Signors and Signoras, who might have fitted their pupils to become chorus-singers at the opera, were multiplied around the young ladies at Mrs. Penfold's "College of Frivolity," followed in ceaseless succession by Messieurs and Mesdames, who taught the young ladies to maltreat pianofortes, by playing on them at the rate of 100 miles an hour, or to speak foreign languages better than the natives, and to write them better than they could write their own;—
While hands, lips, and eyes were put to school,
And each instructed feature had its rule.
On Sunday evenings, for the sake of effect, the girls were regularly assembled to prayers, which were conducted like those of Frederick the Great's soldiers, being performed simultaneously at the word of command as a part of their exercise, without a semblance of reverence, and within a very limited number of minutes, while they were hastily slurred over by Mrs. Penfold herself, with scarcely an external aspect of solemnity or interest. Sunday had long been considered by all the pupils at Mrs. Penfold's as a privileged day for writing letters, wearing best bonnets, peeping from behind a red silk curtain at the congregation, criticising the clergyman's manner, dress, and appearance, discussing, in suppressed whispers, who it would be possible or impossible for them to think of marrying, and enjoying rather a longer walk than common in strolling to church and returning again.
Any knowledge of the Bible inculcated at Mrs. Penfold's was like all the other acquirements taught in that establishment, more for show than use. Each young pupil could repeat by heart, without hesitation or mistake, the whole history of Jacob, Abraham, and any of the patriarchs, prophets, or apostles, and enumerate all the kings who ever reigned over Israel, but they remained utterly uninstructed respecting the influence which the Divine revelation should obtain over their own life and character, nor were they ever taught to inquire what was their own nature, why they were placed upon the earth, and whither they were likely to go after this perishable world had passed from their sight. Summer flowers alone were implanted in their minds, but no thoughts, hopes, or affections, such as may last for winter wear. To them their birth seemed merely to have been the commencement of an existence, given entirely for their own individual pleasure or advantage, which was finally to terminate at their death.
Before Marion had been long at school, however, she formed an intimacy which produced a permanent and most happy effect on all her subsequent life and feelings. Clara Granville, several years older than herself, had been nurtured, like her brother, in holiness, and in every domestic excellence, while she lived only for the dictates of a chastened and sanctified heart. Delicate in health, and fragile in extreme to appearance, there was something almost seraphic in the delicate purity of her lovely countenance, and in the tranquil composure of her graceful manner. During a long and tedious illness, with which Clara was seized, a short time before leaving school, she testified a tender and almost exclusive affection for Marion, who spent all her leisure hours—or rather moments, for hours were scarce at Mrs. Penfold's—in the most assiduous attention to the beloved invalid, and in imbibing those elements of good, those feelings and principles of religion which were to be guides of all her future life, and thus she became, before long, an enlightened, well informed, and deeply pious Christian, not shrinking from the society of one who excelled herself, but humbly and gratefully seeking, on all occasions, her advice and instruction, while both had their hearts filled with a fervent desire, steadily and consistently to pursue their own best interests, and an anxious wish also to succor and benefit others, in all the troubles and sorrows of life, though Marion was apt to feel like the poet,—
Ready to aid all beings, I would go
The world around to succor human woe,
Yet am so largely happy, that it seems,
There are no woes, and sorrows are but dreams.