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- Herausgeber: Booksell-Verlag
- Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
- Sprache: Englisch
In "All Sorts and Conditions of Men," Walter Besant intricately weaves a tapestry of Victorian London, exploring the stark contrasts between social classes and the struggles of the urban poor. This novel employs a vivid, realistic style that reflects the social issues of the era, blending character-driven narratives with sharp social criticism. Set against the backdrop of a rapidly industrializing city, Besant illuminates the lives of various inhabitants, deftly illustrating their interconnected fates and the pressing need for reform in housing and labor conditions through a poignant, engaging storyline. Walter Besant (1836-1901) was not merely a novelist but also a historian and social reformer. His experiences as a city official and his active involvement in the social reform movements of his time undoubtedly informed his passionate portrayal of the plight of the less fortunate. Besant's commitment to advocating for social justice and change is evident throughout the work, showcasing his desire to stir public conscience and incite action among his readers. "All Sorts and Conditions of Men" is a compelling read for those interested in Victorian literature and social issues. It serves both as a moving narrative and a clarion call for empathy and reform. Readers will find Besant's exploration of human resilience and societal responsibility both enlightening and profoundly relevant. In this enriched edition, we have carefully created added value for your reading experience: - A succinct Introduction situates the work's timeless appeal and themes. - The Synopsis outlines the central plot, highlighting key developments without spoiling critical twists. - A detailed Historical Context immerses you in the era's events and influences that shaped the writing. - A thorough Analysis dissects symbols, motifs, and character arcs to unearth underlying meanings. - Reflection questions prompt you to engage personally with the work's messages, connecting them to modern life. - Hand‐picked Memorable Quotes shine a spotlight on moments of literary brilliance. - Interactive footnotes clarify unusual references, historical allusions, and archaic phrases for an effortless, more informed read.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019
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All Sorts and Conditions of Men
Table of Contents
Introduction
This is a story about crossing the lines that wealth, habit, and city streets draw between human lives. Walter Besant examines how proximity can unsettle assumptions, turning charity into engagement and spectatorship into participation. Without revealing its later turns, the novel opens a path from comfortable drawing rooms to crowded workshops, asking what it would mean to share not only alms but also amusement, education, and dignity. The result is at once a social inquiry and a narrative of discovery, inviting readers to approach a familiar city as if it were new, and to consider whose voices shape its future.
All Sorts and Conditions of Men is a Victorian social novel set largely in London’s East End, first published in 1882. Its world is that of late nineteenth-century urban Britain, with teeming streets, trades, and tenements forming a vivid backdrop. The book belongs to a tradition of realist, reform-minded fiction that explores living and working conditions while telling an accessible story. Besant, writing for a broad readership, situates the action within the era’s public debates about poverty, culture, and civic responsibility. The setting and period matter: they frame questions about how an industrial metropolis might provide beauty, learning, and recreation alongside employment.
The premise is simple and bold: a young woman of means, curious and determined, chooses to enter the East End quietly, to learn how people live, labor, and find delight amid constraint. She is joined by an ally who shares her experiment in observation and companionship. Rather than preaching from afar, they listen, wander, and imagine practical ways to widen access to wholesome pleasure and self-improvement. The narrative remains spoiler-safe here: its early chapters establish a program of seeing and being seen, of testing whether thoughtful attention and creative institutions can bridge distance without condescension or spectacle, and of discovering what residents themselves desire.
From this setup flow the novel’s central themes: class encounter, the ethics of philanthropy, the value of leisure, and the dignity of ordinary lives. Besant presses readers to ask whether benevolence can be collaborative instead of paternal, and whether culture must be scarce or may be shared generously. He juxtaposes deprivation with energy, showing communities rich in resourcefulness yet underserved by opportunities for art, music, and conviviality. The book examines how social barriers are enforced by custom as much as by law, and how curiosity, respect, and organization might loosen them. It explores the costs of indifference and the possibilities of attention.
Stylistically, the novel blends clear, accessible prose with scenes of bustling urban color and occasional melodramatic flourish. Besant’s narrator is companionable and explanatory, guiding readers through markets, workshops, and byways with an eye for occupations, entertainments, and speech. The mood alternates between earnest critique and buoyant hope, tempering admonition with humor and affection for the city’s diversity. Dialogues and set pieces advance ideas without eclipsing character, while descriptive passages dwell on the texture of streets and the rhythms of working life. The tone remains welcoming rather than austere, aiming to persuade through sympathy, practicality, and the pleasures of storytelling.
For contemporary readers, the book resonates as a meditation on inequality, cultural access, and the design of public life. It asks how institutions can meet people where they are, and how reform can grow from listening rather than imposing. Questions that animate today’s discussions—about the role of leisure in well-being, the responsibilities of employers and benefactors, and the difference between charity and partnership—appear here in narrative form. The East End setting becomes a lens on enduring urban dilemmas: who gets beauty, who gets time, and who gets to decide. The novel encourages reflective reading, open to nuance and to the voices within the community.
