Mary Russell Mitford

by William James Roberts

FOOTNOTES:

[6] A game resembling backgammon.

CHAPTER IV
SCHOOLDAYS AND MISS ROWDEN’S INFLUENCE

In both the conduct of his establishment and its curriculum, M. St. Quintin was very thorough, and no doubt it was to this quality that he owed the large measure of his success as a schoolmaster. He himself taught the pupils French, history, geography, and a smattering of science, the scope of which was limited for the very obvious reason that the tutor knew little of the subject. He was ably seconded by Miss Rowden, the Fanny Rowden who subsequently endeared herself greatly to her precocious pupil and, in course of time, succeeded M. St. Quintin, upon his retirement, as mistress of the school. She was responsible for the general course of study, being assisted by special finishing masters for Italian, music, dancing and drawing. In all of these, save that of music, Mary Mitford became a proficient pupil, so proficient indeed that she often nonplussed her teachers by her intelligent questionings.

“Our treasure,” wrote Mrs. Mitford to her husband whilst she was on a short visit to the school, “was much amused yesterday morning. In her astronomical lecture, she not only completely posed Miss Rowden, but M. St. Quintin himself could not reconcile a contradiction which she had discovered in the author they were perusing. You cannot have an idea of the gratification the dear little rogue feels in puzzling her instructors.”

In the month previous to this she had again successfully carried the day against her tutor in an English composition of which the subject was “The Advantage of a Well-educated Mind.” In examining this M. St. Quintin observed a word which struck him as needless, and he was about to erase it when the pupil in her pretty, meek way, an artless manner of which she seems to have made good use in her childhood, urged that it should be left standing. The tutor was immediately perplexed and appealed to Miss Rowden, who gave judgment in favour of the pupil, suggesting that in the event of the disputed participle being dismissed, the whole sentence would need complete alteration. On a more deliberate view of the subject, St. Quintin agreed to the retention of the word and “with all the liberality which is so amiable a point in his character, begged our daughter’s pardon,” wrote the proud mother.

The year 1802 found her the winner of the prize for both French and English composition, and so keen was her desire for knowledge that two months later she wrote home to her mother the information: “I have just taken a lesson in Latin; but I shall, in consequence, omit some of my other business. It is so extremely like Italian, that I think I shall find it much easier than I expected.” For this, Miss Rowden was immediately responsible, so emulous was the child of her governess; indeed, Miss Rowden’s influence on the little girl was undoubtedly far-reaching and must have laid the foundation of all her love for literature which was so marked a characteristic of Miss Mitford’s life. Truly, Miss Rowden had in the child a wonderfully receptive soil in which to plant the seeds of learning—we must not forget the early precocious years and their association with Percy’s Reliques and kindred mental exercises—but she was a wise woman, and fostered and encouraged her pupil to an extent which would demand a tribute of praise from the most superficial historian of Miss Mitford’s life. The fact that Miss Rowden was at this time diligently reading Virgil was sufficient stimulus to her pupil to study to the same end, hence the letter home announcing her decision. On this occasion it would appear that Mrs. Mitford entertained a doubt as to the wisdom of the proposal, and consulted her husband, with the result that a letter on the subject was forthwith despatched to Hans Place.

“Your mother and myself,” wrote the Doctor, “have had much conversation concerning the utility of your learning Latin, and we both agree that it is perfectly unnecessary, and would occasion you additional trouble. It would occupy more of your time than you could conveniently appropriate to it; and we are more than satisfied with your application and proficiency in everything.”

In this, as in most other matters at this period of her life, the child had her own way, and the Latin lessons were continued—advantageously, as the sequel will show.

On the whole, her life at Hans Place was of the happiest, although, of course, the early days were touched with the miseries of home-sickness which are the common lot of all children in similar circumstances.

“I was scarcely less happy,” she wrote in the after years, “in the great London school than at home; to tell the truth, I was well nigh as much spoilt in one place as in the other; but as I was a quiet and orderly little girl, and fell easily into the rules of the house, there was no great harm done, either to me or to the school discipline.”

Nevertheless, there is a lonely touch in one of her early letters home from Hans Place. It is dated September 15, 1799, and after thanking the dear papa for certain parcels just received, goes on to state: “My uncle called on me twice while he stayed in London, but he went away in five minutes both times. He said that he only went to fetch my aunt, and would certainly take me out when he returned. I hope that I may be wrong in my opinion of my aunt; but I again repeat, I think she has the most hypocritical drawl I have ever heard. Pray, my dearest papa, come soon to see me. I am quite miserable without you, and have a thousand things to say to you.”

A year later—November 30, 1800—she wrote exuberantly in her pocket book: “Where shall I be this day month? At home! How happy I shall be, and shall be ready to jump out of my skin for joy.”

