Part 4 (1/2)

”Don't you know what tree we read of in Genesis?--No! I hope you have not got to read so easily as that.” A pause. ”Who has taught you to read and write?”

”Please, my lady, I meant no harm, my lady.” He was fairly blubbering, overcome by her evident feeling of dismay and regret, the soft repression of which was more frightening to him than any strong or violent words would have been.

”Who taught you, I ask?”

”It were Mr. Horner's clerk who learned me, my lady.”

”And did Mr. Horner know of it?”

”Yes, my lady. And I am sure I thought for to please him.”

”Well! perhaps you were not to blame for that. But I wonder at Mr.

Horner. However, my boy, as you have got possession of edge-tools, you must have some rules how to use them. Did you never hear that you were not to open letters?”

”Please, my lady, it were open. Mr. Horner forgot for to seal it, in his hurry to be off.”

”But you must not read letters that are not intended for you. You must never try to read any letters that are not directed to you, even if they be open before you.”

”Please, may lady, I thought it were good for practice, all as one as a book.”

My lady looked bewildered as to what way she could farther explain to him the laws of honour as regarded letters.

”You would not listen, I am sure,” said she, ”to anything you were not intended to hear?”

He hesitated for a moment, partly because he did not fully comprehend the question. My lady repeated it. The light of intelligence came into his eager eyes, and I could see that he was not certain if he could tell the truth.

”Please, my lady, I always hearken when I hear folk talking secrets; but I mean no harm.”

My poor lady sighed: she was not prepared to begin a long way off in morals. Honour was, to her, second nature, and she had never tried to find out on what principle its laws were based. So, telling the lad that she wished to see Mr. Horner when he returned from Warwick, she dismissed him with a despondent look; he, meanwhile, right glad to be out of the awful gentleness of her presence.

”What is to be done?” said she, half to herself and half to me. I could not answer, for I was puzzled myself.

”It was a right word,” she continued, ”that I used, when I called reading and writing 'edge-tools.' If our lower orders have these edge-tools given to them, we shall have the terrible scenes of the French Revolution acted over again in England. When I was a girl, one never heard of the rights of men, one only heard of the duties. Now, here was Mr. Gray, only last night, talking of the right every child had to instruction. I could hardly keep my patience with him, and at length we fairly came to words; and I told him I would have no such thing as a Sunday-school (or a Sabbath-school, as he calls it, just like a Jew) in my village.”

”And what did he say, my lady?” I asked; for the struggle that seemed now to have come to a crisis, had been going on for some time in a quiet way.

”Why, he gave way to temper, and said he was bound to remember, he was under the bishop's authority, not under mine; and implied that he should persevere in his designs, notwithstanding my expressed opinion.”

”And your ladys.h.i.+p--” I half inquired.

”I could only rise and curtsey, and civilly dismiss him. When two persons have arrived at a certain point of expression on a subject, about which they differ as materially as I do from Mr. Gray, the wisest course, if they wish to remain friends, is to drop the conversation entirely and suddenly. It is one of the few cases where abruptness is desirable.”

I was sorry for Mr. Gray. He had been to see me several times, and had helped me to bear my illness in a better spirit than I should have done without his good advice and prayers. And I had gathered from little things he said, how much his heart was set upon this new scheme. I liked him so much, and I loved and respected my lady so well, that I could not bear them to be on the cool terms to which they were constantly getting.

Yet I could do nothing but keep silence.

I suppose my lady understood something of what was pa.s.sing in my mind; for, after a minute or two, she went on:--

”If Mr. Gray knew all I know,--if he had my experience, he would not be so ready to speak of setting up his new plans in opposition to my judgment. Indeed,” she continued, las.h.i.+ng herself up with her own recollections, ”times are changed when the parson of a village comes to beard the liege lady in her own house. Why, in my grandfather's days, the parson was family chaplain too, and dined at the Hall every Sunday.