“I find I have made a mistake in the date; February 25 is in Lent. In any case, the dance cannot be managed before Easter.
“Have you seen Punch? There is a small young lady who, when accused by her mother of being ‘stupid,’ says, ‘No, I am only inattentive!’ Let me hope my mistake was like the child’s!”
Mrs. Hill, who knew the Cambridge life well, says of it—
“She seemed most in her element, so to say, when she was at Cambridge. I went with her ten or twelve times, and she was always most anxious that her young people should have the best time possible. If necessary, she would herself chaperon us to breakfast, lunch, tea, coffee, in the Undergraduate’s rooms, and (what added to the pleasure) she enjoyed going. Twice she gave a dance, when she made a delightful hostess.”
It is also in reference to this phase of her life that Mrs. Bryant gives this pretty picture of Miss Buss—
“Her sympathy with young people was by no means limited to the serious side of things, or to her own remembered experiences. Her imagination, with the tender, happiness-loving heart behind, held her in touch with all the innocent gaieties, and even vanities of youth. Many will remember her pleasant parties at Cambridge, including some dances, and the delightful way in which she acted the part of motherly chaperon, never tired, never in a hurry to get to the end, never distressed by those modifications in the order and punctuality of meals which youth regards as a normal part of merry-making. Respecting the vanities, I remember telling her on one occasion that my niece was going to her first ‘grown-up’ dance. ‘There are such pretty shoes nowadays for girls,’ she said, ‘I hope you have got her something very pretty. A girl’s first dance comes only once.’”
Miss Newman tells a similar tale of a time when, as they were together at Matlock, Miss Buss asked her to help choose some amber for a birthday present, asking her opinion and advice. Miss Newman had no idea that Miss Buss knew that the next day was her birthday; but when the birthday came she found the amber on her table, with a card of good wishes.
Mrs. Bryant says also that—
“when boys were in question, her sympathy was even more delightful. In her family experience, boys had predominated, though she had always been a girl-like girl, not given to participation in boys’ games. Her tolerance for boys, their muddy boots and disturbing household ways, was quite unlimited, though doubtless, and probably for that very reason, no boy of her circle would have thought of disobeying her. I have spent more than one happy holiday with her and her nephews in the country, and know how to appreciate her rare sympathy with our more athletic ideas of pleasure, and the ease with which her plans would fall in with ours. Once I was with her in Killarney, and wanted to climb Carn-Tual. ‘I want to go for a climb to-morrow,’ she said. ‘It will suit me excellently to drive to the foot of your mountain, and there will be plenty to amuse me while you go up.’”
Her intensity of vital power kept her in touch with all young life. The strong love of little children, which was one of her most marked characteristics, was only the lovely blossoming of this vigorous growth; nothing refreshed her more, when she was tired of work, or worn with worries, than to have a “baby-show” of her nephews and nieces in their day, and then of their children and the children of old pupils. She liked just a few at a time, so that she might thoroughly enjoy them, when she would herself get out toys from her stores, watching the play while she and the mothers told stories of child wit and wisdom. One of her very latest pleasures in life was the visit of a little new namesake—a tiny “Frances Mary,” who will rejoice in the name though she can have no memory of the kind face that brightened at the sight of her baby ways—and one of her last quite coherent remarks was an inquiry for “little curly-head,” as she called her nephew’s little son.