“Oh Mary, Mary, what is to be done about the hair?” cried Sophy, one Sunday after church.
“Isn’t it dreadful?” said Dora. “Those fearful curl-papers sticking out with rolls of old newspapers! I told them it was not fit to be seen last Sunday, but there were even Elizabeth and Jane Hewlett in them to-day.”
“Yes,” said Mary, “they said that mother’s aunt was coming to tea, so she had curled them before they came out. I told them I would excuse it for this once, but that I should send any one home who came such a figure on Sunday.”
Elizabeth and Jane, be it observed, were George Hewlett’s daughters, the most civilised, if the dullest-witted, of the flock. Polly, Betsy, and Judy were the children of Dan Hewlett. As a rule, all the old women of the parish were called Betty, all the middle-aged4 Lizzie, and the girls Elizabeth.
“It is worse on week-days,” said Dora. “One would think it was a collection of little porcupines5!”
“And so dirty,” began Sophy, but she was hushed up, for Edmund was seen approaching, and Mary never allowed him to be worried with the small, fretting6 details of school life.
It was a time when it was the fashion for young ladies up to their teens to have their hair curled in ringlets round their heads or on their shoulders. Sophy’s hair curled naturally, and had been “turned up” ever since she had come to live at home in the dignity of fourteen, but she and both her sisters wore falls of drooping7 ringlets in front, and in Mary’s case these had been used to be curled in paper at night, though she would as soon have been seen thus decorated by day as in her night-cap. But there was scarcely another matron in the parish who did not think a fringe of curl-paper the proper mode of disposing of her locks when in morning désabillé, unless she were elderly and wore a front, which could be taken off and put on with the best cap.
Maid-servants wore short curls or smooth folds round side-combs under net caps, and this was the usual trim of the superior kind of women. The working women wore thick muslin white caps, under which, it was to be hoped, their hair was cut short, though often it straggled out in unseemly elf-locks. Married women did not go bareheaded, not even the younger ladies, except in the evening, when, like their maiden8 sisters, they wore coils of their back hair round huge upright ornamental9 combs on the summit of their heads.
But the children’s heads were deservedly pain and grief to the Carbonel senses, and Mary was impelled10 to go and make a speech in school, desiring that no more curl-papers should appear there on Sundays, and recommending that all hair should be kept short, as her own and her sister’s had been, till the fit age for the “turning up” was attained11. She called up Susan Pucklechurch and Rachel Mole12, who had nice smooth hair neatly13 parted in the middle, and declared them to be examples of the way that heads ought to appear.
That afternoon the women stood out at their gates. “So the lady told you to take pattern by Widdy Mole’s child, did her?” said Nanny Barton, loud enough for all her neighbours to hear.
“Ay, mother, by Rachel Mole and Susie Pucklechurch.”
“As if I’d go out of my way to follow after a mean creeper and low thing like Widow Mole,” exclaimed Mrs Barton.
“She knows which way her bread is buttered. A-making favourites!” exclaimed Nancy Morris.
“Getting in to work in the garding away from Farmer Goodenough, as her man had worked for for years, ay, and his before un,” chimed in Nanny Barton.
“And if you could see the platefuls and cupfuls as the ladies carries out to her,” added Betsy Seddon. “My word and honour! No wonder she is getting lively enough just to bust14 some day.”
“That’s the way she comes over them,” said Nanny Barton.
“That’s what them gentlefolks likes, and Bessy Mole she knows it,” observed Nancy Morris; at which they all laughed shrilly15.
“As though I’d take pattern by her,” exclaimed Nanny Barton. “I’d liefer take pattern by Softy Sam, or Goodenough’s old scarecrow.”
“Whatever’s that?” demanded Tirzah, coming out of the “Fox and Hounds.” “What have they been after now?”
“Just the lady’s been a preachin’ down at that there school, how that she don’t want no curl-papers there, and that all the poor children’s heads is to be clipped like boys, and setting up that there Rachel Mole’s bowl-dish of a poll to set the fashion.”
“There! As I telled you,” said Tirzah. “That’s the way gentry16 always goes on if they gets their way.”
“They just hates to see a curl or a bit of ribbon,” added Betsy Seddon.