Approaching All Sorts and Conditions of Men as both story and social sketch yields a rich experience: a guided walk through a city’s hidden theaters of labor and joy, led by characters learning to see. Expect an inviting pace, vivid scenes, and arguments embedded in action rather than detached treatise. The book does not demand prior knowledge of Victorian institutions; it offers orientation as it goes. Readers interested in civic imagination, humane reform, and the possibilities of shared culture will find material to ponder. Above all, the novel proposes that attention itself can be transformative, and it invites the reader to practice that attention on every page.
Synopsis
Walter Besant’s All Sorts and Conditions of Men opens in late Victorian London, contrasting the prosperous West End with the crowded East End. Angela Messenger, a young heiress to a vast brewery fortune tied to the East, becomes curious about the lives sustained by her wealth. Instead of relying on reports or patronizing visits, she resolves to see the district firsthand. Concealing her identity, she moves into modest lodgings near the brewery. The novel quickly establishes its central concern: how leisure, culture, and companionship might improve daily life for workers whose labor enables the city’s prosperity but who enjoy few opportunities for recreation or refinement.
Settled among shopkeepers, artisans, and clerks, Angela observes the realities of long hours, tight budgets, and limited choices for wholesome enjoyment. She notes the prevalence of public houses and the scarcity of venues where people can meet for music, reading, or dancing without moral suspicion. Her vantage point within a boarding house brings a cross section of East End characters into view, presented with sympathy and detail. As she listens, she gathers practical insights rather than abstract theories. This immersion informs her guiding idea: that elevating the quality of leisure could strengthen community spirit just as surely as relief might address material want.
Among those she meets is Harry Goslett, a capable and imaginative workman with a knack for organization and design. He represents a stratum of skilled labor often overlooked: ambitious, self-educated, and eager for opportunities beyond wages. Their acquaintance, formed under Angela’s assumed role, grows through shared projects and conversations about what people actually enjoy. Harry’s perspective tempers earnest schemes with practicality, and he introduces her to clubs, workshops, and local leaders. Through him, the book explores the pride and independence of artisans, underscoring a key theme: that any effort to uplift must respect the aims and tastes of those it serves.
Angela begins with small, reversible experiments. She arranges evenings of music and dance, informal lectures, and reading rooms stocked with popular literature as well as improving works. The response is immediate and enthusiastic, suggesting unmet demand for cheerful, respectable amusements. Resistance emerges from two sides: moralists who distrust pleasure as a path to vice, and guardians of her estate who distrust her East End involvement. These tensions sharpen the narrative, but the episodes remain observational. The story records successes and failures alike, showing how cost, convenience, and the warmth of welcome can determine whether a working person attends a class or a concert.
From these trials, a larger vision forms: a comprehensive center that would bring music, theater, gardens, baths, libraries, and social rooms under one roof. Angela and her allies test components in temporary quarters, learning which programs draw families and which require adaptation. They consider fees low enough to include many, yet sufficient to ensure care and pride. The phrase Palace of Delight crystallizes the ambition without implying luxury; it means a clean, lighted space where respectability and enjoyment coexist. Practical questions dominate this middle section: location, design, staffing, heating, acoustics, and the everyday management needed to keep such a place open and safe.
While plans develop, the novel broadens its canvas with vignettes of everyday East End life. The boarding house becomes a stage for sailors with yarns of distant ports, clerks rehearsing comic songs, needlewomen trading news, and small traders defending tight margins. Light comic interludes balance sober scenes of illness or unemployment. Street markets, chapels, warehouses, and riverside wharves appear in turn. These glimpses fulfill the title’s promise to portray many sorts and conditions, connecting individual fortunes to neighborhood rhythms. Angela’s listening deepens into patient observation, and the book emphasizes how affection and habit, as much as money, bind a community together.
Complications arise as Angela’s unusual position attracts curiosity. Rumors swirl about her background, and a few opportunists attempt to turn her ventures to private advantage. A dispute in a workshop and murmurs at the brewery test the fragile trust she has built. Harry’s tact and organizing skill prove useful in mediating disagreements and rallying participants when enthusiasm flags. The risk of exposure adds urgency, yet the narrative maintains focus on practical questions: how to keep order without dampening enjoyment, how to welcome women and children safely, and how to ensure the programs belong to the neighborhood, not imposed upon it.
Approaching its climax, the story turns to decisions about permanence. Angela and her circle consider securing a site, raising steady funds, and formalizing governance to protect the institution from fashion or scandal. Negotiations with property holders and cautious benefactors unfold alongside public demonstrations of what the project offers. Personal threads quietly tighten: mutual regard grows, loyalties are tested, and misunderstandings threaten to derail hard-won progress. Without dwelling on sentiment, the book aligns emotional resolution with civic achievement, suggesting that private happiness and public purpose can reinforce one another when guided by respect for the people whose lives are at stake.
In its closing movement, the novel affirms a simple proposition: that pleasure, decently provided and shared, is a form of social good. Rather than preaching reform from a distance, it portrays companionship, music, and play as forces that dignify labor and knit neighbors together. The prospective institution stands as a concrete expression of that belief, pointing beyond alms to common life. Angela’s experiment, the artisans’ pride, and the community’s response combine to convey the book’s central message: effective philanthropy listens first, builds with, not for, and trusts that culture and joy are as necessary as bread for a thriving city.
