As a matter of fact, certain rumours against Lady Dedlock’s reputation, and hints as to her “past,” have come to the ears of the honest tradesman, and he prefers to remove his son’s betrothed wife from the contact of a possible pernicious influence. The very same thing is done scores of times over in many similar cases to-day.
No one knows the real character and disposition of the mistress of a home better than the servants she employs, and if she is honoured and loved by her domestics, she stands on surer ground than the praise or flattery of her fashionable friends. It is all a question of “home” again. A real home is a home to all connected with it. The very kitchen-maid employed in it, the boy who runs errands for the house; indeed every servant, from the lowest to the highest, should feel that their surroundings are truly “homelike,”—that things are well-ordered, peaceful and happy; that the presiding spirit of the place, the mistress, is contented with her life, and cheerfully interested in the welfare of all around her,—then “all things work together for good,” and the house becomes a bulwark against adversity, a harbour in storm, a “nest” indeed, where warmth, repose, and mutual trust and help make the days sweet and the nights calm. But where the mistress is scarcely ever at home,—when she prefers public restaurants to her own dining-room,—when with each change of the seasons she is gadding about somewhere, and avoiding home as much as possible, how is it to be expected that even servants will care to stay with her, or ever learn to admire and respect her? Peace and happiness are hers to possess in the natural and God-given ways of home life, if she chooses,—but if she turns aside from her real sovereignty, throws down her sceptre and plays with the sticks and straws of the “half-world,” she has only herself to blame if the end should prove but dire confusion and the bitterness of strife.
Apart altogether from the individual dignity and self-poise which are invariably lacking to the “vagrant,” or home despising human being, the decay of home life in England is a serious menace to the Empire’s future strength. If our coming race of men have been accustomed to see their mothers indulging in a kind of high-class public house feasting, combined with public house morals, and have learned from them an absolute indifference to home and home ties, they in their turn will do likewise and live as “vagrants,”—here, there and everywhere, rather than as well-established, self-respecting citizens and patriots, proud of their country, and proud of the right to defend their homes. Even as it is, there are not wanting signs of a general “wandering,” tendency, combined with morbid apathy and sickly inertia. “One place is as good as another,” says one section of society, and “anything is better than the English climate,” says another, preparing to pack off to Egypt or the Riviera at the first snap of winter. These opinions are an exact reversion of those expressed by our sturdy, patriotic forefathers, who made the glory of Great Britain. “There is no place like England” was their sworn conviction, and “no place like home” was the essence of their national sentiment. The English climate, too, was quite good enough for them, and they made the best of it. When will the “Smart Set” grasp the fact that the much-abused weather, whatever it may be, is pretty much the same all over Europe? The Riviera is no warmer than the Cornish coast, but certes it is better provided with hotels, and—chiefest attraction of all—it has a Gambling Hell. The delights of Monte Carlo and “Home,” are as far apart as the poles; and those who seek the one cannot be expected to appreciate the other. But such English women as are met at the foreign gambling-tables, season after season, may be looked upon as the deliberate destroyers of all that is best and strongest in our national life, in the sanctity of Home, and the beauty of home affections. The English Home used to be a model to the world;—with a few more scandalous divorce cases in high life, it will become a by-word for the mockery of nations. The following from the current Press is sufficiently instructive:
“The crowd of well-dressed women who daily throng the court during the hearing of the ... case and follow with such intense eagerness every incident in the dissection of a woman’s honour afford a remarkable object-lesson in contemporary social progress.
“Ladies, richly garbed, who drive up in smart broughams, emblazoned carriages, and motor-cars, and are representative of the best known families in the land, fight and scramble for a seat, criticize the proceedings in a low monotone, and, without the smallest indication of a blush, balance every point made by counsel, and follow with keen apprehension the most suggestive evidence.
“Others, no less intensely interested in the sordid details of divorce, come on foot—women of the great well-to-do middle-class, who have all their lives had the advantage of refined and educated surroundings. Some are old, with silvery hair; others are middle-aged women, who bring comely daughters still in their teens; others are in the first flush of womanhood; but they all crowd into the narrow court and struggle to get a glimpse of the chief actors in the drama, and listen to the testimony which would convict them of dishonour.”
No one in their sober senses will call any of these women fit to rule their homes, or to be examples to their children. Unblushingly indecent, and unspeakably vulgar, their brazen effrontery and shameless interest in the revolting details of a revolting case, have shown them to be beyond the pale of all true womanhood, and utterly unfit to be the mothers of our future men, or guardians of the honour of home and family. There is no “railing” against society in this assertion; the plain facts speak for themselves.
