Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

“ As dear sweet Aunt Buxton would have said,
'There is a holy purpose in it;' and as Aunt Buxton would not have said,
but as I, a 'fool, rush in where angels fear to tread,' I decide that the
purpose is to teach Master Frank patience and submission."
"Erminia--how could you help"--and there Maggie stopped.
"I know what you mean; how could I help falling in love with him? I think
he has not mystery and reserve enough for me. I should like a man with some
deep, impenetrable darkness around him; something one could always keep
wondering about. ”

“ They seemed like old
friends, Maggie, who was reserved at home because no one cared to hear what
she had to say, opened out, and told Erminia and Mrs. Buxton all about her
way of spending her day, and described her home.
"How odd!" said Erminia. "I have ridden that way on Abdel-Kadr, and never
seen your house."
"It is like the place the Sleeping Beauty lived in; people sometimes seem
to go round it and round it, and never find it. But unless you follow a
little sheep-track, which seems to end at a gray piece of rock, you may
come within a stone's throw of the chimneys and never see them. ”

“ Up in a dark corner Edward stood, with an old rake in his hand.
"I thought it was you, Maggie!" said he, heaving a deep breath of relief.
"What have you done? Have you agreed to write the letter? You've done
something for me, I see by your looks."
"Yes! I have told Mr. Buxton all. He is waiting for you in the parlor. Oh!
I knew he could not be so hard!" She was out of breath.
"I don't understand you!" said he. "You've never been such a fool as to go
and tell him where I am?" ”

“ Maggie took him into the parlor, which was always cool and fresh in the
hottest weather. It was scented by a great beau-pot filled with roses; and,
besides, the casement was open to the fragrant court. Mr. Buxton was so
large, and the parlor so small, that when he was once in, Maggie thought
when he went away, he could carry the room on his back, as a snail does its
house.
"And so, you are a notable little woman, are you?" said he, after he had
stretched himself (a very unnecessary proceeding) , and unbuttoned his
waistcoat, Maggie stood near the door, uncertain whether to go or to stay. ”

“ After dinner, when Mr. Buxton and the two
young men were left alone, Edward launched out still more. He thought he
was impressing Frank with his knowledge of the world, and the world's ways.
But he was doing all in his power to repel one who had never been much
attracted toward him. Worldly success was his standard of merit. The end
seemed with him to justify the means; if a man prospered, it was not
necessary to scrutinize his conduct too closely. The law was viewed in its
lowest aspect; and yet with a certain cleverness, which preserved Edward
from being intellectually contemptible. ”

“ Here Maggie used to come and sit and dream in any scarce half-hour
of leisure. Here she came to cry, when her little heart was overfull at her
mother's sharp fault-finding, or when bidden to keep out of the way, and
not be troublesome. She used to look over the swelling expanse of moor, and
the tears were dried up by the soft low-blowing wind which came sighing
along it. She forgot her little home griefs to wonder why a brown-purple
shadow always streaked one particular part in the fullest sunlight; why the
cloud-shadows always seemed to be wafted with a sidelong motion ”

“ After tea, Frank asked Maggie if she would walk out with him; and
accordingly they climbed the Fell-Lane and went out upon the moors, which
seemed vast and boundless as their love.
"Have you told your father?" asked Maggie; a dim anxiety lurking in her
heart.
"Yes," said Frank. He did not go on; and she feared to ask, although she
longed to know, how Mr. Buxton had received the intelligence.
"What did he say?" at length she inquired.
"Oh! it was evidently a new idea to him that I was attached to you; and he
does not take up a new idea speedily. ”

“ She hid her face in her mother's lap for an instant; and then she lifted it
up, as brimful of the light of happiness as is the cup of a water-lily of
the sun's radiance.
"Maggie--you don't say so," said her mother, half incredulously. "It can't
be, for he's at Cambridge, and it's not post-day. What do you mean?" ”

“ Of these two visions, the favorite one (for
his sister's sake) was that of marriage with Erminia.
And, in the midst of all this, fell, like a bombshell, the intelligence of
his engagement with Maggie Browne; a good sweet little girl enough, but
without fortune or connection--without, as far as Mr. Buxton knew, the
least power, or capability, or spirit, with which to help Frank on in his
career to eminence in the land! He resolved to consider it as a boyish
fancy, easily to be suppressed; and pooh-poohed it down, to Frank,
accordingly. ”

“ Dear Frank, think! It may be very
little you can do--and you may never see the effect of it, any more than
the widow saw the world-wide effect of her mite. Then if all the good and
thoughtful men run away from us to some new country, what are we to do with
our poor dear Old England?"
"Oh, you must run away with the good, thoughtful men-- (I mean to consider
that as a compliment to myself, Maggie!) Will you let me wish I had been
born poor, if I am to stay in England? ”

