“At that date it was considered necessary that every girl should work; and before I was ten years of age I had made a shirt for my father, all the parts being cut out and arranged by my mother, sewing machines not being then invented. So, too, as it was long before the days of Peak and Frean, or Huntley and Palmer, for our childish parties, I used to help my mother make all the biscuits, as well as the cakes and tarts. I remember one large grown-up party which my parents gave, on which occasion the door was smoothed in some way, and a very handsome border painted round it by my father (an elaborate design about two feet wide). This was my first appearance among grown-up people, and I quite well remember the delight I felt at the idea of being asked to dance by a very tall man, an engraver, whose name I forget, whom I met in after years and found to be very insignificant. The belles of that evening were the Miss Cumberlands, daughters of the publisher, for whom at that time my father was painting a series of theatrical portraits.”
Among the celebrated actors forming this series were Charles Matthews, Reeve, Harley, Mrs. Nesbit, Buckstone, Ellen Tree, Vandenhof, Macready, and Dowton. At an early age “Fanny” had been taken to the theatre, of which we learn that “at that date the Sadler’s Wells Theatre was held in high repute. The stage was very large, and being situated near the New River was able to utilize a great deal of water.” We may imagine the excitement of the children over the arrival of these wonderful personages; how they peered silently over the banisters, and how, when the sittings were over, they stole into the studio to examine the costumes which were left for the artist’s use, with what glee to discover, for instance, that Vandenhof’s cap, in some great character, was “made of a large blue sugar-bag covered with some coloured material.”
Amateur theatricals were a favourite amusement at the young parties—at first, when the kind father was the chief performer, in “a series of dancing card figures, exhibited on a sheet as shadows, he writing and reading the text;” afterwards, the performances were of more ambitious character, at Mr. Wyand’s school, when the boys were allowed to invite their sisters and friends, and “where the plays were written by the boys, and the women’s parts taken by boys, to our great delight, as they invariably tumbled over their skirts.”
In one play, the king’s part is taken by John Blockley, son of the author of the then favourite song “Love Not,” in a play in which the chief characters are “King Edward” and the “Sultan of Turkey,” Edward being a “tall, thin, shy lad, who in the meekest possible way announced that while he lived no Turkish prince should wield Edward’s sceptre” (a folded sheet of exercise paper). “My brother Alfred contributed a large cloak, lined with red, which continued to be a famous piece of stage property. The swords, shields, etc., were made by my father.”
The pupils who knew the school when Miss Buss was in full vigour will read with interest these early developments of the dramatic power which played such part in the tableaux vivants, plays, charades, or costume dances of that period. These entertainments, involving parties counted by hundreds where ordinary folk have units, were a great feature of school-life. They must have formed a delightful break in that excessive study so condemned by the world outside, which assuredly in no wise prevented the most hilarious enjoyment of these revels, shared by all, from the dignified head down to the most frolicsome of the “little ones.”
And for all readers it is pleasant to have these glimpses of the happy home-life in which this loving nature had such free room for growth. So much is implied as we see the busy father making time for play with his children, as well as for “writing letters on grammar,” which the studious little daughter “used to find on the stairs;” or again, as we note the good mother, not less busy, kindly shutting her eyes to those surreptitious studies under the sofa, instead of calling on her only girl to take her part in amusing the younger children, of whom, in course of time, one sister and eight brothers made their appearance in the active household. Of these, however, only four brothers attained manhood.
In later years the elder sister needed no bidding to stand by the mother to whom she was devoted, and whose comfort and stay she became in the long struggle with the many claims on a narrow income. In those days life was a struggle to even the most distinguished artists, and fame was by no means synonymous with fortune.
In the natural course of things more than one opportunity came to the girl to change this home struggle for a life of her own under easier auspices. And once she had felt the force of the temptation; but duty had early become the watchword of her life; and as she looked at the mother burdened with her weight of cares, the good daughter, at a cost none but herself could measure, turned from the dreams of her girlhood, from the hopes of womanhood, and kept her place by her mother’s side.
Years afterwards in a few words she tells us all the story—
“I have had real heart-ache, such as at intervals in earlier life I had to bear: when I put aside marriage; when Mr. Laing died; and again when my dearest mother, the brave, loving, strong, tender woman, left all her children. I quite believe in heart-ache! God’s ways are not our ways!”