Of her inability to master music, due to her absolute lack of taste for it, we have already spoken. Her first attempts were made on the piano at the age of five, and so determined was her father in the matter that, waiving all objections, he insisted on her continuing to practise right up to the date of her removal to the school in Hans Place and for some years after.

The music-master at Hans Place was Mr. Hook, the father of Theodore Hook, and a composer of songs for the Vauxhall Gardens. He was, so we learn, an instructor of average ability, smooth-faced, good-natured and kindly, but although these commended him to Miss Mitford they aroused no enthusiasm in her for his art. So he, like many others who had preceded him in the thankless task of trying to teach little Mary her notes, was promptly told by the hasty father—who, unlike his daughter, was not struck by Mr. Hook’s appearance or manner—that he was no good and must be replaced by some one more competent. This some one promptly appeared in the person of Herr Schuberl, at that time engaged in the special tuition of two of Mary’s schoolfellows. He was an impatient, irritable, but undoubtedly able man, and before long amply avenged Mr. Hook, by refusing to have anything more to do with the impossible pupil.

This dismissal was, of course, hailed by the child with great glee, for she began to entertain the hope that the incident would put a stop for ever to the attempts being made in regard to her musical education. But her joy was short-lived; her father was too pertinacious to be so easily turned from his purpose, and believing that the failure of his child was due to incompetent teachers and to his own choice of instrument, he decreed that she must learn the harp.

Apart from any other consideration, this decision had an advantage in that it was supposed to afford the child an opportunity of learning what was then designated as an “elegant accomplishment.” So, a harp was installed at the school, being placed for the convenience of the tutor and pupil in the principal reception-room, an apartment connected with the entrance-hall by a long passage and two double doors, the outer pair of which were covered in green-baize and swung to with a resounding bang when let go by the person who had opened them.

Being a reception-room, it was handsomely fitted up with shelves upon which reposed a number of nicely-bound books, chiefly of French plays and classics. To this room was the unwilling pupil sent each morning to practise alone the exercises previously set her by the “demure little Miss Essex,” the new music mistress; “sent alone, most comfortably out of sight and hearing of every individual in the house.”

But there was little of harp-practice, for before long “I betook myself to the book-shelves, and seeing a row of octavo volumes lettered Théâtre de Voltaire, I selected one of them and had deposited it in front of the music-stand, and perched myself upon the stool to read it in less time than an ordinary pupil would have consumed in getting through the first three bars of ‘Ar Hyd y Nos.’ The play upon which I opened was ‘Zaïre.’ ‘Zaïre’ is not ‘Richard the Third,’ any more than M. de Voltaire is Shakespeare: nevertheless, the play has its merits. I proceeded to other plays—‘Œdipe,’ ‘Mérope,’ ‘Alzire,’ ‘Mahomet,’ plays well worth reading, but not so absorbing as to prevent my giving due attention to the warning doors, and putting the book in its place, and striking the chords of ‘Ar Hyd y Nos’ as often as I heard a step approaching; or gathering up myself and my music, and walking quietly back to the school-room as soon as the hour for practice had expired.”

All of which was, of course, very naughty, and scarcely what the dear papa, blissfully ignorant away in Reading, would have desired! But worse was to follow. In time Voltaire was exhausted, and, hunting along the shelves, the omnivorous Miss came upon the comedies of Molière, which plunged her at once into the gaieties of his delightful world, blotting out all thought of present things—harp, music-books, and lessons—and even demure little Miss Essex vanished into thin air along with “Ar Hyd y Nos.” Fascinated by the tribulations of “Sganarelle” or the lessons of the “Bourgeois Gentilhomme,” she was at length caught by none other than M. St. Quintin, who found her laughing till she cried over the apostrophes of the angry father to the galley in which he is told his son has been taken captive. “Que diable alloit-il faire dans cette galère!” an apostrophe which, as she quaintly wrote, “comes true with regard to somebody in a scrape during every moment of every day, and was never more applicable than to myself at that instant.”

M. St. Quintin could not chide, for, apart from his own adoration of Molière, an adoration he did not extend to music, he was convinced that no proficiency in any art could be gained without natural qualifications and sincere goodwill. So he joined in the tearful laughter, and when he could compose himself, complimented rather than rebuked the pupil upon her relish for the comic drama. More than this, he spoke plainly to the dear papa, with the result that the harp and Miss Essex went together, that music was henceforth abandoned, and the event crowned with the gift of a cheap edition of Molière for the wayward little maid’s own reading.

These were the foundations skilfully laid and built upon by Miss Rowden. They marked the beginnings of a distinct and strong literary taste and a passion for the Drama which, had she and her father but known at the time, were to furnish and equip her for the stern battle of life in which she was to engage, a battle for the bare necessities of life for herself and the provision of luxuries for the careless and thriftless parent upon whom she doted and spent herself.