“ Ned is sometimes very cross," thought she. "I did not understand he was
carrying it there. Perhaps I am clumsy. Mamma says I am; and Ned says I
am. Nancy never says so and papa never said so. I wish I could help being
clumsy and stupid. Ned says all women are so. I wish I was not a woman. It
must be a fine thing to be a man. Oh dear! I must go up the field again
with this heavy pitcher, and my arms do so ache!" She rose and climbed the
steep brae. As she went she heard her mother's voice.
"Maggie! Maggie! there's no water for dinner, and the potatoes are quite
boiled. Where is that child?" ”

“ But it's
self--self--paramount above all."
"Oh Maggie! how can you be so hard-hearted and selfish?" echoed Mrs.
Browne, crying and sobbing.
"Mother!" said Maggie, "I know that I think too often and too much of
myself. But this time I thought only of Frank. He loves me; it would break
his heart if I wrote as Mr. Buxton wishes, cutting our lives asunder, and
giving no reason for it."
"He loves you so!" said Edward, tauntingly. "A man's love break his
heart! You've got some pretty notions! ”

“ Henry told me about it all last
night. 'Never talk to me of virtue and such humbug again,' I said, 'I'll
never believe in them. Every one is for what he can get.' However, Mr.
Henry wrote to the superintendent of police at Woodchester; and has gone
over himself this morning to see after it. But to think of your father
having such a son!"
"Oh my poor father!" sobbed out Maggie. "How glad I am you are dead before
this disgrace came upon us!"
"You may well say disgrace. You're a good girl yourself, Maggie. I have
always said that. How Edward has turned out as he has done, I cannot
conceive. ”

“ It is different to the case of one out of a large family."
"I wish I were one in twenty, then I might marry where I liked to-morrow."
"It would take two people's consent to such a rapid measure," said Maggie,
laughing. "But now I am going to wish a wish, which it won't require a
fairy godmother to gratify. Look, Frank, do you see in the middle of that
dark brown purple streak of moor a yellow gleam of light? It is a pond, I
think, that at this time of the year catches a slanting beam of the sun. It
cannot be very far off. I have wished to go to it every autumn. ”

“ Let us fix a day before then."
"Do mamma," said Edward.
"I am not in spirits for visiting," Mrs. Browne answered. But the quick
children detected a hesitation in her manner of saying the oft spoken
words, and had hopes, if only Mr. Buxton would persevere in his invitation.
"Your not visiting is the very reason why you are not in spirits. A little
change, and a few neighborly faces, would do you good, I'll be bound.
Besides, for the children's sake you should not live too secluded a life.
Young people should see a little of the world." ”

“ Gently as this was said, he yet felt it as a reproach, and
tried to excuse himself.
"You see, Maggie, a man must be educated to be a gentleman. Now, if a woman
knows how to keep a house, that's all that is wanted from her. So my time
is of more consequence than yours. Mamma says I'm to go to college, and be
a clergyman; so I must get on with my Latin."
Maggie submitted in silence; and almost felt it as an act of gracious
condescension when, a morning or two afterwards, he came to meet her as
she was toiling in from the well, carrying the great brown jug full of
spring-water ready for dinner. ”

“ The kind people at Llandudno had made ready their own humble beds, with
every appliance of comfort they could think of, as soon as they understood
the nature of the calamity which had befallen the ship on their coasts.
Frank walked, dripping, bareheaded, by the body of his Margaret, which was
borne by some men along the rocky sloping shore.
"She is not dead!" he said. He stopped at the first house they came to. It
belonged to a kind-hearted woman. They laid Maggie in her bed, and got the
village doctor to come and see her.
"There is life still," said he, gravely.
"I knew it," said Frank. ”

“ Now
he knows what it is; and I must try, though I am but an unknowing girl, to
warn and to strengthen him. Don't weaken my faith. Who can do right if we
lose faith in them?"
"And Frank!" said Erminia, after a pause. "Poor Frank!"
"Dear Frank!" replied Maggie, looking up, and trying to smile; but, in
spite of herself, her eyes filled with tears. ”

“ Erminia is a little
sensible creature, and says she does not wonder at any man falling in love
with you. Nay, Maggie, don't hang your head so down; let me have a glimpse
of your face."
"I am sorry your father does not like it," said Maggie, sorrowfully.
"So am I. But we must give him time to get reconciled. Never fear but he
will like it in the long run; he has too much good taste and good feeling.
He must like you."
Frank did not choose to tell even Maggie how violently his father had set
himself against their engagement. ”