Cranford, Chapter 12 - Engaged To Be Married

Relax and drift off to sleep listening to the twelfth chapter of Elizabeth Gaskell's gently humorous classic novel, in which something mildly horrifying reaches the ladies' ears - news of an impending marriage. Our narrator hasn't quite finished with the mystery of Poor Peter, either.

For more gentle writing you might like Ted the Shed, also available on Free Tracks.

Transcript

Hello there,

It's Mandy here.

Welcome back to Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell.

So we've reached chapter 12,

Which is called Engaged to be Married.

And before we begin,

Just an interesting fact about Elizabeth Gaskell,

That even though her writing conforms to Victorian conventions,

Including the use of the name Mrs Gaskell,

As she was known,

She usually framed her stories as critiques of contemporary attitudes,

As you can see in Cranford.

So before I begin,

Please go ahead and make yourself really comfortable.

Sink down into whatever surface you're sitting or lying on,

Relax your hands,

Release your shoulders,

And just soften your jaw.

You might like to close your eyes as well.

That's great.

So,

If you're comfy,

I shall begin.

Chapter 12,

Engaged to be Married.

Was the poor Peter of Cranford the Aga Jenkins of Chunderabad,

Or was he not?

As somebody says,

That was the question.

In my own home,

Whenever people had nothing else to do,

They blamed me for want of discretion.

Indiscretion was my bugbear fault.

Everybody has a bugbear fault,

A sort of standing characteristic,

A piece de resistance for their friends to cut at,

And in general,

They cut and come again.

I was tired of being called indiscreet and incautious,

And I determined for once to prove myself a model of prudence and wisdom.

I would not even hint my suspicions respecting the Aga.

I would collect evidence and carry it home to lay before my father as the family friend of the two Miss Jenkinses.

In my search after facts,

I was often reminded of a description my father had once given of a ladies' committee that he'd had to preside over.

He said he couldn't help thinking of a passage in Dickens which spoke of a chorus in which every man took the tune he knew best and sang it to his own satisfaction.

So,

At this charitable committee,

Every lady took the subject uppermost in her mind and talked about it to her own great contentment,

But not much to the advancement of the subject they had met to discuss.

But even that committee could have been nothing to the Cranford ladies when I attempted to gain some clear and definite information as to Paul Peter's height,

Appearance,

And when and where he was seen and heard of last.

For instance,

I remember asking Miss Pole,

And I thought the question was very opportune,

For I put it when I met her at a call at Mrs.

Forrester's,

And both ladies had known Peter,

And I imagined that they might refresh each other's memories.

I asked Miss Pole what was the very last thing they had ever heard about him,

And then she named the absurd report to which I have alluded about his having been elected Great Llama of Tibet,

And this was a signal for each lady to go off on her separate idea.

Mrs.

Forrester's start was made on the veiled prophet in Lalaruk,

Whether I thought he was meant for the Great Llama,

Though Peter was not so ugly,

Indeed rather handsome if he had not been freckled.

I was thankful to see her double upon Peter,

But in a moment the delusive lady was off upon Roland's Kalidor,

And the merits of cosmetics and hair oils in general,

And holding forth so fluently that I turned to listen to Miss Pole,

Who,

Through the llamas,

The beasts of burden,

Had got to Peruvian bonds,

And the share market,

And her poor opinion of joint stock banks in general,

And of that one in particular,

In which Miss Matty's money was invested.

In vain I put in,

When was it,

In what year was it,

That you heard that Mr.

Peter was the Great Llama?

They only joined issue to dispute whether llamas were carnivorous animals or not,

In which dispute they were not quite on fair grounds,

As Mrs.

Forrester,

After they had grown warm then cool again,

Acknowledged that she always confused carnivorous and gramminivorous together,

Just as she did horizontal and perpendicular,

But then she apologized for it very prettily,

Saying that in her day the only use people made of four-syllabled words was to teach how they should be spelt.

The only fact I gained from this conversation was that certainly Peter had last been heard of in India,

Or that neighborhood,

And that this scanty intelligence of his whereabouts had reached Cranford in the year when Miss Pole had brought her Indian muslin gown,

Long since worn out.