Historical Context
Set in late-Victorian London, the narrative unfolds chiefly in the East End—Whitechapel, Stepney, and Mile End—during the early 1880s, when the capital’s population exceeded four million. This was a city enlarged by railways and docks yet divided by class geography: the affluent West End enjoyed widening boulevards and clubs while the East End was dense with courts, workshops, and casual labor. The Metropolitan Board of Works (1855–1889) had transformed sewers and built embankments, but overcrowding and low wages persisted east of the City. Besant situates his plot amid shops, music halls, and lodging houses, counterpointing genteel wealth with the daily economies of costermongers, seamstresses, and dockside families.
The most insistent historical backdrop is East End poverty hastened by industrial casualism. Dock labor was irregular and low paid, often four to five pence per hour before 1889, with men hired by the day at the dock gates. Charles Booth’s first poverty maps (1889) recorded that roughly 30 percent of Londoners lived in or near poverty; in districts such as Bethnal Green and St George-in-the-East, rates exceeded 40 percent. Death rates in these parishes remained markedly higher than the metropolitan average in the early 1880s. The novel translates these statistics into lived experience as its heroine immerses herself among workers, encountering crowded rooms, sweated trades, and the thin margins of respectability.
Contesting indiscriminate almsgiving, late-Victorian social reform pioneered systematic philanthropy and settlement work. The Charity Organization Society (founded 1869) sought to rationalize relief, while housing reformers like Octavia Hill managed tenements to inculcate thrift and order. Samuel and Henrietta Barnett’s Toynbee Hall opened in Whitechapel in 1884, sending university graduates to live among the poor, offering lectures, clubs, and libraries. Besant’s book aligns with this shift from relief to culture and fellowship: its program of concerts, reading rooms, and gardens envisions neighborly uplift rather than dole. It thus mirrors the settlement ideal that social contact, education, and wholesome recreation could rebuild civic bonds in districts where wages and housing failed.
Most consequentially, the novel’s imagined Palace of Delight helped catalyze the real People’s Palace on Mile End Road. Opened by Queen Victoria in 1887 and augmented by Technical Schools in 1888, the institution offered a winter garden, library, swimming baths, concerts, and instruction. The Drapers’ Company became a principal supporter, and by 1892 the schools evolved into East London College, later joining the University of London (1907) and becoming Queen Mary College (1915). This concrete legacy embedded Besant’s cultural remedy in brick and curriculum, asserting that amusement and technical education were integral to citizenship. The book therefore functions not merely as reflection but as blueprint for East End civic infrastructure.
Labor unrest in the late 1880s, centered in the East End, gave public voice to grievances the novel treats as everyday experience. The Matchgirls’ Strike at Bryant and May in Bow (June–July 1888), catalyzed by Annie Besant’s exposé of phosphorus-related illness and fines, won concessions on conditions and fines after mass meetings at Mile End. The London Dock Strike (August–September 1889), led by Ben Tillett, Tom Mann, and John Burns, mobilized tens of thousands to secure the docker’s tanner—six pence per hour—and regular hiring. Although published earlier, the book’s insistence on dignity, organized leisure, and social spaces anticipates the era’s demand for fair wages and collective bargaining.
Large-scale immigration reshaped the East End’s trades and streets in the 1880s. After the assassination of Tsar Alexander II (1881) and the May Laws (1882), between roughly 120,000 and 150,000 Jewish migrants came to Britain by 1914, many settling in Whitechapel and Spitalfields. Tailoring, bootmaking, and cabinetmaking workshops expanded, with long hours and piecework wages in cramped premises. Petticoat Lane markets and Yiddish signage marked this cosmopolitan arrival. While not focused on immigration policy, the novel’s depictions of crowded workshops, shifting neighborhoods, and small traders resonate with these demographic changes, presenting a district where cultural variety and economic precarity coexisted in the same tenements and lanes.
Public health and housing reform formed another decisive framework. The Public Health Act of 1875 consolidated sanitary powers, but the East End still bore legacies of the 1866 cholera outbreak that devastated Stepney and Bethnal Green. The Artisans’ and Labourers’ Dwellings Improvement Act (1875) enabled slum clearance, while the Peabody Trust (established 1862; first blocks opened 1864 in Spitalfields) built model dwellings across East London. The 1870 Elementary Education Act created School Board classrooms that punctuated poor streets with new brick landmarks. Besant’s emphasis on baths, open halls, and libraries dovetails with these reforms, arguing that healthy recreation and instruction were as necessary as sewers and brick to lift neighborhoods.
As social critique, the book indicts the moral distance between metropolitan wealth and laboring districts, exposing the limits of paternalism and perfunctory charity. By making a brewery heiress engineer collective amenities, it challenges the uses of capital and the gendered gatekeeping of reform, proposing accessible culture as a civic right rather than a patron’s gift. It scrutinizes the economy of casual labor, the price of cheap housing, and the lure of public houses in entertainment-poor streets, urging purposeful alternatives. The narrative’s practical imagination—halls, gardens, and technical classes—confronts structural inequality in the very neighborhoods where it is lived, and presses the era’s elites toward institutional responsibility.
All Sorts and Conditions of Men
PREFACE.
