Free My Lady Ludlow by Elizabeth Gaskell

he, meanwhile, right glad to be out of the
awful gentleness of her presence.
    "What is to be done?" said she, half to herself and half to me. I could
not answer, for I was puzzled myself.
    "It was a right word," she continued, "that I used, when I called reading
and writing 'edge-tools.' If our lower orders have these edge-tools
given to them, we shall have the terrible scenes of the French Revolution
acted over again in England. When I was a girl, one never heard of the
rights of men, one only heard of the duties. Now, here was Mr. Gray,
only last night, talking of the right every child had to instruction. I
could hardly keep my patience with him, and at length we fairly came to
words; and I told him I would have no such thing as a Sunday-school (or a
Sabbath-school, as he calls it, just like a Jew) in my village."
    "And what did he say, my lady?" I asked; for the struggle that seemed now
to have come to a crisis, had been going on for some time in a quiet way.
    "Why, he gave way to temper, and said he was bound to remember, he was
under the bishop's authority, not under mine; and implied that he should
persevere in his designs, notwithstanding my expressed opinion."
    "And your ladyship—" I half inquired.
    "I could only rise and curtsey, and civilly dismiss him. When two
persons have arrived at a certain point of expression on a subject, about
which they differ as materially as I do from Mr. Gray, the wisest course,
if they wish to remain friends, is to drop the conversation entirely and
suddenly. It is one of the few cases where abruptness is desirable."
    I was sorry for Mr. Gray. He had been to see me several times, and had
helped me to bear my illness in a better spirit than I should have done
without his good advice and prayers. And I had gathered from little
things he said, how much his heart was set upon this new scheme. I liked
him so much, and I loved and respected my lady so well, that I could not
bear them to be on the cool terms to which they were constantly getting.
Yet I could do nothing but keep silence.
    I suppose my lady understood something of what was passing in my mind;
for, after a minute or two, she went on:—
    "If Mr. Gray knew all I know,—if he had my experience, he would not be
so ready to speak of setting up his new plans in opposition to my
judgment. Indeed," she continued, lashing herself up with her own
recollections, "times are changed when the parson of a village comes to
beard the liege lady in her own house. Why, in my grandfather's days,
the parson was family chaplain too, and dined at the Hall every Sunday.
He was helped last, and expected to have done first. I remember seeing
him take up his plate and knife and fork, and say with his mouth full all
the time he was speaking: 'If you please, Sir Urian, and my lady, I'll
follow the beef into the housekeeper's room;' for you see, unless he did
so, he stood no chance of a second helping. A greedy man, that parson
was, to be sure! I recollect his once eating up the whole of some little
bird at dinner, and by way of diverting attention from his greediness, he
told how he had heard that a rook soaked in vinegar and then dressed in a
particular way, could not be distinguished from the bird he was then
eating. I saw by the grim look of my grandfather's face that the
parson's doing and saying displeased him; and, child as I was, I had some
notion of what was coming, when, as I was riding out on my little, white
pony, by my grandfather's side, the next Friday, he stopped one of the
gamekeepers, and bade him shoot one of the oldest rooks he could find. I
knew no more about it till Sunday, when a dish was set right before the
parson, and Sir Urian said: 'Now, Parson Hemming, I have had a rook shot,
and soaked in vinegar, and dressed as you described last Sunday. Fall
to, man, and eat it with as good an appetite as you had last Sunday. Pick
the bones clean, or by—, no more Sunday dinners shall you eat at my
table!' I gave one look at poor Mr.