We washed it and mended it,

And traced its decline and fall into a window blind before we could go on,

And in a year when Womwell came to Cranford because Miss Matty had wanted to see an elephant,

In order that she might the better imagine Peter riding on one,

And had seen a boa constrictor too,

Which was more than she wished to imagine in her fancy pictures of Peter's locality,

And in a year when Miss Jenkins had learnt some piece of poetry off by heart,

And used to say at all the Cranford parties how Peter was surveying mankind from China to Peru,

Which everybody had thought very grand and rather appropriate,

Because India was between China and Peru,

If you took care to turn the globe to the left instead of the right.

I suppose all these inquiries of mine,

And the consequent curiosity excited in the minds of my friends,

Made us blind and deaf to what was going on around us.

It seemed to me as if the sun rose and shone,

And as if the rain rained on Cranford,

Just as usual,

And I didn't notice any sign of the times that could be considered as a prognostic of any uncommon event,

And,

To the best of my belief,

Not only Miss Matty and Mrs Forrester,

But even Miss Pole herself,

Who we looked upon as a kind of prophetess from the knack she had of foreseeing things before they came to pass,

Although she didn't like to disturb her friends by telling them her foreknowledge,

Even Miss Pole herself was breathless with astonishment when she came to tell us of the astounding piece of news.

But I must recover myself.

The contemplation of it,

Even at this distance of time,

Has taken away my breath and my grammar,

And unless I subdue my emotion,

My spelling will go too.

We were sitting,

Miss Matty and I,

Much as usual,

She in the blue chintz easy chair,

With her back to the light and her knitting in her hand,

I reading aloud the St James's Chronicle.

A few minutes more,

And we should have gone to make the little alterations in dress,

Usual,

Before calling time,

Twelve o'clock,

In Cranford.

I remember the scene and the date well.

We had been talking of the Signior's rapid recovery since the warmer weather had set in,

And praising Mr Hoggin's skill,

And lamenting his want of refinement and manner.

It seems a curious coincidence that this should have been our subject,

But so it was,

When a knock was heard,

A caller's knock,

Three distinct taps,

And we were flying,

That is to say,

Miss Matty could not walk very fast,

Having had a touch of rheumatism,

To our rooms,

To change cap and collars,

When Miss Pole arrested us by calling out,

As she came up the stairs,

Don't go,

I can't wait,

It is not twelve,

I know,

But never mind your dress,

I must speak to you.

We did our best to look as if it was not we who had made the hurried movement,

The sound of which she had heard,

For of course we didn't like to have it supposed that we had any old clothes that it was convenient to wear out,

In the sanctuary of home,

As Miss Jenkins once prettily called the back parlour,

Where she was tying up preserves.

So we threw our gentility with double force into our manners,

And very gentile we were,

For two minutes,

While Miss Pole recovered breath,

And excited our curiosity strongly,

By lifting up her hands in amazement,

And bringing them down in silence,

As if what she had to say was too big for words,

And could only be expressed by pantomime.

What do you think Miss Matty,

What do you think?

Lady Glenmire is to marry,

Is to be married I mean,

Lady Glenmire,

Mr Hoggins,

Mr Hoggins is going to marry Lady Glenmire.

Marry,

Said we,

Marry,

Madness.

Marry,

Said Miss Pole,

With the decision that belonged to her character,

I said,

Marry,

As you do,

And I also said,

What a fool my lady is going to make of herself.

I could have said,

Madness,

But I controlled myself,

For it was in a public shop that I heard of it.

Where feminine delicacy has gone to,

I don't know.

You and I,

Miss Matty,

Would have been ashamed to have known that our marriage was spoken of in a grocer's shop,

In the hearing of shop men.

But,

Said Miss Matty,

Sighing as one recovering from a blow,

Perhaps it is not true,

Perhaps we are doing her injustice.

No,

Said Miss Pole,

I have taken care to ascertain that.

I went straight to Mrs Fitzadam to borrow a cookery book,

Which I knew she had,

And I introduced my congratulations apropos of the difficulty gentlemen must have in housekeeping,

And Mrs Fitzadam bridled up,

And said that she believed it was true,

Though how and where I could have heard it,

She did not know.

She said her brother and Lady Glenmire had come to an understanding at last.

