Her
boxes were full of good dresses, of a solid, unassuming kind, such as
would wear well - a perfect wardrobe. Her purse was always well supplied
with money; she had money saved up, and she sent money to her parents:
yet her wages, until late years, had been small. In doing her duty to
others she did good to herself. A duchess would have been glad to have
her in her household. She had been in farmhouse service from girlhood,
and had doubtless learned much from good housewives; farmers' wives are
the best of all teachers: and the girls, for their own sakes, had much
better be under them than wasting so much time learning useless knowledge
at compulsory schools.
Freckles said, when he came in,
He never would enter a tawny skin,
was another of her rhymes. Freckles come in with summer, but never appear
on a dark skin, so that the freckled should rejoice in these signs of
fairness.
Your father, the elderberry,
Was not such a gooseberry
As to send in his bilberry
Before it was dewberry.
Some children are liable to an unpleasant complaint at night; for this
there is a certain remedy. A mouse is baked in the oven to a 'scrump,'
then pounded to powder, and this powder administered. Many ladies still
have faith in this curious medicine; it reminds one of the powdered
mummy, once the great cure of human ills. Country places have not always
got romantic names - Wapse's Farm, for instance, and Hog's Pudding Farm.
Wapse is the provincial for wasp.
Country girls are not all so shrewd as Louisa: we heard of two - this was
some time since - who, being in service in London, paid ten shillings each
to Madame Rachel for a bath to be made beautiful for ever. Half a
sovereign out of their few coins! On the other hand, town servants are
well dressed and have plenty of finery, but seldom have any reserve of
good clothing, such as Louisa possessed. All who know the country regret
the change that has been gradually coming over the servants and the class
from which they are supplied. 'Gawd help the pore missis as gets hold of
- you - !' exclaimed a cottage woman to her daughter, whose goings on had
not been as they should be: 'God help the poor mistress who has to put up
with you!' A remark that would be most emphatically echoed by many a
farmer's wife and country resident. 'Doan't you stop if her hollers at
'ee,' said another cottage mother to her girl, just departing for
service - that is, don't stop if you don't like it; don't stop if your
mistress finds the least fault.
