out of tune; but we were none of
us musical though Miss Jenkyns beat time out of time by way of
appearing to be so.
It was very good of Miss Jenkyns to do this; for I had seen that a
little before she had been a good deal annoyed by Miss Jessie
Brown's unguarded admission (a propos of Shetland wool) that she
had an uncle her mother's brother who was a shop-keeper in
Edinburgh. Miss Jenkyns tried to drown this confession by a
terrible cough--for the Honourable Mrs Jamieson was sitting at a
card-table nearest Miss Jessie and what would she say or think if
she found out she was in the same room with a shop-keeper's niece!
But Miss Jessie Brown (who had no tact as we all agreed the next
morning) WOULD repeat the information and assure Miss Pole she
could easily get her the identical Shetland wool required "through
my uncle who has the best assortment of Shetland goods of any one
in Edinbro'." It was to take the taste of this out of our mouths
and the sound of this out of our ears that Miss Jenkyns proposed
music; so I say again it was very good of her to beat time to the
song.
When the trays re-appeared with biscuits and wine punctually at a
quarter to nine there was conversation comparing of cards and
talking over tricks; but by-and-by Captain Brown sported a bit of
literature.
"Have you seen any numbers of 'The Pickwick Papers'?" said he.
(They we're then publishing in parts.) "Capital thing!"
Now Miss Jenkyns was daughter of a deceased rector of Cranford;
and on the strength of a number of manuscript sermons and a
pretty good library of divinity considered herself literary and
looked upon any conversation about books as a challenge to her. So
she answered and said "Yes she had seen them; indeed she might
say she had read them."
"And what do you think of them?" exclaimed Captain Brown. "Aren't
they famously good?"
So urged Miss Jenkyns could not but speak.
"I must say I don't think they are by any means equal to Dr
Johnson. Still perhaps the author is young. Let him persevere
and who knows what he may become if he will take the great Doctor
for his model?" This was evidently too much for Captain Brown to
take placidly; and I saw the words on the tip of his tongue before
Miss Jenkyns had finished her sentence.
"It is quite a different sort of thing my dear madam" he began.
"I am quite aware of that" returned she. "And I make allowances
Captain Brown."
"Just allow me to read you a scene out of this month's number"
pleaded he. "I had it only this morning and I don't think the
company can have read it yet."
"As you please" said she settling herself with an air of
resignation. He read the account of the "swarry" which Sam Weller
gave at Bath. Some of us laughed heartily. _I_ did not dare
because I was staying in the house. Miss Jenkyns sat in patient
gravity. When it was ended she turned to me and said with mild
dignity -
"Fetch me 'Rasselas' my dear out of the book-room."
When I had brought it to her she turned to Captain Brown -
"Now allow me to read you a scene and then the present company can
judge between your favourite Mr Boz and Dr Johnson."
She read one of the conversations between Rasselas and Imlac in a
high-pitched majestic voice: and when she had ended she said "I
imagine I am now justified in my preference of Dr Johnson as a
writer of fiction." The Captain screwed his lips up and drummed
on the table but he did not speak. She thought she would give him
a finishing blow or two.
"I consider it vulgar and below the dignity of literature to
publish in numbers."
"How was the Rambler published ma'am?" asked Captain Brown in a
low voice which I think Miss Jenkyns could not have heard.
"Dr Johnson's style is a model for young beginners. My father
recommended it to me when I began to write letters--I have formed
my own style upon it; I recommended it to your favourite."
"I should be very sorry for him to exchange his style for any such
pompous writing" said Captain Brown.
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
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