In August, 1802—she would then be fifteen years of age—she writes to her father: “I told you that I had finished the Iliad, which I admired beyond anything I ever read. I have now begun the Æneid, which I cannot say I admire so much. Dryden is so fond of triplets and alexandrines, that it is much heavier reading; and though he is reckoned a more harmonious versifier than Pope, some of his lines are so careless that I shall not be sorry when I have finished it. I shall then read the Odyssey. I have already gone through three books, and shall finish it in a fortnight ... I am now reading that beautiful opera of Metastasio, Themistocles; and when I have finished that, I shall read Tasso’s Jerusalem Delivered. How you would dote on Metastasio; his poetry is really heavenly,” a letter which, apart from the excusable conventional school-girl gush of its closing words, is not only remarkable for its style, but for its display of a critical faculty really astounding in a girl of fifteen.

Later, in the same month, she wrote to her mother: “I am glad my sweet mamma agrees with me with regard to Dryden, as I never liked him as well as Pope. Miss Rowden had never read any translation of Virgil but his, and consequently could not judge of their respective merits. If we can get Wharton’s Æneid, we shall finish it with that. After I have read the Odyssey, I believe I shall read Ovid’s Metamorphoses. I shall be very glad of this, as I think they are extremely beautiful.... I am much flattered, my darlings, by the praises you bestowed on my last letter, though I have not the vanity to think I deserved them. It has ever been my ambition to write like my darlings, though I fear I shall never attain their style.”

A week later, she followed this with another in similar strain: “M. St. Quintin was perfectly delighted with my French on Saturday. Signor Parachiretti is sure that I shall know Italian as well as I do French by Christmas. I know you will not think it is through vanity that I say this, who should not say it; but I well know you like to hear that your darling is doing well, and I consult more your gratification than false modesty in relating it to you. I went to the library the other day with Miss Rowden, and brought back the first volume of Goldsmith’s Animated Nature. It is quite a lady’s natural history, and extremely entertaining. The style is easy and simple, and totally free from technical terms, which are generally the greatest objection to books of that kind. I am likewise reading the Odyssey, which I even prefer to the Iliad. I think it beautiful beyond comparison.”

These few extracts from the letters not only serve to show the singular thirst for knowledge which the child possessed, but also indicate the perfect understanding which existed between the mother and child, resembling, as the Rev. A. G. L’Estrange justly remarks, “those of one sister to another.”

In return Mrs. Mitford retailed all the gossip and news of Reading, giving the eager child the fullest accounts of the dinners and suppers and card-parties which formed a regular interchange of courtesies between neighbours in that town a century ago. These accounts, only intended by the fond mother, as we may properly suppose, to bridge the distance between school and home, were carefully stored away in the wonderful memory of their recipient, there to rest until, many years after, they were revivified and placed on record for all time—as we hope—in the pages of Belford Regis, the work which, quite apart from Our Village, has endeared its writer to all ardent Reading lovers in that it affords them a true and living picture of the ancient borough as it was in the opening years of the nineteenth century.

In regard to this correspondence between the mother and daughter, it has been elsewhere remarked that “no word of advice, moral or religious, is ever mingled,” and the question: “Was this wisdom?” is answered by the querist himself that, ruling out the possibility of carelessness or indifference as the motives which actuated Mrs. Mitford and “knowing what a devoted daughter Mary Mitford became, we may be well induced to believe that her mother’s silence on these more serious arguments originated in deep reflection; and that she had judiciously determined simply to attach and amuse her child by her correspondence, and trusted to the impressive persuasion of her example for the inculcation of higher things.”[7]

With every desire to pay the sincerest tribute to the learned editor in his difficult task, we are inclined to disagree with him as to the wisdom of Mrs. Mitford’s plan. If by “example” we are to understand that the Christian virtues of forbearance with a selfish and overmastering father and fortitude in adversity are intended, then we agree that Mary Russell Mitford well learned her lesson, but—and herein is the basis of our disagreement—had mother and daughter been less content, for the sake of peace, to pander to the every whim and caprice of Dr. Mitford, much, if not all, of the miserable poverty of later years would have been avoided, and the tragedy of Miss Mitford’s life, with its last days of spiritual doubts and fears, been averted. The result on her father’s career may be speculative, but we are inclined to hope that had the two women more boldly asserted their claims to consideration, the good that was in Dr. Mitford and which is to be found in all men, would have been roused, and the cruel selfishness of his life been checked if not altogether effaced.

These letters from home undoubtedly gave the fullest details of the daily occurrences, and must occasionally have tickled the schoolgirl immensely, if we may judge by one of the replies which they evoked.

