A Rousseauist might have overlooked the philosophy in this little book,—the annals of a parsonage family, in which all the characters are individuals and friends of the writer; for there is not an ounce of theory in it. Jemima herself is neither a pedant nor an infant prodigy. She is never expected to reason about her own development. Her philosophy is of the older sort that comes of gentle discipline, and she is “placid” not through pleasing no one but herself, but in spite of other people’s unjust or exacting ways. It is doubtful whether she would have been very different under the Eye of Mrs. Mason, but assuredly she would have been less happy. No theoretic Child of Nature ever was so happy as Jemima with her brothers.
The scene of parting, when the little girl (six years old) goes to London, is an introduction to these three:
“I wish you were not going” says Charles, “for I put this box and drove in these nails on purpose for you to hang up your doll’s clothes, and now they will be no further use to us.” William bids her not cry, and promises to write about the young rabbits. “And, Jemima,” adds Charles more tactfully, “I wish I was going with you to London, for I should like to see it, ’tis such a large place, a great deal bigger than any village which we have seen; and they say the houses stand close together for a great way and there are no fields or trees....”
It is the same village, seen from a different standpoint, narrowed on the one hand to the record of a particular house, on the other, varied by journeys and visits to town.
Old customs survive with the flowered covers of the book, and the next few lines bring Jemima Placid into touch with her predecessors. For in London there is a great number of shops, and to be sure, among other things, Jemima must bring back “Some little books which we can understand, and which ... may be bought at Mr. Marshall’s somewhere in some churchyard, but Jemima must inquire about it.”
The little things that make up a child’s life happen with natural inconsequence. What gives the book a hold is the author’s unaffected truth and tenderness, the modest philosophy which hides under simple speeches or incidents.
Who but Jemima Placid, the unhappy guest of two spoilt London cousins, could comfort herself under unjust reproof with “the rough drawing of a little horse, which Charles had given her on the day of her departure and which she had since carefully preserved.”
It is no wonder that her brothers are loth to welcome the Londoners on their return visit; but “S. S.” can make her own “Book of Courtesy”, and she refreshes it with the comments of real boys. William answers his father’s rebuke with disconcerting logic: “You always tell me that the naughtiest thing I can do is to tell lies, and I am sure I am very sorry they are come, for I like Jemima to ourselves: so pray, Sir, what would you choose I should do?”
There is not a trace of the “Juvenile Correspondent” in Charles’s letters to Jemima; but the sentiment of humanitarians is mere vapouring compared with this boy’s account of how they found the dog shot by a game-keeper and buried him under the Laylock tree.
“‘Poor Hector! I shall hate Ben Hunt as Long as I live for it!’