Frances Mary Buss and her work for education

by Annie E. Ridley

Just ten years after that picture of splendid vigour which had so taken captive “the timid child of seven,” we have a companion portrait in a not less lasting impression made on a shy girl of seventeen, who after the long lapse of years, thus recalls that first interview—

“You ask me what it is which stands out most clearly in my early recollections of our dear friend. It is nearly thirty-three years since I saw her first, but I always remember her as I saw her then. She was seated at her table (a round table) in what in those days was always called ‘the parlour.’ It corresponded to the ‘office’ of the present day, but with this difference, that Miss Buss was always to be found there whenever she was not occupied with her girls, in teaching or in superintending their work. She was her own secretary, and we all became thoroughly accustomed to seeing her writing there, but ready to lay aside her pen and give her undivided attention to any one who needed it. Indeed, to the best of my recollection, the door always stood partly open. I felt there was something different about her from what I was accustomed to observe in other women. There was such a mingling of motherliness and sweetness with intense earnestness and thoroughness about her work. She was at that time in deep mourning. Her mother had died shortly before, and also the Reverend David Laing, under whose wing she had begun, and for several years carried on, her school. The double grief had been felt very keenly, and she had been so ill that her hair was already mingled with grey. I remember the way she dressed it—the front hair being brought down over the ears, and the back rolled under and covered with a black net. Her black dress was plainly made, but fitted well. It was long, and made her look taller than she was.

“I felt attracted to her at once, and, as I got to know her, I found that my first impressions were more than justified by experience.”

The change is very striking from the vivacious and vigorous young head of the new school of 1850 and this grave, kind woman of 1860, a change greater than the mere lapse of time can justify. But the loss of her mother, followed so closely by that of her friend Mr. Laing, who had been the mainstay of all her school career, must have been to her as the uprooting of her very life. To the end she spoke of her mother with the same deep tenderness. She had been friend as well as mother, a double tie that meant so much as the daughter grew to be the helper. Family claims took firm grasp of this loyal nature, and the mother’s death meant also taking her place to the father, left for the time helpless without the all-pervading care that had stood between him and all the minor miseries that loom so large to the artist temperament.

How this trust was fulfilled shows in the daughter’s words when, fifteen years afterwards, this work of love was ended.

“Jan. 3, 1875.

“On Saturday I go away with my father to Worthing. He has been growing more and more feeble, and is a constant source of anxiety. I feel that he needs me, and yet I cannot give up more time to him than can be got on Sunday. But, you see, this means Sunday as well as week-days. If you could peep in on me it would be a pleasure to see your dear face. I think often of you in my hurricane-speed life.”

“Feb. 11.

“My father is still very ill. It looks as if he were fading away. He is so patient, gentle, and loving to us all, and especially to me, that I can scarcely keep up.”

“Feb. 20.