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Honor O'Callaghan By: Mary Russell Mitford (1787-1855) |
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By Mary Russell Mitford
Times are altered since Gray spoke of the young Etonians as a set of
dirty boys playing at cricket. There are no such things as boys to be
met with now, either at Eton or elsewhere; they are all men from ten
years old upwards. Dirt also hath vanished bodily, to be replaced by
finery. An aristocratic spirit, an aristocracy not of rank but of
money, possesses the place, and an enlightened young gentleman of my
acquaintance, who when somewhere about the ripe age of eleven, conjured
his mother " not to come to see him until she had got her new carriage,
lest he should be quizzed by the rest of the men," was perhaps no unfair
representative of the mass of his schoolfellows. There are of course
exceptions to the rule. The sons of the old nobility, too much
accustomed to splendour in its grander forms, and too sure of their own
station to care about such matters, and the few finer spirits, whose
ambition even in boyhood soars to far higher and holier aims, are,
generally speaking, alike exempt from these vulgar cravings after petty
distinctions. And for the rest of the small people, why "winter and
rough weather," and that most excellent schoolmaster, the world, will
not fail, sooner or later, to bring them to wiser thoughts. In the meanwhile, as according to our homely proverb, "for every gander
there's a goose," so there are not wanting in London and its environs
"establishments," (the good old name of boarding school being altogether
done away with,) where young ladies are trained up in a love of fashion
and finery, and a reverence for the outward symbols of wealth, which
cannot fail to render them worthy compeers of the young gentlemen
their contemporaries. I have known a little girl, (fit mate for the
above mentioned amateur of new carriages,) who complained that her
mamma called upon her, attended only by one footman; and it is certain,
that the position of a new comer in one of these houses of education
will not fail to be materially influenced by such considerations as the
situation of her father's town residence, or the name of her mother's
milliner. At so early a period does the exclusiveness which more or
less pervades the whole current of English society make its appearance
amongst our female youth. Even in the comparatively rational and old fashioned seminary in which
I was brought up, we were not quite free from these vanities. We too
had our high castes and our low castes, and (alas! for her and for
ourselves!) we counted among our number one who in her loneliness and
desolation might almost be called a Pariah or if that be too strong an
illustration, who was at least, in more senses than one, the Cinderella
of the school. Honor O'Callaghan was, as her name imports, an Irish girl. She had been
placed under the care of Mrs. Sherwood before she was five years old,
her father being designated, in an introductory letter which he
brought in his hand, as a barrister from Dublin, of ancient family, of
considerable ability, and the very highest honour. The friend, however,
who had given him this excellent character, had, unfortunately, died
a very short time after poor Honor's arrival; and of Mr. O'Callaghan
nothing had ever been heard after the first half year, when he sent
the amount of the bill in a draft, which, when due, proved to
be dishonoured. The worst part of this communication, however
unsatisfactory in its nature, was, that it was final. All inquiries,
whether in Dublin or elsewhere, proved unavailing; Mr. O'Callaghan had
disappeared; and our unlucky gouvernante found herself saddled with the
board, clothing, and education, the present care, and future destiny, of
a little girl, for whom she felt about as much affection as was felt
by the overseers of Aberleigh towards their involuntary protege, Jesse
Cliffe. Nay, in saying this, I am probably giving our worthy governess
credit for somewhat milder feelings upon this subject than she
actually entertained; the overseers in question, accustomed to such
circumstances, harbouring no stronger sentiment than a cold, passive
indifference towards the parish boy, whilst she, good sort of woman as
in general she was, did certainly upon this occasion cherish something
very like an active aversion to the little intruder... Continue reading book >>
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Fiction |
Literature |
Short stories |
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