We had a special meeting of the Mothers'-Small-Clothes-Conversion

Society that night, summoned expressly with a view to obtaining

Mr. Godfrey's advice and assistance. Instead of sustaining

our sisterhood, under an overwhelming flow of Trousers which

quite prostrated our little community, he had arranged to take

coffee in Montagu Square, and to goto a ball afterwards!

The afternoon of the next day had been selected for the Festival of the

British-Ladies'-Servants'-Sunday-Sweetheart-Supervision Society. Instead

of being present, the life and soul of that struggling Institution, he

had engaged to make one of a party of worldlings at a morning concert!

I asked myself what did it mean? Alas! it meant that our Christian Hero

was to reveal himself to me in a new character, and to become associated

in my mind with one of the most awful backslidings of modern times.

To return, however, to the history of the passing day. On finding myself

alone in my room, I naturally turned my attention to the parcel which

appeared to have so strangely intimidated the fresh-coloured young

footman. Had my aunt sent me my promised legacy? and had it taken the

form of cast-off clothes, or worn-out silver spoons, or unfashionable

jewellery, or anything of that sort? Prepared to accept all, and to

resent nothing, I opened the parcel--and what met my view? The twelve

precious publications which I had scattered through the house, on the

previous day; all returned to me by the doctor's orders! Well might the

youthful Samuel shrink when he brought his parcel into my room! Well

might he run when he had performed his miserable errand! As to my

aunt's letter, it simply amounted, poor soul, to this--that she dare not

disobey her medical man.

What was to be done now? With my training and my principles, I never had

a moment's doubt.

Once self-supported by conscience, once embarked on a career of manifest

usefulness, the true Christian never yields. Neither public nor private

influences produce the slightest effect on us, when we have once got our

mission. Taxation may be the consequence of a mission; riots may be the

consequence of a mission; wars may be the consequence of a mission: we

go on with our work, irrespective of every human consideration which

moves the world outside us. We are above reason; we are beyond ridicule;

we see with nobody's eyes, we hear with nobody's ears, we feel with

nobody's hearts, but our own. Glorious, glorious privilege! And how is

it earned? Ah, my friends, you may spare yourselves the useless inquiry!

We are the only people who can earn it--for we are the only people who

are always right.

In the case of my misguided aunt, the form which pious perseverance was

next to take revealed itself to me plainly enough.

Preparation by clerical friends had failed, owing to Lady Verinder's

own reluctance. Preparation by books had failed, owing to the doctor's

infidel obstinacy. So be it! What was the next thing to try? The next

thing to try was--Preparation by Little Notes. In other words, the books

themselves having been sent back, select extracts from the books, copied

by different hands, and all addressed as letters to my aunt, were, some

to be sent by post, and some to be distributed about the house on the

plan I had adopted on the previous day. As letters they would excite no

suspicion; as letters they would be opened--and, once opened, might be

read. Some of them I wrote myself. "Dear aunt, may I ask your attention

to a few lines?" &c. "Dear aunt, I was reading last night, and I chanced

on the following passage," &c. Other letters were written for me by my

valued fellow-workers, the sisterhood at the Mothers'-Small-Clothes.

"Dear madam, pardon the interest taken in you by a true, though humble,

friend." "Dear madam, may a serious person surprise you by saying a

few cheering words?" Using these and other similar forms of courteous

appeal, we reintroduced all my precious passages under a form which not

even the doctor's watchful materialism could suspect. Before the shades

of evening had closed around us, I had a dozen awakening letters for

my aunt, instead of a dozen awakening books. Six I made immediate

arrangements for sending through the post, and six I kept in my pocket

for personal distribution in the house the next day.




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