In the first place, and as of primary consequence to Rose's well-being1, Mrs. Jennings, the lady with whom Rose was boarded, turned out an excellently-disposed gentlewoman. She had a well-ordered house, pervaded2 with the spirit of a gentlewoman. The whole establishment was full of the self-respect which showed itself in a scrupulous3 consideration for the rights and claims, the doings and feelings, of others.
Rose did not complain because Mrs. Jennings and her house alike were also antiquated4 and formal. But the lady was not merely formal; it was a point of honour and an inveterate6 weak
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ness with her to refuse to own that she had anything to do with such small but welcome boons7 to her as boarders. There she sat, serenely8 disclaiming9 the slightest knowledge of what had taken place, and attributing every attention to her old servant Susan, who had been with Mrs. Jennings since her marriage five-and-thirty years before. Or, if it was not Susan, it was her coadjutor, Marianne, in her housemaid's neat dress, whom Susan, in her working housekeeper's black cap and gold-rimmed spectacles, had trained to all fit and proper service in a gentlewoman's house.
In person Mrs. Jennings was tall and thin, sallow, and slightly hook-nosed, but still handsome. Her upright, broad-shouldered, and, by comparison, slender waisted figure was conventionally good; but it was hard to say how far it was her own, or how much it was made up. For she was one of those women who consider that it is a duty which they owe to the world not only to show themselves to the best advantage in bodily presence to the last, but so to conceal10 and atone11 for the ravages12 of time as to preserve a semblance13 of their maturity14 after it is long past. The performance is not altogether successful. For one thing, it is apt to call forth15 a spirit of contemptuous pity in the youthful spectator who is still a long way from needing to employ such laborious16, self-denying arts.
Mrs. Jennings added to her natural air of dignity
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by a filmy shawl of black lace in summer, and of white Shetland wool in winter, draped round her without so much as a fold out of order, and by a somewhat elaborate modification17 of a widow's cap which added half an inch to her height. As Rose wrote in an early letter home, Mrs. Jennings's cap looked as if she had been born with it on her coal black hair, or as if it were glued and gummed there beyond any possibility of being displaced. Mother ought to see it, take an example, and abandon her flighty, waggling head-gear. No, on second thoughts, Rose would not like to see mother with a cap fitted on her head like the bowl of a helmet, and giving the idea of such stony18 stability that it might have been fastened with invisible nails hammered into her skull19.
Hester Jennings, Mrs. Jennings's daughter, was the young art student like Rose's self, to whom she and her friends had naturally looked for congenial companionship where the girl was concerned; and if she did not find it with Hester, she was not likely to discover it in any of the other residents at No. 12 Welby Square. Naturally Rose did not greatly affect the remaining members of that elderly society, on which Mrs. Jennings professed20 to set store. She could not help liking21 Mrs. Jennings, though, alas22! Rose scarcely believed in her so much as she would have been justified23 in doing.
In Mrs. Jennings's daughter, who had been from
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the first thought of as a friend for Rose, she believed entirely24. Yet Rose had been in the beginning both startled by Hester Jennings and disappointed in her.
Hester Jennings looked considerably25 older than she was, which was about Annie Millar's age; in fact, she was prematurely26 worn with study and work. She was like her mother on a larger scale, with advantages of a fair paleness and remarkable27 violet-blue eyes, which Mrs. Jennings had never possessed28. Hester might have passed for a lovely young woman if she had cared in the least to do it. But never was girl more indifferent to such claims or more capable of doing her worst to qualify them and render them the next thing to null and void. When Annie Millar made Hester Jennings's acquaintance, Annie maintained that there was something left out in Hester's composition, the part which makes a woman desire to look well in the eyes of her neighbours, and win admiration29, though the admiration be as skin deep as the beauty which creates it.
To think that a daughter of Mrs. Jennings, an artist in her own right, could dress so badly, with such a careless contempt for patterns and colours, in such ill-fitting frocks and dowdy30 or grotesque31 hats! Her preference for strident aniline dyes and gigantic stripes and checks in the different
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articles of her costume looked very like perversity32; especially when it was shown that with reference to other persons, in arranging to paint a portrait, for instance, no one, not Mrs. Jennings, displayed such a fine sense of fitness and harmony as Hester exhibited. Dress was to her, in her private character, mere5 necessary clothing, warm or cool as the season required. It was not worth the waste of thought implied by turning it over in her mind. Her mother dressed for the family; or, if she did not, Hester understood that her married sisters and sisters-in-law devoted33, with success, a great deal of time which they did not value in other respects, to the subject in question.