Understanding,

Such a coarse word,

But my lady will have to come down to many a want of refinement.

I have reason to believe Mr Hoggins sups on bread and cheese and beer every night.

Marry,

Said Miss Matty,

Once again.

Well,

I never thought of it,

Two people that we know going to be married,

It's coming very near.

So near that my heart stopped beating when I heard of it,

While you might have counted 12,

Said Miss Pole.

One does not know whose turn may come next.

Here in Cranford,

Poor Lady Glenmire might have thought herself safe,

Said Miss Matty,

With pity in her tones.

Bah,

Said Miss Pole,

With a toss of her head,

Don't you remember poor dear Captain Brown's song,

Tibby Fowler,

And the line,

Set her on the tin-tock tap,

The wind will blow a man till her.

That was because Tibby Fowler was rich,

I think.

Well,

There was that kind of attraction about Lady Glenmire that I,

For one,

Should be ashamed to have.

I put in my wonder.

But how can she have fancied Mr Hoggins?

I'm not surprised that Mr Hoggins has liked her.

Oh,

I don't know.

Mr Hoggins is rich and very pleasant-looking,

Said Miss Matty,

And very good-tempered and kind-hearted.

She has married for an establishment,

That's it.

I suppose she takes the surgery with it,

Said Miss Pole,

With a little dry laugh at her own joke.

But like many people who think they have made a severe and sarcastic speech,

Which yet is clever of its kind,

She began to relax in her grimness from the moment when she made this allusion to the surgery,

And we turned to speculate on the way in which Mrs Jameson would receive the news.

The person whom she had left in charge of her house,

To keep off followers from her maids,

To set up a follower of her own,

And that follower a man whom Mrs Jameson had tabooed as vulgar and inadmissible to Cranford society,

Not merely on account of his name,

But because of his voice,

His complexion,

His boots,

Smelling of the stable,

And himself smelling of drugs.

Had he ever been to see Lady Glenmire at Mrs Jameson's,

Chloride of lime would not purify the house in its owner's estimation if he had,

Or had their interviews been confined to the occasional meetings in the chamber of the poor sick conjurer,

To whom,

With all our sense,

Of the mes alliance,

We could not help allowing that they had both been exceedingly kind.

And now it turned out that a servant of Mrs Jameson's had been ill,

And Mr Hoggins had been attending her for some weeks.

So the wolf had got into the fold,

And now he was carrying off the shepherdess.

What would Mrs Jameson say?

We looked into the darkness of futurity,

As a child gazes after a rocket up in the cloudy sky,

Full of wandering expectation of the rattle,

The discharge,

And the brilliant shower of sparks and light.

Then we brought ourselves down to earth and the present time by questioning each other,

Being all equally ignorant,

And all equally without the slightest data to build any conclusions upon,

As to when it would take place,

Where,

How much a year Mr Hoggins had,

Whether she would drop her title,

And how Maria and the other correct servants in Cranford would ever be brought to announce a married couple as Lady Glenmire and Mr Hoggins.

But would they be visited?

Would Mrs Jameson let us?

Or must we choose between the honourable Mrs Jameson and the degraded Lady Glenmire?

We all liked Lady Glenmire the best.

She was bright and kind and sociable and agreeable,

And Mrs Jameson was dull and inert and pompous and tiresome.

But we had acknowledged the sway of the latter so long,

That it seemed like a kind of disloyalty now,

Even to meditate disobedience to the prohibition we anticipated.

Mrs Forrester surprised us in our darned caps and patch collars,

And we forgot all about them in our eagerness to see how she would bear the information,

Which we honourably left to Miss Poole to impart,

Although if we'd been inclined to take them for our advantage,

We might have rushed in ourselves,

For she had a most out of place fit of coughing for five minutes after Mrs Forrester entered the room.

I shall never forget the imploring expression of her eyes as she looked at us over her pocket handkerchief.

They said,

As plain as words could speak,

Don't let nature deprive me of the treasure which is mine,

Although for a time I can make no use of it.

And we did not.

Mrs Forrester's surprise was equal to ours,

And her sense of injury rather greater,

Because she had to feel for her order,

And saw more fully than we could do how such conduct brought stains on the aristocracy.