“Or to see one have a bit of pleasure,” added Nancy Morris. “Pucklechurches and Mole, they never durst send their poor children to the fair—”
“And to hear the lady run out agin’ me for just having a drop of beer,” exclaimed Nanny Barton. “Nothing warn’t bad enough for me! As if she hadn’t her wine and all the rest of it, and a poor woman mayn’t touch one draught17, if it is ever so—”
“Well, you know, Nan, you’d had a bit more than enough,” said Tirzah.
“Well, and what call to that was hern or yourn?” cried Nancy, facing upon her.
“A pretty job I had to get you home that night,” said Tirzah; and they all laughed. “And you wouldn’t be here now if Tom Postboy hadn’t pulled up his horses in time.”
“And was it for her to cast up to me if I was a bit overtaken?” demanded Nanny.
It may be supposed that after such a conversation as this there was not much chance of the bowl-dish setting the fashion. There was not the same ill-temper and jealousy18 of Susan Pucklechurch being held up as an example, for her family were the natural hangers-on of Greenhow, and were, besides, always neater and better dressed than the others; but Mrs Mole was even poorer than themselves, and had worked with them, even while “keeping herself to herself,” a great offence in their eyes. Thus nobody was inclined to follow the clipped fashion, except one or two meeker19 women, who had scarcely seen that their girls’ hair was getting beyond bounds. It is to be remembered that seventy years ago, long hair could hardly be kept in respectable trim by busy mothers working in the fields, and with much less power of getting brushes and combs than at present; so that the crops were almost the only means of securing cleanliness and tidiness, and were worn also by all the little daughters of such gentry as did not care for fashion, nor for making them sleep on a ring of lumps as big as walnuts20. So that Mrs Carbonel and her sisters really wished for what was wholesome21 and proper when they tried to make the children conform to their rules, if the women could only have seen it so, instead of resenting the interference.
Sunday brought George Hewlett’s two girls with their hair fastened up in womanly guise22, and their cousins becurled as before; but there was nothing particularly untidy, and Mary held her peace.
However, the war was not over, and one day, when, after a short absence, Dora and Sophy went into the school, they found five or six girls bristling23 with twists of old newspapers, and others in a still more objectionable condition, with wild unkempt hair about their necks, and the half-dozen really neat ones were on the form around Mrs Thorpe, who proceeded to tell Dora that she was quite in despair, the more she spoke24 to the girls about tidy heads, the worse they were, and she was really afraid to let her own children or the clean ones sit near the dirty ones.
Dora’s spirit was roused. “Very well,” she said, “Mrs Carbonel and I will not be disobeyed. Come here, Lizzie Barton. Your head is disgraceful. Lend me your scissors, Mrs Thorpe.”
Lizzie Barton began to cry, with her knuckles25 in her eyes, and would not stir; but Dora was resolute26. One child made a rush for the door; but Dora desired Sophy to stand by the door and bar the passage, and called Mrs Thorpe to hold Lizzie Barton, who certainly was a spectacle, with half-a-dozen horns twisted out of old advertisement papers, but the rest of her hair flying in disgusting elf-locks. She was cowed, however, into standing27 quiet, till her appendages28 had been sheared29 off by the determined30 scissors. “There, I am sure you must be much more comfortable,” Dora assured her. “Get your mother to wash your head, and you will look so nice to-morrow. Now then, Betsy Hewlett.”
Betsy cried, but submitted; but the next victim, Sally French, howled and fought, and said, “Mammy would not have it done.” But Dora sternly answered, “Then she should keep your head fit to be seen.” And Mrs Thorpe held down her hands, with whispers of “Now, my dear, don’t.”
And so it went on through nineteen girls, the boys sniggering all the time. Some cried and struggled, but latterly they felt it was their fate, and resisted no longer. Even Mary Cox, who had a curly head by nature, stood still to be clipped. Dora’s hands were in a dreadful state, and her mind began to quail31 a little; but, having once started, she felt bound to go on and complete her work, and when she finally dismissed the school, there was a very undesirable32 heap of locks, brown, black, and carroty, interspersed33 with curl-papers, on the floor. The girls looked, to her mind, far better, and Mrs Thorpe, a little doubtful, gave her a basin of water to wash her hands.
Home the two sisters went, their spirits rising as they laughed over their great achievement, and looked forward to amusing Mary with the account of the various behaviour of the victims.
So they burst upon her, as she was planting bulbs in the garden, and Edmund helping34 her by measuring distances.
“Oh, Mary, such fun!” cried Sophy. “We have been cutting all the children’s hair.”
“What do you mean, Sophy?”