The ten years' partnership of myself and my late friend Mr. James Rice[1] has been terminated by death. I am persuaded that nothing short of death would have put an end to a partnership which was conducted throughout with perfect accord, and without the least difference of opinion. The long illness which terminated fatally on April 25th of this year began in January of last year. There were intervals during which he seemed to be recovering and gaining strength; he was, indeed, well enough in the autumn to try change of air by a visit to Holland; but he broke down again very shortly after his return: though he did not himself suspect it, he was under sentence of death, and for the last six months of his life his downward course was steady and continuous.
Almost the last act of his in our partnership was the arrangement, with certain country papers and elsewhere, for the serial publication of this novel, the subject and writing of which were necessarily left entirely to myself.
The many wanderings, therefore, which I undertook last summer in Stepney, Whitechapel, Poplar, St. George's in the East, Limehouse, Bow, Stratford, Shadwell, and all that great and marvellous unknown country which we call East London, were undertaken, for the first time for ten years, alone. They would have been undertaken in great sadness had one foreseen the end. In one of these wanderings I had the happiness to discover Rotherhithe, which I afterward explored with carefulness; in another, I lit upon a certain Haven of Rest for aged sea-captains, among whom I found Captain Sorensen; in others I found many wonderful things, and conversed with many wonderful people. The "single-handedness," so to speak, of this book would have been a mere episode in the history of the firm, a matter of no concern or interest to the general public, had my friend recovered. But he is dead; and it therefore devolves upon me to assume the sole responsibility of the work, for good or bad. The same responsibility is, of course, assumed for the two short stories, "The Captain's Room," published at Christmas last, and "They Were Married," published as the summer number of the Illustrated London News. The last story was, in fact, written after the death of my partner; but as it had already been announced, it was thought best, under the circumstances, to make no change in the title.
I have been told by certain friendly advisers that this story is impossible. I have, therefore, stated the fact on the title-page, so that no one may complain of being taken in or deceived. But I have never been able to understand why it is impossible.
Walter Besant.
United Universities' Club, August 19, 1882.
CHAPTER
PAGE
Prologue—in Two Parts
,
9
I.
—
News for His Lordship
,
26
II.
—
A Very Complete Case
,
40
III.
—
Only a Dressmaker
,
46
IV.
—
Uncle Bunker
,
56
V.
—
The Cares of Wealth
,
67
VI.
—
A First Step
,
76
VII.
—
The Trinity Almshouse
,
88
VIII.
—
What He Got by It
,
99
IX.
—
The Day Before the First
,
108
X.
—
The Great Davenant Case
,
116
XI.
—
The First Day
,
124
XII.
—
Sunday at the East End
,
133
XIII.
—
Angela's Experiment
,
142
XIV.
—
The Tender Passion
,
153
XV.
—
A Splendid Offer
,
161
XVI.
—
Harry's Decision
,
169
XVII.
—
What Lord Jocelyn Thought
,
176
XVIII.
—
The Palace of Delight
,
182
XIX.
—
Dick the Radical
,
191
XX.
—
Down on Their Luck
,
197
XXI.
—
Lady Davenant
,
205
XXII.
—
Daniel Fagg
,
214
XXIII.
—
The Missing Link
,
223
XXIV.
—
Lord Jocelyn's Troubles
,
229
XXV.
—
An Invitation
,
238
XXVI.
—
Lord Davenant's Greatness
,
247
XXVII.
—
The Same Signs
,
257
XXVIII.
—
Harry Finds Liberty
,
260
XXIX.
—
The Figure-heads
,
276
XXX.
—
The Professor's Proposal
,
285
XXXI.
—
Captain Coppin
,
292
XXXII.
—
Bunker at Bay
,
303
XXXIII.
—
Mr. Bunker's Letter
,
310
XXXIV.
—
Proofs in Print
,
316
XXXV.
—
Then we'll Keep Company
,
323
XXXVI.
—
What will be the End?
,
333
XXXVII.
—
Truth with Faithfulness
,
338
XXXVIII.
—
I am the Dressmaker
,
347
XXXIX.
—
Thrice Happy Boy
,
356
XL.
—
Sweet Nelly
,
363
XLI.
—
Boxing-Night
,
371
XLII.
—
Not Josephus, but Another
,
378
XLIII.
—
O my Prophetic Soul!
,
387
XLIV.
—
A Fool and his Money
,
397
XLV.
—
Lady Davenant's Dinner-party
,
402
XLVI.
—
The End of the Case
,
413
XLVII.
—
A Palace of Delight
,
418
XLVIII.
—
My Lady Sweet
,
425
XLIX.
—"
Uprouse ye then, my Merry, Merry Men
,"
432
All Sorts and Conditions of Men
PROLOGUE.—Part I.
