Stories for Helen. Leslie Eliza
Читать онлайн книгу.
FEAST
"They hear a voice in every wind,
And snatch a fearful joy."
IT is a very common subject of complaint with boarding-school children (and there is often sufficient foundation for it) that they are too much restricted in their food, and that their diet is not only inferior in quality to what it ought to be, but frequently deficient in quantity also. There was certainly, however, no cause for any dissatisfaction of this sort at Mrs. Middleton's boarding-school, in Philadelphia. The table was in every respect excellent; and a basket of bread or biscuit, and sometimes of gingerbread, was handed round to all the pupils, every morning at eleven o'clock. Mrs. Middleton's young ladies were strangers to the common boarding-school practice of coaxing or bribing the servants to procure them cakes and tarts from the confectioners; for the table was sufficiently supplied with those articles, made in such a manner as to be agreeable to the taste without endangering the health; and they were every day allowed some sort of fruit, of the best quality the market could furnish.
At last, a young lady named Henrietta Harwood became a member of Mrs. Middleton's seminary. Miss Harwood had been for several years a pupil of one of those too numerous establishments, where the comfort of the children is sacrificed to the vanity of a governess, who rests her claims to encouragement principally on the merits of elegantly furnished parlours, an expensive style of dress, frequent evening parties, and occasional balls. In schools where outward show is the leading principle, the internal economy is generally conducted on the most parsimonious plan, and while the masters (who attend only at certain hours) are such as are considered the most fashionable, the female teachers that live in the house, are too often vulgar girls obtained at a low salary, and who frequently are in league with the elder pupils in ridiculing and plotting against the governess.
Most of the faults and follies that were likely to be acquired at a show-boarding-school, Henrietta Harwood brought with her to the excellent and well-conducted establishment of Mrs. Middleton: but she had some redeeming qualities that made her rather a favourite with her new companions, and disposed her governess to hope that all would come right at last.
One evening, the elder young ladies were sitting very comfortably at their different occupations, round the table in the front school-room. The window-shutters were closed, a good fire was burning in the stove, and Mrs. Middleton had just sent them a basket of apples, according to her custom in the winter evenings. After finishing a very fine one, Henrietta Harwood exclaimed – "Well – I wonder at myself for eating these apples!"
Miss Brownlow. Why, I am sure they are the very best Newtown pippins.
Henrietta. That is true, Brownie: but at Madame Disette's we had something better of evenings than mere apples.
Miss Brownlow. What had you?
Henrietta. We had sometimes cheesecakes, and sometimes tarts; with very frequently pound-cake and jumbles; and sometimes we had even little mince-pies, and oyster-patties.
Miss Wilcox. O, delicious! What an excellent governess! How could you ever consent to leave her? I thought Mrs. Middleton allowed us a great many good things; but she does not send us cheesecakes and tarts of an evening.
Henrietta. O, do not mistake! We might have gone without them all our lives, before Madame Disette would have sent us any thing of the sort. She did not even allow us apples of an evening, or a piece of bread between breakfast and dinner. Why, one summer evening, she bought at the door some common ice-cream, of a black man that was carrying it through the streets in a tin pot; and when we thought that, for once, she had certainly treated us, she charged the ice-cream in our quarter-bills. No, no, – we got nothing from her, but stale bread; bad butter; sloppy tea; coffee without taste or colour; skinny meat, half-cooked one day, cold the next, and hashed or rather coddled the third. Then, for a dessert, we were regaled with sour knotty apples in the winter, worm-eaten cherries in the summer, and dry squashy pears in the autumn; and once a week we had boiled rice, or baked bread and milk, by way of pudding. Though after the scholars had eaten their allowance, and made their curtsies and gone up to the school-room, she always had something nice brought for herself, and her sister, and niece: and of which poor Benson, the under teacher, was never invited to partake.
Miss Wilcox. But how did you get such nice things in the evening?
Henrietta. We bought them, to be sure: bought them with our own money. That was the only way. When the little girls had all gone to bed, and Madame Disette, and Madame Trompeur, and Mademoiselle Mensonge were engaged in the parlour with their company, we all (that is, the first class) subscribed something; and we commissioned the chambermaid to bring us whatever we wanted from the confectioner's. O, what delightful feasts we had!
Miss Thomson. Did Madame Disette never find you out?
Henrietta. O, no! – we laid our plans too cunningly. And Benson, the teacher, was a good creature, and always joined our party; so we knew she would not tell.
Miss Scott. I am sure we never could prevail on our teacher, Miss Loxley, to be concerned in such things. She would think it so very improper.
Henrietta. Well, we must take an opportunity when Miss Loxley is not at home. Mrs. Middleton permits her to go out whenever she requests it. She does not keep her so closely confined as Madame Disette did poor Benson.
Miss Scott. Mrs. Middleton has so much reliance on her elder pupils, that she is not afraid to trust us sometimes without Miss Loxley. And we, certainly, have never yet abused her confidence.
Henrietta. O, you are undoubtedly a most exemplary set! But you never had one like me among you. I shall soon put a little spirit into you all, and get you out of this strict-propriety sort of way. I do not despair even of my friend Isabella Caldwell, the good girl of the school.
Isabella. Our way is a very satisfactory one. It is impossible for boarding-school girls to be happier than we are. Our minds are not exhausted with long and difficult lessons, and with studies beyond our capacity. When school-hours are over, we have full time for recreation, and are amply provided with the means of amusing ourselves. We have a library of entertaining books; and we have liberty to divert ourselves with all sorts of juvenile plays and games. Then how much attention is paid to our health and our comforts, and how kindly and judiciously are we treated in every respect! Certainly, we ought to think ourselves happy.
Henrietta. Ay! so you are made to say in the letters which you write home to your parents. All our French letters, at Madame Disette's were written first by her niece Mademoiselle Mensonge; and the English letters were manufactured by poor Benson; and then we copied them in our very best hands, with a new pen at every paragraph. They were all nearly the same; and told of nothing but the superabundant kindness and liberality of Madame Disette, our high respect and esteem for Madame Trompeur, her sister, and our vast affection for her amiable niece, Mademoiselle Mensonge: together with our perfect health, and extreme felicity. In every letter we grew happier and happier.
Miss Snodgrass. And were you not so in reality?
Henrietta. No, indeed, – all the happiness we had was of our own making, for we derived none from any thing our governess did for us; though we were obliged in our letters to call her our beloved Madame Disette, and to express the most fervent hopes that we might one day exactly resemble her; which, I am sure, was the last thing we could have desired; for she was one of the ugliest women that I ever saw in my life.
Miss Thomson. But you might have wished to resemble her in mind and manners.
Henrietta. Why, as to that, her mind was worse than her face, and her manners we all thought absolutely ridiculous. Benson could mimic her exactly.
Miss Marley. I do not wonder that your parents took you away from such a school.
Henrietta. The school was certainly bad enough. We had dirty, uncomfortable chambers; scanty fires; a mean table, and all such inconveniences. But then it was a very fashionable school; all the masters were foreigners, and above all things there was a great point made of our speaking French. We knew the common phrases perfectly well. We could all