Feyther stole th' Paason's sheep;
A merry Christmas we shall keep;
We shall have both mutton and beef -
- But we won't say nothing about it - .
To rightly understand this rhyme you must sing it with long-drawn
emphasis on each word, lengthening it into at least two syllables; the
first a sort of hexameter, the second a pentameter of sound:
Fey-ther sto-ole th' Paa-son's sheep.
The last line is to come off more trippingly, like an 'aside.' This old
sing-song had doubtless been handed down from the times when the
labourers really did steal sheep, a crime happily extinct with cheap
bread. Louisa was one of the rare old sort - hard-working, and always
ready; never complaining, but satisfied with any food there chanced to
be; sensible and sturdy; a woman who could be thoroughly depended on. 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. 'Come along home if you don't like it.'
Home to what? In this instance it was a most wretched hovel, literally
built in a ditch; no convenience, no sanitation; and the father a
drunkard, who scarcely brought enough money indoors to supply bread.
You would imagine that a mother in such a position would impress upon her
children the necessity of endeavouring to do something. For the sake of
that spirit of independence in which they seem to take so much pride, one
would suppose they would desire to see their children able to support
themselves. But it is just the reverse; the poorer folk are, the less
they seem to care to try to do something. 'You come home if you don't
like it;' and stay about the hovel in slatternly idleness, tails
bedraggled and torn, thin boots out at the toes and down at the heels,
half starved on potatoes and weak tea - stay till you fall into disgrace,
and lose the only thing you possess in the world - your birthright, your
character. Strange advice it was for a mother to give.
Nor is the feeling confined to the slatternly section, but often
exhibited by very respectable cottagers indeed.
'My mother never would go out to service - she - wouldn't - go,' said a
servant to her mistress, one day talking confidentially.
'Then what did she do?' asked the mistress, knowing they were very poor
people.
'Oh, she stopped at home.'
'But how did she live?'
'Oh, her father had to keep her. If she wouldn't go out, of course he had
to somehow.'
This mother would not let her daughter go to one place because there was
a draw-well on the premises; and her father objected to her going to
another because the way to the house lay down a long and lonely lane. The
girl herself, however, had sense enough to keep in a situation; but it
was distinctly against the feeling at her home; yet they were almost the
poorest family in the place. They were very respectable, and thought well
of in every way, belonging to the best class of cottagers.
Unprofitable sentiments! injurious sentiments - self-destroying; but I
always maintain that sentiment is stronger than fact, and even than
self-interest. I see clearly how foolish these feelings are, and how they
operate to the disadvantage of those whom they influence.