Speak of Rose Millar's professional notions as to the human figure being left easy and untrammelled! Rose was a pattern of decorous neatness and trimness compared to Hester; indeed, Rose was appalled34 by the total absence of order and ceremony, not to say of embellishment, in her friend's toilet. Hester abandoned herself permanently35 to deshabilles. She appeared in a jacket indoors as well as out. She dispensed36 with collars in morning and lace in evening wear. She did her hair once when she got up, and regarded passing her hand over her head when she took off her hat as all that was incumbent37 upon her afterwards. Without intending it, and without dreaming of
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copying the bushes of hair in Rossetti's pictures, Hester Jennings's sandy-coloured locks, not a good point in her personal appearance, were, as her great-grandmother would have cried in horror, more like a dish-mop than anything else. She stopped short of dirt in her slovenliness38 because of her purity of soul, her deep respect for the laws of health, and because of the traditions of her class, from which she could not altogether escape. But between her bondage39 to work, and her scornful neglect of other claims which she had known over-exalted and exaggerated, she had accomplished40 marvels41.
Hester Jennings had attained42 such eminence43 in her recklessness of consequences, that, in place of being a nearly lovely woman, in accordance with her profile, complexion44, and glorious eyes, she was barely good-looking because of them, in a style which repulsed45 many more people than it attracted others. The sight of Hester was one of the numerous lessons which she was destined46 to give to Rose Millar. It frightened Rose into becoming tamely conventional and elaborately tidy in dress, to the surprise and edification of her sister Annie, for it was just at the time when Annie was most spent by her new life and labours, and least inclined to put off her hospital gown and cap.
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1
well-being
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| n.安康，安乐，幸福 | |
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2
pervaded
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| v.遍及，弥漫( pervade的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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scrupulous
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| adj.审慎的，小心翼翼的，完全的，纯粹的 | |
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antiquated
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| adj.陈旧的，过时的 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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inveterate
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| adj.积习已深的，根深蒂固的 | |
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7
boons
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| n.恩惠( boon的名词复数 )；福利；非常有用的东西；益处 | |
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8
serenely
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| adv.安详地，宁静地，平静地 | |
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9
disclaiming
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| v.否认( disclaim的现在分词 ) | |
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conceal
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
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atone
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| v.赎罪，补偿 | |
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12
ravages
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| 劫掠后的残迹，破坏的结果，毁坏后的残迹 | |
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semblance
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| n.外貌，外表 | |
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maturity
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| n.成熟；完成；(支票、债券等)到期 | |
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15
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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16
laborious
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| adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅 | |
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17
modification
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| n.修改，改进，缓和，减轻 | |
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18
stony
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| adj.石头的，多石头的，冷酷的，无情的 | |
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19
skull
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| n.头骨；颅骨 | |
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professed
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| 公开声称的，伪称的，已立誓信教的 | |
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liking
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| n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢 | |
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22
alas
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| int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
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justified
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| a.正当的，有理的 | |
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24
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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25
considerably
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| adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上 | |
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prematurely
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| adv.过早地，贸然地 | |
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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29
admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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30
dowdy
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| adj.不整洁的；过旧的 | |
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31
grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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32
perversity
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| n.任性；刚愎自用 | |
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33
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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34
appalled
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| v.使惊骇，使充满恐惧( appall的过去式和过去分词)adj.惊骇的；丧胆的 | |
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35
permanently
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| adv.永恒地，永久地，固定不变地 | |
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36
dispensed
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| v.分配( dispense的过去式和过去分词 )；施与；配（药） | |
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37
incumbent
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| adj.成为责任的，有义务的；现任的，在职的 | |
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38
slovenliness
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39
bondage
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| n.奴役，束缚 | |
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40
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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41
marvels
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| n.奇迹( marvel的名词复数 )；令人惊奇的事物（或事例）；不平凡的成果；成就v.惊奇，对…感到惊奇( marvel的第三人称单数 ) | |
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42
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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43
eminence
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| n.卓越，显赫；高地，高处；名家 | |
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44
complexion
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| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
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45
repulsed
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| v.击退( repulse的过去式和过去分词 )；驳斥；拒绝 | |
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46
destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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