Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood

Perhaps it might do something to modify the scorn of all classes for those beneath them, to consider that, by regarding others thus, they justify those above them in looking down upon them in their turn. In London shops, I am credibly informed, the young women who serve in the show-rooms, or behind the counters, are called LADIES, and talk of the girls who make up the articles for sale as PERSONS. To the learned professions, however, the distinction between the shopwomen and milliners is, from their superior height, unrecognizable; while doctors and lawyers are again, I doubt not, massed by countesses and other blue-blooded realities, with the literary lions who roar at soirees and kettle-drums, or even with chiropodists and violin-players! But I am growing scornful at scorn, and forget that I too have been scornful. Brothers, sisters, all good men and true women, let the Master seat us where He will. Until he says, “Come up higher,” let us sit at the foot of the board, or stand behind, honoured in waiting upon His guests. All that kind of thing is worth nothing in the kingdom; and nothing will be remembered of us but the Master’s judgment.

I have known a good churchwoman who would be sweet as a sister to the abject poor, but offensively condescending to a shopkeeper or a dissenter, exactly as if he was a Pariah, and she a Brahmin. I have known good people who were noble and generous towards their so-called inferiors and full of the rights of the race—until it touched their own family, and just no longer. Yea I, who had talked like this for years, at once, when Tom Weir wanted to marry my sister, lost my faith in the broad lines of human distinction judged according to appearances in which I did not even believe, and judged not righteous judgment.

“For,” reasoned the world in me, “is it not too bad to drag your wife in for such an alliance? Has she not lowered herself enough already? Has she not married far below her accredited position in society? Will she not feel injured by your family if she see it capable of forming such a connexion?”

What answer I returned to Tom I hardly know. I remember that the poor fellow’s face fell, and that he murmured something which I did not heed. And then I found myself walking in the garden under the great cedar, having stepped out of the window almost unconsciously, and left Tom standing there alone. It was very good of him ever to forgive me.

Wandering about in the garden, my wife saw me from her window, and met me as I turned a corner in the shrubbery.

And now I am going to have my revenge upon her in a way she does not expect, for making me tell the story: I will tell her share in it.

“What is the matter with you, Henry?” she asked.

“Oh, not much,” I answered. “Only that Weir has been making me rather uncomfortable.”

“What has he been doing?” she inquired, in some alarm. “It is not possible he has done anything wrong.”

My wife trusted him as much as I did.

“No—o—o,” I answered. “Not anything exactly wrong.”

“It must be very nearly wrong, Henry, to make you look so miserable.”

I began to feel ashamed and more uncomfortable.

“He has been falling in love with Martha,” I said; “and when I put one thing to another, I fear he may have made her fall in love with him too.” My wife laughed merrily.

“Whal a wicked curate!”

“Well, but you know it is not exactly agreeable.”

“Why?”

“You know why well enough.”

“At least, I am not going to take it for granted. Is he not a good man?”

“Yes.”

“Is he not a well-educated man?”

“As well as myself—for his years.”

“Is he not clever?”

“One of the cleverest fellows I ever met”

“Is he not a gentleman?”

“I have not a fault to find with his manners.”

“Nor with his habits?” my wife went on.

“No.”

“Nor with his ways of thinking?”

“No.—But, Ethelwyn, you know what I mean quite well. His family, you know.”

“Well, is his father not a respectable man?”

“Oh, yes, certainly. Thoroughly respectable.”

“He wouldn’t borrow money of his tailor instead of paying for his clothes, would he?”

“Certainly not”

“And if he were to die to-day he would carry no debts to heaven with him?”

“I believe not.”

“Does he bear false witness against his neighbour?”

“No. He scorns a lie as much as any man I ever knew.”

“Which of the commandments is it in particular that he breaks, then?”

“None that I know of; excepting that no one can keep them yet that is only human. He tries to keep every one of them I do believe.”

“Well, I think Tom very fortunate in having such a father. I wish my mother had been as good.”

“That is all true, and yet—”

“And yet, suppose a young man you liked had had a fashionable father who had ruined half a score of trades-people by his extravagance—would you object to him because of his family?”

“Perhaps not.”

“Then, with you, position outweighs honesty—in fathers, at least.”

To this I was not ready with an answer, and my wife went on.

“It might be reasonable if you did though, from fear lest he should turn out like his father.—But do you know why I would not accept your offer of taking my name when I should succeed to the property?”

“You said you liked mine better,” I answered.

“So I did. But I did not tell you that I was ashamed that my good husband should take a name which for centuries had been borne by hard-hearted, worldly minded people, who, to speak the truth of my ancestors to my husband, were neither gentle nor honest, nor high-minded.”

“Still, Ethelwyn, you know there is something in it, though it is not so easy to say what. And you avoid that. I suppose Martha has been talking you over to her side.”