It was the evening of a day in early June. The time was last year, and the place was Cambridge. The sun had been visible in the heavens, a gracious presence, actually a whole week—in itself a thing remarkable; the hearts of the most soured, even of landlords and farmers, were coming to believe again in the possibility of fine weather; the clergy were beginning to think that they might this year hold a real Harvest Thanksgiving instead of a sham; the trees at the Backs were in full foliage; the avenues of Trinity and Clare were splendid; beside them the trim lawns sloped to the margin of the Cam, here most glorious and proudest of English rivers, seeing that he laves the meadows of those ancient and venerable foundations, King's, Trinity, and St. John's, to say nothing of Queen's and Clare and Magdalen; men were lazily floating in canoes, or leaning over the bridges, or strolling about the walks, or lying on the grass; and among them—but not—oh! not with them—walked or rested many of the damsels of learned Newnham[2], chiefly in pairs, holding sweet converse
not neglecting the foundations of the Christian faith and other fashionable topics, which ladies nowadays handle with so much learning, originality, dexterity, and power.
We have, however, to do with only one pair, who were sitting together on the banks opposite Trinity. These two were talking about a subject far more interesting than any concerning mind, or art, or philosophy, or the chances of the senate-house, or the future of Newnham: for they were talking about themselves and their own lives, and what they were to do each with that one life which happened, by the mere accident of birth, to belong to herself. It must be a curious subject for reflection in extreme old age, when everything has happened that is going to happen, including rheumatism, that, but for this accident, one's life might have been so very different.
"Because, Angela," said the one who wore spectacles and looked older than she was, by reason of much pondering over books and perhaps too little exercise, "because, my dear, we have but this one life before us, and if we make mistakes with it, or throw it away, or waste it, or lose our chances, it is such a dreadful pity. Oh, to think of the girls who drift and let every chance go by, and get nothing out of their lives at all—except babies" (she spoke of babies with great contempt). "Oh! it seems as if every moment were precious: oh! it is a sin to waste an hour of it."
She gasped and clasped her hands together with a sigh. She was not acting, not at all; this girl was that hitherto rare thing, a girl of study and of books; she was wholly possessed, like the great scholars of old, with the passion for learning.
"Oh! greedy person!" replied the other with a laugh, "if you read all the books in the University library, and lose the enjoyment of sunshine, what shall it profit you, in the long run?"
This one was a young woman of much finer physique than her friend. She was not short-sighted, but possessed, in fact, a pair of orbs of very remarkable clearness, steadiness, and brightness. They were not soft eyes, nor languishing eyes, nor sleepy eyes, nor downcast, shrinking eyes; they were wide-awake, brown, honest eyes, which looked fearlessly upon all things, fair or foul. A girl does not live at Newnham two years for nothing, mind you; when she leaves that seat of learning, she has changed her mind about the model, the perfect, the ideal woman. More than that, she will change the minds of her sisters and her cousins; and there are going to be a great many Newnhams, and the spread of this revolution will be rapid; and the shrinking, obedient, docile, man-reverencing, curate-worshipping maiden of our youth will shortly vanish and be no more seen. And what will the curate do then, poor thing? Wherefore let the bishop look to certain necessary changes in the marriage service; and let the young men see that their own ideas change with the times, else there will be no sweethearts for them. More could I prophesy, but refrain.
This young lady owned, besides those mentioned above, many other points which will always be considered desirable at her age, whatever be the growth of feminine education (wherefore, courage, brothers!). In all these points she contrasted favorably with her companion. For her face was sunny, and fair to look upon; one of the younger clerical dons—now a scanty band, almost a remnant—was reported to have said, after gazing upon that face, that he now understood, which he had never understood before, what Solomon meant when he compared his love's temples to a piece of pomegranate within her locks. No one asked him what he meant, but he was a mathematical man, and so he must have meant something, if it was only trigonometry. As to her figure, it was what a healthy, naturally dressed, and strong young woman's figure ought to be, and not more slender in the waist than was the figure of Venus or Mother Eve; and her limbs were elastic, so that she seemed when she walked as if she would like to run, jump, and dance, which, indeed, she would have greatly preferred, only at Newnham they "take it out" at lawn tennis. And whatever might be the course of life marked out by herself, it was quite certain to the intelligent observer that before long Love the invincible—Love that laughs at plots, plans, conspiracies, and designs—would upset them all, and trace out quite another line of life for her, and most probably the most commonplace line of all.
"Your life, Constance," she went on, "seems to me the most happy and the most fortunate. How nobly you have vindicated the intellect of women by your degree!"
"No, my dear." Constance shook her head sadly. "No: only partly vindicated our intellect; remember I was but fifth wrangler[3], and there were four men—men, Angela—above me. I wanted to be senior."
"Everybody knows that the fifth is always as good as the first." Constance, however, shook her head at this daring attempt at consolation. "At all events, Constance, you will go on to prove it by your original papers when you publish your researches. You will lecture like Hypatia[4]; you will have the undergraduates leaving the men and crowding to your theatre. You will become the greatest mathematician in Cambridge; you will be famous for ever. You will do better than man himself, even in man's most exalted level of intellectual strength."
The pale cheek of the student flushed.
"I do not expect to do better than men," she replied humbly. "It will be enough if I do as well. Yes, my dear, all my life, short or long, shall be given to science. I will have no love in it, or marriage, or—or—anything of that kind at all."
"Nor will I," said the other stoutly, yet with apparent effort. "Marriage spoils a woman's career; we must live our life to its utmost, Constance."