“They had their heads worse than ever,” said Dora, “so I took Mrs Thorpe’s scissors and clipped them all round.”
“My dear Dora, I wish you had not been so hasty,” Mary was gently saying; but Edmund was standing up, looking quite judicial35.
“Did you get their parents’ permission?” he demanded.
“No, of course I never should.”
“Then what right had you to meddle36 with the children?”
“They were quite horrid37. My hands! They’ll never recover,” said Dora, spreading out her fingers.
“Very likely; but the children were not your slaves. You have a perfect right to forbid them to enter your school except on certain conditions, but not to tyrannise over them when there. You have done more harm than you will undo38 in a hurry.”
“I am afraid so,” murmured Mary.
Dora had a temper, and answered angrily, “Well, I’m sure I did it for the best.”
“I don’t approve of opinionative young ladies,” said Edmund, who was really from old habit quite like an elder brother.
“Oh, Dora,” sighed Mary, “don’t!”
Dora felt impelled to argue the matter out on the spot, but something in Mary’s look withheld39 her. She went away, stepping high and feeling stately and proud; but when she had walked up and down her own room a few times, her better sense began to revive, and she saw that she had acted in anger and self-will quite as much as from a sense of propriety40, and she threw herself on her bed and shed some bitter tears.
They would have been still more bitter if she could have heard the exclamations41 of the mothers over their gates that evening.
“Well, to be sure, that a young lady should have treated my poor like that!”
“Her father says, says he, ‘I’ll have the law of she.’”
“My Jenny, she come home looking like a poor mad woman. ‘Whatever has thee been arter?’ says I. ‘’Tis the lady,’ says she.”
“Lady! She ought to be ashamed on herself, a-making such Betties of the poor children.”
“Ah! didn’t I tell you,” gibed42 Tirzah, “what would come of making up to the gentlefolk, with their soft words and such. They only want to have their will of you, just like the blackamoors.”
“You’ll not find me a sending my Liz and Nan,” cried Mrs Morris, “no, not if her was to offer me a hundred goulden guineas.”
“I don’t let my gal43 go to be made into a guy!” was the general sentiment; and Mrs Verdon, in her bed, intensified44 it by warning her neighbours that the cropping their heads was “a preparation for sending them out to them foreign parts where they has slaves.”
And on Sunday, there were only ten of the female pupils at school, and poor Dora and Sophia both cried all church time. They thought their hasty measures had condemned45 their poor girls to be heathens and good-for-nothings for ever and ever.
Tirzah Todd laughed at them all. The Todds had gipsy connections; Todd himself was hardly ever visible. He was never chargeable to the parish, but he never did regular work except at hay and harvest times, or when he was cutting copsewood. Then old Pucklechurch’s brother, Master Pucklechurch of Downhill, who always managed the copse cutting, used to hire him, and they and another man lived in a kind of wigwam made of chips, and cut down the seven years’ growth of underwood, dividing it into pea-sticks from the tops, and splitting the thicker parts to be woven into hurdles46, or made into hoops47 for barrels. They had a little fire, but their wives brought them their food, and little Hoglah, now quite well only with a scarred neck, delighted to toddle48 about among the chips, and cry out, “Pitty! pitty!” at the primroses49.
Copse cutting over, Joe Todd haunted fairs and drove cattle home, or did anything he could pick up. He lived in a mud hovel which he and Tirzah had built for themselves on the border land, and where they kept a tall, thin, smooth-haired dog, with a grey coat, a white waistcoat, a long nose and tail, and blue eyes, which gave him a peculiarly sinister50 expression of countenance51, and he had a habit of leaping up and planting his fore3 feet on the gate, growling52, so that Dora and Sophy were very much afraid of him, and no one except Mr Harford had ever attempted to effect an entrance into the cottage. It was pretty well understood that Joe Todd and his lurcher carried on a business as poachers, and Tirzah going about with clothes’-pegs, rush baskets, birch brooms, and in their season with blackberries, whortleberries, or plovers’ eggs, was able to dispose of their game to the poulterers at Minsterham, with whom she had an understanding. Her smiling black eyes, white teeth, and merry looks, caused a great deal of business to be done through her, and servants were not unwilling53 to carry in her stories about rabbits knocked down unawares by a stick, and pheasants or partridges killed by chance in reaping. Indeed, she had a little trade in dripping and other scraps54 with sundry55 of these servants, which rendered them the more disposed to receive her.
