“It were verily good world, Master Justice, wherein every man should do his duty,” was the answer of Mistress Grena, delivered in that slightly prim and didactic fashion which was characteristic of her.
“What is duty?” concisely asked Mistress Collenwood, who was by some ten years the elder of her brothers, and therefore the eldest of the company.
Gertrude’s eyes were dancing with amusement; Pandora only looked interested.
“Duty,” said Mr Roberts, the host, “is that which is due.”
“To whom?” inquired his sister.
“To them unto whom he oweth it,” was the reply; “first, to God; after Him, to all men.”
“Which of us doth that?” said Mistress Collenwood softly, looking round the table.
Mistress Grena shook her head in a way which said, “Very few—not I.”
Had Gertrude lived three hundred years later, she would have said what now she only thought—“I am sure I do my duty.” But in 1557 young ladies were required to “hear, see, and say nought,” and for one of them to join unasked in the conversation of her elders would have been held to be shockingly indecorous. The rule for girls’ behaviour was too strict in that day; but if a little of it could be infused into the very lax code of the present time, when little misses offer their opinions on subjects of which they know nothing, and unblushingly differ from, or even contradict their mothers, too often without rebuke, it would be a decided improvement on social manners.
“Which of the folks in these parts be not doing their duty?” asked Mr Roberts of his brother.