"We must, Angela. It is the only thing in this world of doubt that is a clear duty. I owe mine to science. You, my dear, to——"
She would have said to "Political Economy," but a thought checked her. For a singular thing had happened only the day before. This friend of hers, this Angela Messenger, who had recently illustrated the strength of women's intellect by passing a really brilliant examination in that particular science, astonished her friends at a little informal meeting in the library by an oration. In this speech she went out of her way to pour contempt upon Political Economy. It was a so-called science, she said—not a science at all: a collection of theories impossible of proof. It treated of men and women as skittles, it ignored the principal motives of action, it had been put together for the most part by doctrinaires who lived apart, and knew nothing about men and less about women, and it was a favorite study, she cruelly declared, of her own sex, because it was the most easily crammed and made the most show. As for herself, she declared that for all the good it had done her, she might just as well have gone through a course of æsthetics or studied the symbols of advanced ritualism.
Therefore, remembering the oration, Constance Woodcote hesitated. To what Cause (with a capital C) should Angela Messenger devote her life?
"I will tell you presently," said Angela, "how I shall begin my life. Where the beginning will lead me, I cannot tell."
Then there was silence for a while. The sun sank lower and the setting rays fell upon the foliage, and every leaf showed like a leaf of gold, and the river lay in shadow and became ghostly, and the windows of Trinity Library opposite to them glowed, and the New Court of St. John's at their left hand became like unto the palace of Kubla Khan.
"Oh!" sighed the young mathematician. "I shall never be satisfied till Newnham crosses the river. We must have one of these colleges for ourselves. We must have King's. Yes, King's will be the best. And oh! how differently we shall live from the so-called students who are now smoking tobacco in each other's rooms, or playing billiards, or even cards—the superior sex!"
"As for us, we shall presently go back to our rooms, have a cup of tea and a talk, my dear. Then we shall go to bed. As regards the men, those of your mental level, Constance, do not, I suppose, play billiards; nor do they smoke tobacco. Undergraduates are not all students, remember. Most of them are nothing but mere pass-men who will become curates."
Two points in this speech seem to call for remark. First, the singular ignorance of mankind, common to all women, which led the girl to believe that a great man of science is superior to the pleasures of weaker brethren; for they cannot understand the delights of fooling. The second point is—but it may be left to those who read as they run.
Then they rose and walked slowly under the grand old trees of Trinity Avenue, facing the setting sun, so that when they came to the end and turned to the left, it seemed as if they plunged into night. And presently they came to the gates of Newnham, the newer Newnham, with its trim garden and Queen Anne mansion. It grates upon one that the beginnings of a noble and lasting reform should be housed in a palace built in the conceited fashion of the day. What will they say of it in fifty years, when the fashion has changed and new styles reign?
"Come," said Angela, "come into my room. Let my last evening in the dear place be spent with you, Constance."
Angela's own room was daintily furnished and adorned with as many pictures, pretty things, books, and bric-à-brac as the narrow dimensions of a Newnham cell will allow. In a more advanced Newnham there will be two rooms for each student, and these will be larger.
The girls sat by the open window: the air was soft and sweet. A bunch of cowslips from the Coton meadows perfumed the room; there was the jug-jug of a nightingale in some tree not far off; opposite them were the lights of the other Newnham.
"The last night!" said Angela. "I can hardly believe that I go down to-morrow."
Then she was silent again.
"My life," she went on, speaking softly in the twilight, "begins to-morrow. What am I to do with it? Your own solution seems so easy because you are clever and you have no money, while I, who am—well, dear, not devoured by thirst for learning—have got so much. To begin with, there is the Brewery[5]. You cannot escape from a big brewery if it belong to you. You cannot hide it away. Messenger, Marsden & Company's Stout, their XXX, their Old and Mild, their Bitter, their Family Ales (that particularly at eight-and-six the nine-gallon cask, if paid for on delivery), their drays, their huge horses, their strong men, whose very appearance advertises the beer, and makes the weak-kneed and the narrow-chested rush to Whitechapel—my dear, these things stare one in the face wherever you go. I am that brewery, as you know. I am Messenger, Marsden & Company, myself, the sole partner in what my lawyer sweetly calls the Concern. Nobody else is concerned in it. It is—alas!—my own Great Concern, a dreadful responsibility."
"Why? Your people manage it for you."
"Yes—oh! yes—they do. And whether they manage it badly or well I do not know; whether they make wholesome beer or bad, whether they treat their clerks and workmen generously or meanly, whether the name of the company is beloved or hated, I do not know. Perhaps the very making of beer at all is wickedness."
"But—Angela," the other interrupted, "it is no business of yours. Naturally, wages are regulated by supply and——"
"No, my dear. That is political economy. I prefer the good old English plan. If I employ a man and he works faithfully, I should like that man to feel that he grows every day worth to me more than his marketable value."
Constance was silenced.
"Then, beside the brewery," Angela went on, "there is an unconscionable sum of money in the funds."
"There, at least," said her friend, "you need feel no scruple of conscience."