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1
bind
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| vt.捆，包扎；装订；约束；使凝固；vi.变硬 | |
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2
ballad
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| n.歌谣，民谣，流行爱情歌曲 | |
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fore
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| adv.在前面；adj.先前的；在前部的；n.前部 | |
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middle-aged
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| adj.中年的 | |
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porcupines
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| n.豪猪，箭猪( porcupine的名词复数 ) | |
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fretting
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| n. 微振磨损 adj. 烦躁的, 焦虑的 | |
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7
drooping
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| adj. 下垂的，无力的 动词droop的现在分词 | |
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8
maiden
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| n.少女，处女；adj.未婚的，纯洁的，无经验的 | |
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ornamental
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| adj.装饰的；作装饰用的；n.装饰品；观赏植物 | |
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10
impelled
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| v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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11
attained
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| （通常经过努力）实现( attain的过去式和过去分词 )； 达到； 获得； 达到（某年龄、水平、状况） | |
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mole
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| n.胎块；痣；克分子 | |
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13
neatly
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| adv.整洁地，干净地，灵巧地，熟练地 | |
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14
bust
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| vt.打破；vi.爆裂；n.半身像；胸部 | |
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15
shrilly
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| 尖声的； 光亮的，耀眼的 | |
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16
gentry
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| n.绅士阶级，上层阶级 | |
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17
draught
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| n.拉，牵引，拖；一网（饮，吸，阵)；顿服药量，通风；v.起草，设计 | |
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18
jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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19
meeker
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| adj.温顺的，驯服的( meek的比较级 ) | |
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20
walnuts
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| 胡桃（树）( walnut的名词复数 )； 胡桃木 | |
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21
wholesome
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| adj.适合；卫生的；有益健康的；显示身心健康的 | |
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guise
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| n.外表，伪装的姿态 | |
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23
bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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24
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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25
knuckles
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| n.（指人）指关节( knuckle的名词复数 )；（指动物）膝关节，踝v.（指人）指关节( knuckle的第三人称单数 )；（指动物）膝关节，踝 | |
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26
resolute
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| adj.坚决的，果敢的 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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appendages
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| n.附属物( appendage的名词复数 )；依附的人；附属器官；附属肢体（如臂、腿、尾等） | |
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29
sheared
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| v.剪羊毛( shear的过去式和过去分词 )；切断；剪切 | |
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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31
quail
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| n.鹌鹑；vi.畏惧，颤抖 | |
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32
undesirable
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| adj.不受欢迎的，不良的，不合意的，讨厌的；n.不受欢迎的人，不良分子 | |
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33
interspersed
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| adj.[医]散开的；点缀的v.intersperse的过去式和过去分词 | |
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34
helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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35
judicial
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| adj.司法的，法庭的，审判的，明断的，公正的 | |
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36
meddle
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| v.干预，干涉，插手 | |
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37
horrid
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| adj.可怕的；令人惊恐的；恐怖的；极讨厌的 | |
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38
undo
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| vt.解开，松开；取消，撤销 | |
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39
withheld
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| withhold过去式及过去分词 | |
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40
propriety
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| n.正当行为；正当；适当 | |
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41
exclamations
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| n.呼喊( exclamation的名词复数 )；感叹；感叹语；感叹词 | |
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42
gibed
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| v.嘲笑，嘲弄( gibe的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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43
gal
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| n.姑娘，少女 | |
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44
intensified
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| v.（使）增强， （使）加剧( intensify的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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45
condemned
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| adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词 | |
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46
hurdles
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| n.障碍( hurdle的名词复数 )；跳栏；（供人或马跳跃的）栏架；跨栏赛 | |
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47
hoops
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| n.箍( hoop的名词复数 )；（篮球）篮圈；（旧时儿童玩的）大环子；（两端埋在地里的）小铁弓 | |
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48
toddle
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| v.（如小孩）蹒跚学步 | |
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49
primroses
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| n.报春花( primrose的名词复数 )；淡黄色；追求享乐（招至恶果） | |
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50
sinister
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| adj.不吉利的，凶恶的，左边的 | |
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51
countenance
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| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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52
growling
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| n.吠声, 咆哮声 v.怒吠, 咆哮, 吼 | |
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53
unwilling
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| adj.不情愿的 | |
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54
scraps
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| 油渣 | |
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55
sundry
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| adj.各式各样的，种种的 | |
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