“I really think,” she wrote, “that my dearly-beloved mother had better have the jack-asses than the horses. The former will at least have the recommendation of singularity, which the other has not; as I am convinced that more than half the smart carriages in the neighbourhood of Reading are drawn by the horses which work in the team,” a reply, the whimsicality of which is only equalled by its pertness, when we remember that the smart carriages alluded to must have been the conveyances of the county gentry whose estates in the neighbourhood and whose lineage were not altogether insignificant. At the same time it is a reply—and for this reason is quoted—which marks the outcropping of that characteristic which Miss Mitford possessed and to which she often gave expression—an abiding distaste for anything approaching snobbery or self-assertion.

We have now come to the year 1802, a red-letter year in the child’s life, inasmuch as its close was to witness the termination of her school career and that it brought to her the news that her father had purchased a house in the country, with land attached, where he intended to set up a small farm as a hobby and, generally, to live the life of a country gentleman. It is certain that the child would receive with pleasure the news of this projected change of residence, for despite the attractions which her school-life in London had for her, the interest she always displayed in matters pertaining to the country, with its free and open life, its close associations with flowers and animals, and its comparative freedom from restraint, could leave no doubt in the minds of those who knew her as to the choice she would make between life in town or country, were such a choice offered her.

Nevertheless, she was undoubtedly happy at Hans Place, enjoying to the full the companionship and affection bestowed upon her by Miss Rowden, and the deference of M. St. Quintin, who regarded her not only as a prodigy but as a distinct credit to his establishment. Nor was this all, for her keen sense of humour and quick perception of the ludicrous side of life, found plenty of scope for their display in a school where the tutors were of mixed nationality and the scholars were drawn from various classes of society.

There is evidence of this in a letter which she wrote, some ten years later, to one of her favourite correspondents, Sir William Elford, wherein she describes a contretemps into which the French governess precipitated herself, mainly through over-zeal in her attempts to correct the untidy habits of her charges and, incidentally, in the hope of discomposing and so scoring off the dancing-master, whom she did not like.

3 Mile † May 10^th 1839
G Mitford
Doctor Mitford.
(From a painting by John Lucas, 1839.)

It was the custom to signalize the break-up of a term by the performance of a Drama such as Hannah More’s “Search after Happiness,” in which Mary Mitford once took the part of Cleora; or by a ballet, on which occasions “the sides of the school-room were fitted up with bowers, in which the little girls who had to dance were seated, and whence they issued at a signal from M. Duval, the dancing-master, attired as sylphs or shepherdesses, to skip or glide through the mazy movements which he had arranged for them, to the music of his kit.” Doubtless the exhibitions proper were carried out with the utmost decorum by all concerned, seeing that a critical public, consisting of fond parents, would be assembled, ready to note, and later to comment upon, any lapse in deportment or manners. It was, however, in the rehearsals that opportunities for fun occurred, and one such occasion forms the basis of the description which we now quote.

“Madame,” was a fine majestic-looking old woman of sixty, but with all the activity of sixteen and the fidgety neatness of a Dutchwoman. She had, for days, been murmuring against the untidy habits of the young ladies, and had threatened to make a terrible example of those who left their belongings lying about.

“A few exercise books found out of place were thrown into the fire, and a few skipping-ropes (one of which had nearly broken Madame’s neck by her falling over it in the dark) thrown out of the window. This was but the gathering of the wind before the storm.” The storm itself broke on the dancing-day and when all the pupils, dressed for the occasion, were assembled in the room. Then, to the consternation of all, Madame appeared and bidding the young ladies follow her, commenced a rummage all over the house.

“Oh! the hats, the tippets, the shoes, the gloves, the books, the music, the playthings, the workthings, that this unlucky search discovered thrown into holes, and corners, and everywhere but where they ought to have been! Well, my dear Sir, all this immense quantity of litter was to be fastened to the person and the dress of the unfortunate little urchin to whom it belonged.”

The task of apportioning the articles to the delinquents was a severe one for the governess, to whose inquiries the only reply obtainable was “Ce n’est pas à moi,” with the result that she had left on her hands a large quantity of hats, gloves and slippers the ownership of which no one would acknowledge. But there were many other articles which refused to be thus abandoned, and the result was a decorative effect more novel than elegant. Dictionaries were suspended from necks en médaillon, shawls were tied round the waist en ceinture, and loose pieces of music were pinned to the dancing frocks en queue. “I escaped,” says the merry recorder of the incident, “with a good lecture and a pocket-handkerchief fastened to my frock, which, as it was quite clean, was scarcely perceptible.”

Unfortunately for Madame, the dancing-master was not due for an hour, the interval having to be devoted to the drill-sergeant, whose astonishment, when he arrived and viewed the odd habiliments of the pupils, may well be imagined. And to make matters more disconcerting for Madame and more amusing for the culprits, she could not speak a word of English, while the sergeant knew no word of French; so, as drill could not be performed by a squad so hampered by extraneous accoutrements, the sergeant ordered their removal, and Madame, we may well imagine, retired discomfited.