"But indeed I do; for how do I know that it is right to keep all this money idle! A hundred pounds saved and put into the funds mean three pounds a year. It is like a perennial stream flowing from a hidden reservoir in the hillside. But this stream, in my case, does no good at all. It neither fertilizes the soil nor is it drunk by man or beast, nor does it turn mills, nor is it a beautiful thing to look upon, nor does its silver current flow by banks of flowers or fall in cascades. It all runs away, and makes another reservoir in another hillside. My dear, it is a stream of compound interest, which is constantly getting deeper and broader and stronger, and yet is never of the least use, and turns no wheels. Now, what am I to do with this money?"
"Endow Newnham; there, at least, is something practical."
"I will found some scholarships, if you please, later on, when you have made your own work felt. Again, there are my houses in the East End."
"Sell them."
"That is only to shift the responsibility. My dear, I have streets of houses. They all lie about Whitechapel way. My grandfather, John Messenger, bought houses, I believe, just as other people buy apples, by the peck, or some larger measure, a reduction being made on taking a quantity. There they are, and mostly inhabited."
"You have agents, I suppose?" said Constance unsympathizingly. "It is their duty to see that the houses are well kept."
"Yes, I have agents. But they cannot absolve me from responsibility."
"Then," asked Constance, "what do you mean to do?"
"I am a native almost of Whitechapel. My grandfather, who succeeded to the brewery, was born there. His father was also a brewer: his grandfather is, I believe, prehistoric: he lived there long after his son, my father, was born. When he moved to Bloomsbury Square he thought he was getting into quite a fashionable quarter, and he only went to Portman Square because he desired me to go into society. I am so rich that I shall quite certainly be welcomed in society. But, my dear, Whitechapel and its neighborhood are my proper sphere. Why, my very name! I reek of beer; I am all beer; my blood is beer. Angela Marsden Messenger! What could more plainly declare my connection with Messenger, Marsden & Company? I only wonder that he did not call me Marsden-&—Company Messenger."
"But—Angela——"
"He would, Constance, if he had thought of it. For, you see, I was the heiress from the very beginning, because my father died before my birth. And my grandfather intended me to become the perfect brewer, if a woman can attain to so high an ideal. Therefore I was educated in the necessary and fitting lines. They taught me the industries of England, the arts and manufactures, mathematics, accounts, the great outlets of trade, book-keeping, mechanics—all those things that are practical. How it happened that I was allowed to learn music I do not know. Then, when I grew up, I was sent here by him, because the very air of Cambridge, he thought, makes people exact; and women are so prone to be inexact. I was to read while I was here all the books about political and social economy. I have also learned for business purposes two or three languages. I am now finished. I know all the theories about people, and I don't believe any of them will work. Therefore, my dear, I shall get to know the people before I apply them."
"Was your grandfather a student of political economy?"
"Not at all. But he had a respect for justice, and he wanted me to be just. It is so difficult, he used to say, for a woman to be just. For either she flies into a rage and punishes with excess, or she takes pity and forgives. As for himself, he was as hard as nails, and the people knew it."
"And your project?"
"It is very simple. I efface myself. I vanish. I disappear."
"What?"
"If anybody asks where I am, no one will know, except you, my dear; and you will not tell."
"You will be in——"
"In Whitechapel, or thereabouts. Your Angela will be a dressmaker, and she will live by herself and become—what her great-grandmother was—one of the people."
"You will not like it at all."
"Perhaps not; but I am weary of theories, facts, statistics. I want flesh and blood. I want to feel myself a part of this striving, eager, anxious humanity, on whose labors I live in comfort, by whom I have been educated, to whom I owe all, and for whom I have done nothing—no, nothing at all, selfish wretch that I am!"
She clasped her hands with a fine gesture of remorse.
"O woman of silence!" she cried; "you sit upon the heights, and you can disregard—because it is your right—the sorrows and the joys of the world. But I cannot. I belong to the people—with a great big P, my dear—I cannot bear to go on living by their toil and giving nothing in return. What a dreadful thing is a she-Dives!"
"I confess," said Constance coldly, "that I have always regarded wealth as a means for leading the higher life—the life of study and research—unencumbered by the sordid aims and mean joys of the vulgar herd."
"It is possible and right for you to live apart, my dear. It is impossible, because it would be wrong for m[1q]e."
"But—alone? You will venture into the dreadful region alone?"
"Quite alone, Constance."
"And—and—your reputation, Angela?"
Angela laughed merrily.
"As for my reputation, my dear, it may take care of itself. Those of my friends who think I am not to be trusted may transfer their affection to more worthy objects. The first thing in the emancipation of the sex, Constance, is equal education. The next is——"
"What?" for Angela paused.
She drew forth from her pocket a small bright instrument of steel, which glittered in the twilight. Not a revolver, dear readers.
"The next," she said, brandishing the weapon before Constance's eyes, "is—the LATCH-KEY."
PROLOGUE.—Part II.
The time was eleven in the forenoon; the season was the month of roses; the place was a room on the first floor at the Park-end of Piccadilly—a noisy room, because the windows were open, and there was a great thunder and rattle of cabs, omnibuses, and all kinds of vehicles. When this noise became, as it sometimes did, intolerable, the occupant of the room shut his double windows, and immediately there was a great calm, with a melodious roll of distant wheels, like the buzzing of bees about the marigold on a summer afternoon. With the double window a man may calmly sit down amid even the roar of Cheapside, or the never-ending cascade of noise at Charing Cross.