When she and Miss Poole left us,

We endeavoured to subside into calmness,

But Miss Matty was really upset by the intelligence she had heard.

She reckoned it up,

And it was more than fifteen years since she had heard of any of her acquaintance going to be married,

With the one exception of Miss Jessie Brown,

And as she said,

It gave her quite a shock,

And made her feel as if she could not think what would happen next.

I don't know whether it's a fancy of mine,

Or a real fact,

But I have noticed that,

Just after the announcement of an engagement,

In any set,

The unmarried ladies in that set flutter out in an unusual gaiety and newness of dress,

As much as to say,

In a tacit and unconscious manner,

We also are spinsters.

Miss Matty and Miss Poole talked and thought more about bonnets,

Gowns,

Caps and shawls during the fortnight that succeeded this call than I had known them to do for years before.

But it might be the spring weather,

For it was a warm and pleasant march,

And merinos and beavers and woollen materials of all sorts were but ungracious receptacles of the bright sun's glancing rays.

It had not been Lady Glenmire's dress that had won Mr.

Hoggin's heart,

For she went about on her errands of kindness more shabby than ever.

Although,

In the hurried glimpses I caught of her at church or elsewhere,

She appeared rather to shun meeting any of her friends,

Her face seemed to have almost something of the flush of youth in it,

Her lips looked redder and more trembling than in their old compressed state,

And her eyes dwelt on all things with a lingering light,

As if she was learning to love Cranford and its belongings.

Mr.

Hoggin's looked broad and radiant,

And creaked up the middle aisle at church in a brand new pair of top boots,

An audible as well as visible sign of his purposed change of state,

For the tradition went that the boots he had worn till now were the identical pair in which he first set out on his rounds in Cranford twenty-five years ago,

Only they had been new pieced,

High and low,

Top and bottom,

Heel and sole,

Black leather and brown leather,

More times than anyone could tell.

None of the ladies in Cranford chose to sanction the marriage by congratulating either of the parties.

We wished to ignore the whole affair until our liege lady,

Mrs.

Jamieson,

Returned.

Till she came back to give us our cue,

We felt it would be better to consider the engagement in the same light as the Queen of Spain's legs,

Facts which certainly existed,

But the less said about,

The better.

This restraint upon our tongues,

For you see if we did not speak about it to any of the parties concerned,

How could we get the answers to the questions we longed to ask,

Was beginning to be irksome,

And our idea of the dignity of silence was paling before our curiosity,

When another direction was given to our thoughts,

By an announcement on the part of the principal shopkeeper of Cranford,

Who ranged the trades from grocer and cheesemonger to man milliner,

As occasion required,

That the spring fashions were arrived,

And would be exhibited on the following Tuesday at his rooms in the High Street.

Now,

Miss Matty had only been waiting for this before buying herself a new silk gown.

I had offered,

It is true,

To send to Drumble for patterns,

But she had rejected my proposal,

Gently implying that she had not forgotten her disappointment about the sea green turban.

I was thankful that I was on the spot now to counteract the dazzling fascination of any yellow or scarlet silk.

I must say a word or two here about myself.

I have spoken of my father's old friendship for the Jenkins family.

Indeed,

I am not sure if there was not some distant relationship.

He had willingly allowed me to remain all the winter at Cranford,

In consideration of a letter which Miss Matty had written to him about the time of the panic,

In which I suspect she had exaggerated my powers and my bravery as a defender of the house.

But now that the days were longer and more cheerful,

He was beginning to urge the necessity of my return,

And I only delayed in a sort of odd forlorn hope that if I could obtain any clear information,

I might make the account given by the Signora of the Argo Jenkins,

Tally with that of poor Peter,

His appearance and disappearance,

Which I had winnowed out of the conversation of Miss Pole and Mrs Forrester.

To be continued.

Reviews

Marriage in Cranford! Horrors! 🤣Thanks for reading Mandy 🙏🏻

I love how you give us little snippets about the author! 💖

Gently hilarious! I love it… thanks for sharing, my dear!❤️🙏🏼

As frequently the problem, I fell asleep and will have to give it a listen again. Thank you Mandy for providing me with great stories to sleep by! 🥱😴💤