The charm of home depends, of course, entirely on the upbringing and character of the inmates. Stupid and illiterate people make a dull fireside. Morbid faddists, always talking and thinking about themselves, put the fire out altogether. If I were asked my opinion as to the chief talent or gift for making a home happy, I should without a moment’s hesitation, reply, “Cheerfulness.” A cheerful spirit, always looking on the bright side, and determined to make the best of everything, is the choicest blessing and the brightest charm of home. People with a turn for grumbling should certainly live in hotels and dine at restaurants. They will never understand how to make, or to keep, a home as it should be. But, given a cheerful, equable, and active temperament, there is nothing sweeter, happier or safer for the human being than Home, and the life which centres within it, and the duties concerning it which demand our attention and care. There is no need for women to wander far afield for an outlet to their energies. Their work waits for them at their own doors, in the town or village where they reside. No end of useful, kind and neighbourly things are to hand for their doing,—every day can be filled, like a basket of flowers, full of good deeds and gentle words by every woman, poor or rich, who has either cottage or mansion which she can truly call “Home.” Home is a simple background, against which the star of womanhood shines brightest and best. The modern “gad-about” who suggests a composition of female chimpanzee and fashionable “Johnny” combined, is a kind of sexless creature for whom “Home” would only be a cage in the general menagerie. She (or It) would merely occupy the time in scrambling about from perch to perch, screaming on the slightest provocation, and snapping at such other similar neuter creatures who chanced to possess longer or more bushy tails. And it is a pity such an example should be thought worthy of imitation by any woman claiming to possess the advantage of human reason. But the Chimpanzee type of female is just now singularly en evidence, having a habit of pushing to the front on all occasions, and performing such strange antics as call for public protest, and keep the grinding machinery of the law only too busy. The Press, too, pays an enormous amount of unnecessary attention to the performances of these more or less immodest animals, so that it sometimes seems to our Continental neighbours as if we, as a nation, had no real women left, but only chimpanzees. There are, however, slight stirrings of a movement among the true “ladies” of England, those who stand more or less aloof from the “smart set,”—a movement indicative of “drawing the line somewhere.” It is possible that there may yet be a revival of “Home” and its various lost graces and dignities. We may even hear of doors that will not open to millionaires simply because they are millionaires. Only the other day a very great lady said to her sister in my hearing: “No, I shall not ‘present’ my two girls at all. Society is perfectly demoralised, and I would rather the children remained out of it, so far as London is concerned. They are much happier in the country than in town, and much healthier, and I want to keep them so. Besides, they love their home!”
Herein is the saving grace of life,—to love one’s home. Love of home implies lovable people dwelling in the charmed circle,—tender hearts, quick to respond to every word of love, every whisper of confidence, every caress. The homeless man is the restless and unhappy man, for ever seeking what he cannot find. The homeless woman is still more to be pitied, being entirely and hopelessly out of her natural element. And the marked tendency which exists nowadays to avoid home life is wholly mischievous. Women complain that home is “dull,” “quiet,” “monotonous,” “lonely,” and blame it for all sorts of evils which exist only in themselves. If a woman cannot be a few hours alone without finding her house “dull,” her mind must be on the verge of lunacy. The sense of being unable to endure one’s own company augurs ill for the moral equilibrium. To preserve good health and sound nerves, women should always make it a rule to be quite alone at least for a couple of hours in the course of each day. Let them take that space to think, to read, to rest, and mentally review their own thoughts, words and actions in the light of a quiet conscience-time of pause and meditation. Home is the best place so to rest and meditate,—and the hours that are spent in thinking how to make that home happier will never be wasted. It should be very seriously borne in mind that it is only in the home life that marriage can be proved successful or the reverse, and, to quote Mr. Lecky once more:
“A moral basis of sterling qualities is of capital importance. A true, honest and trustworthy nature, capable of self-sacrifice and self-restraint, should rank in the first line, and after that, a kindly, equable and contented temper, a power of sympathy, a habit of looking at the better and brighter side of men and things. Of intellectual qualities, judgment, tact and order, are perhaps the most valuable.... Grace and the charm of manner will retain their full attraction to the last. They brighten in innumerable ways the little things of life, and life is mainly made up of little things, exposed to petty frictions, and requiring small decisions and small sacrifices. Wide interests and large appreciations are in the marriage relation more important than any great constructive or creative talent, and the power to soothe, to sympathize, to counsel and to endure than the highest qualities of the hero or the saint. It is by this alone that the married life attains its full perfection.”
And when we hear, as we so often do, of the complete failure and deplorable disaster attending many marriages, let us look for the root of the evil at its foundation,—namely the decay of home life, the neglect and avoidance of home and home duties,—the indifference to, or scorn of home influence. For whenever any woman, rich or poor, high in rank or of humble estate, throws these aside, and turns her back on Home, her own natural, beautiful and thrice-blessed sphere of action, she performs what would be called the crazed act of a queen, who, called to highest sovereignty, casts away her crown, breaks her sceptre, tramples on her royal robes, and steps from her throne, down;—down into the dust of a saddened world’s contempt.