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Miss Philly Firkin, The China-Woman By: Mary Russell Mitford (1787-1855) |
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By Mary Russell Mitford
In Belford Regis, as in many of those provincial capitals of the
south of England, whose growth and importance have kept pace with the
increased affluence and population of the neighbourhood, the principal
shops will be found clustered in the close, inconvenient streets of the
antique portion of the good town; whilst the more showy and commodious
modern buildings are quite unable to compete in point of custom with the
old crowded localities, which seem even to derive an advantage from the
appearance of business and bustle occasioned by the sharp turnings, the
steep declivities, the narrow causeways, the jutting out windows, and
the various obstructions incident to the picturesque but irregular
street architecture of our ancestors. Accordingly, Oriel Street, in Belford, a narrow lane, cribbed and
confined on the one side by an old monastic establishment, now turned
into alms houses, called the Oriel, which divided the street from that
branch of the river called the Holy Brook, and on the other bounded by
the market place, whilst one end abutted on the yard of a great inn,
and turned so sharply up a steep acclivity that accidents happened
there every day, and the other terminus wound with an equally awkward
curvature round the churchyard of St Stephen's, this most strait and
incommodious avenue of shops was the wealthiest quarter of the Borough.
It was a provincial combination of Regent Street and Cheapside. The
houses let for double their value; and, as a necessary consequence,
goods sold there at pretty nearly the same rate; horse people and
foot people jostled upon the pavement; coaches and phaetons ran against
each other in the road. Nobody dreamt of visiting Belford without
wanting something or other in Oriel Street; and although noise, and
crowd, and bustle, be very far from usual attributes of the good town,
yet in driving through this favoured region on a fine day, between the
hours of three and five, we stood a fair chance of encountering as
many difficulties and obstructions from carriages, and as much din and
disorder on the causeway as we shall often have the pleasure of meeting
with out of London. One of the most popular and frequented shops in the street, and out
of all manner of comparison the prettiest to look at, was the
well furnished glass and china warehouse of Philadelphia Firkin,
spinster. Few things are indeed more agreeable to the eye than the
mixture of glittering cut glass, with rich and delicate china, so
beautiful in shape, colour, and material, which adorn a nicely assorted
showroom of that description. The manufactures of Sèvres, of Dresden,
of Derby, and of Worcester, are really works of art, and very beautiful
ones too; and even the less choice specimens have about them a
clearness, a glossiness, and a nicety, exceedingly pleasant to look
upon; so that a china shop is in some sense a shop of temptation: and
that it is also a shop of necessity, every housekeeper who knows to her
cost the infinite number of plates, dishes, cups, and glasses, which
contrive to get broken in the course of the year, (chiefly by that
grand demolisher of crockery ware called Nobody,) will not fail to bear
testimony. Miss Philadelphia's was therefore a well accustomed shop, and she
herself was in appearance most fit to be its inhabitant, being a trim,
prim little woman, neither old nor young, whose dress hung about her in
stiff regular folds, very like the drapery of a china shepherdess on a
mantel piece, and whose pink and white complexion, skin, eyebrows, eyes,
and hair, all tinted as it seemed with one dash of ruddy colour, had the
same professional hue. Change her spruce cap for a wide brimmed hat, and
the damask napkin which she flourished in wiping her wares, for a china
crook, and the figure in question might have passed for a miniature of
the mistress. In one respect they differed The china shepherdess was a
silent personage. Miss Philadelphia was not; on the contrary, she was
reckoned to make, after her own mincing fashion, as good a use of her
tongue as any woman, gentle or simple, in the whole town of Belford... Continue reading book >>
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Fiction |
Literature |
Short stories |
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