Page:Once a Week, Series 1, Volume II Dec 1859 to June 1860.pdf/204

. 25, 1860.] pink bonnet. Oh, mais, madame, your husband—le barbare—would give that in justification."

Lamb whispered to me: “A client of my own. Barber v. Barber,—on to-morrow at eleven:” and then aloud,—

“Mrs. Barber, I have the responsibility of your case, and you must allow Madame Lareine to decide what is for the best. Have you read the evidence, Madame—and what is it to be?”

“Oh, yes, sare, I have sat up three night, and here is de result. Robe of black gros, wid tree flounces—de usual robe à la divorcée; crinoline not prononcée—chapeau à la Cresswell; and here was de thought. After reading de letters of Madame’s from Florence, I put in that small bunch of pensées—violets. Indian shawl, leetel collar aux trois larmes, leetle muff also wid mouchoir not too fine. What you say to that?” And then turning round to Mrs. Barber:—

“Madame, you are half away across between de British matron and la femme abandonnée: not too stern, not too mild: you have a right to your Opera box, for you have de dot, and to your small shild.”

After some discussion, Mrs. Barber accepted her fate, having only compromised for permission to wear a pair of gold ear-rings.

“Madame—it must be—but vous vous compromttez—de Scotch lawyer against you will say you are fond of admiration. Ah! quel horrreur! but it must be so. Have you seen my special jury sleeves, Monsieur Lamb, and le petit bonnet a l’évanouie? Dat is very good.”

It was finally settled, Mrs. Barber making no objection, that I was to be the next morning at his offices, and attend the great trial of Barber v. Barber. 2em

from many foreign countries speak with hearty admiration, when they return home, of the young ladies of England; and especially of their bloom and gaiety, as the results of a healthy organisation. These admirers, whose impressions reach us by books, or in conversation when we in turn visit them, describe our young maidens as they see them—riding about the country,—possibly viewing the hunt from afar; or walking for hours in the lanes and under the hedgerows, while father or brothers are among the stubbles or the turnips in autumn: or gardening in spring, or attending scenes of rural sport,—perhaps even taking a share in the archery-meeting, as well as the flower-show. When the foreigner meets in town his fair rural acquaintance, he sees them with the glow of country air and exercise still upon them; and he adds his testimony to the many which declare that the young daughters of England are the fairest in the world.

This is probably true of a portion of the girlhood of our nation. The young ladies who are met in that London society which is seen by travelled foreigners who write books, and send forth their impressions in conversation, are, for the most part, daughters of country gentlemen, or of the aristocracy. They are young ladies who live in a park in the autumn, and in Belgravia in the spring, and who have horses, and whatever else promotes health and pleasure. They are few in number, however, in comparison with the daughters of our graduated middle-class: and it may be a question whether foreign observers would give an equally favourable report of the health, spirit, and beauty of the daughters of our merchants and tradesmen, our physicians and surgeons, our lawyers, accountants, and manufacturers. Medical men, anxious parents, and observant moralists might indeed say, that, from one cause or another, one seldom sees a family of thoroughly healthy and cheerful young women of the middle-class, unless they are early married, or have to earn their living in some way, not in itself unhealthy. I am compelled to say, after a long life of observation of middle-class life in England, that I believe this allegation to be only too true.

How does it happen? What is the mode of life of girls of the middle-class?

Where girls have not full occupation and interest after the close of their school-life (which is crowded with interests of its own), they grow languid, indolent, irritable, or depressed; dissatisfied with themselves and everybody about them; morbid, in short, in mind and morals, as well as in physical condition. When, again, girls are seen in this morbid condition, the first thing that should occur to parents and physician is, that they may not have enough occupation and interest. Girls have the same need that other people have of a general exercise of the brain, in its physical, intellectual, and moral regions: yet it would seem, by our practice, that we think girls ought to thrive on a very small range of interests, and under the lowest degree of vital exercise.

Let us see how they live in their own homes in London. Let us take for observation the daughters of a silk manufacturer, or a sugar refiner, or a solicitor, or a surgeon. Let them be members of a household where there is neither wealth nor poverty. Let it be a genuine middle-class London household. What has the eldest daughter to do when her school-days are over?

If her mother and she are sensible women, she will vary her occupations, in the first place. The Ladies’ Colleges in Harley Street and Bedford Square now afford an inestimable resource to women who desire to carry on their intellectual improvement beyond the ordinary school range. Every girl who comes home to her father’s house intends to go on studying. The mother fits up some little room, or some corner of the dear child’s bed-room, or says she shall have the dining-room to herself at certain hours, “for her own pursuits.” But it seldom or never comes to anything. No man, woman, or child can go on long studying (as it is miscalled) without need, or special aim, and without companionship. There is less and less decision about the daily study: there are more and more interruptions; and, after some months, daughter and mother agree that, after all, “the duties of society” are more imperative than the obligation to study. Then begins the slipping away of the knowledge obtained at