The room was furnished with taste; the books on the shelves were well bound, as if the owner took a proper pride in them, as indeed was the case. There were two or three good pictures; there was a girl's head in marble; there were cards and invitations lying on the mantel-shelf and in a rack beside the clock. Everybody could tell at the first look of the room that it was a bachelor's den. Also because nothing was new, and because there were none of the peacockeries, whims and fancies, absurdities, fads and fashions, gimcrackeries, the presence of which does always and infallibly proclaim the chamber of a young man; this room manifestly belonged to a bachelor who was old in the profession. In fact, the owner of the chambers, of which this was the breakfast, morning, and dining-room, whenever he dined at home, was seated in an armchair beside a breakfast-table, looking straight before him, with a face filled with anxiety. An honest, ugly, pleasing, rugged, attractive face, whose features were carved one day when Dame Nature was benevolently disposed, but had a blunt chisel.
"I always told him," he muttered, "that he should learn the whole of his family history as soon as he was three-and-twenty years of age. One must keep such promises. Yet it would have been better that he should never know. But then it might have been found out, and that would have been far worse. Yet, how could it have been found out? No: that is ridiculous."
He mused in silence. In his fingers he held a cigar which he had lit, but allowed to go out again. The morning paper was lying on the table, unopened.
"How will the boy take it?" he asked; "will he take it crying? Or will he take it laughing?"
He smiled, picturing to himself the "boy's" astonishment.
Looking at the man more closely, one became aware that he was really a very pleasant-looking person. He was about five-and-forty years of age, and he wore a full beard and mustache, after the manner of his contemporaries, with whom a beard is still considered a manly ornament to the face. The beard was brown, but it began to show, as wine-merchants say of port, the "appearance of age." In some light, there was more gray than brown. His dark-brown hair, however, retained its original thickness of thatch, and was as yet untouched by any streak of gray. Seeing that he belonged to one of the oldest and best of English families, one might have expected something of that delicacy of feature which some of us associate with birth. But, as has already been said, his face was rudely chiselled, his complexion was ruddy, and he looked as robust as a plough-boy; yet he had the air of an English gentleman, and that ought to satisfy anybody. And he was the younger son of a duke, being by courtesy Lord Jocelyn Le Breton.
While he was thus meditating, there was a quick step on the stair, and the subject of his thoughts entered the room.
This interesting young man was a much more aristocratic person to look upon than his senior. He paraded, so to speak, at every point, the thoroughbred air. His thin and delicate nose, his clear eye, his high though narrow forehead, his well-cut lip, his firm chin, his pale cheek, his oval face, the slim figure, the thin, long fingers, the spring of his walk, the poise of his head—what more could one expect even from the descendant of all the Howards? But this morning the pallor of his cheek was flushed as if with some disquieting news.
"Good-morning, Harry," said Lord Jocelyn quietly.
Harry returned the greeting. Then he threw upon the table a small packet of papers.
"There, sir, I have read them; thank you for letting me see them."
"Sit down, boy, and let us talk; will you have a cigar? No? A cigarette, then? No? You are probably a little upset by this—new—unexpected revelation?"
"A little upset!" repeated the young man, with a short laugh.
"To be sure—to be sure—one could expect nothing else; now sit down, and let us talk over the matter calmly."
The young man sat down, but he did not present the appearance of one inclined to talk over the matter calmly.
"In novels," said Lord Jocelyn, "it is always the good fortune of young gentlemen brought up in ignorance of their parentage to turn out, when they do discover their origin, the heirs to an illustrious name; I have always admired that in novels. In your case, my poor Harry, the reverse is the case; the distinction ought to console you."
"Why was I not told before?"
"Because the boyish brain is more open to prejudice than that of the adult; because, among your companions, you certainly would have felt at a disadvantage had you known yourself to be the son of a——"
"You always told me," said Harry, "that my father was in the army!"
"What do you call a sergeant in a line regiment, then?"
"Oh! of course, but among gentlemen—I mean—among the set with whom I was brought up, to be in the army means to have a commission."
"Yes: that was my pardonable deception. I thought that you would respect yourself more if you felt that your father, like the fathers of your friends, belonged to the upper class. Now, my dear boy, you will respect yourself just as much, although you know that he was but a sergeant, and a brave fellow who fell at my side in the Indian Mutiny."
"And my mother?"
"I did not know her; she was dead before I found you out, and took you from your Uncle Bunker."
"Uncle Bunker!" Harry laughed, with a little bitterness. "Uncle Bunker! Fancy asking one's Uncle Bunker to dine at the club! What is he by trade?"
"He is something near a big brewery, a brewery boom, as the Americans say. What he actually is, I do not quite know. He lives, if I remember rightly, at a place an immense distance from here, called Stepney."
"Do you know anything more about my father's family?"
"No! The sergeant was a tall, handsome, well set-up man; but I know nothing about his connections. His name, if that is any help to you, was, was—in fact"—here Lord Jocelyn assumed an air of ingratiating sweetness—"was—Goslett—Goslett; not a bad name, I think, pronounced with perhaps a leaning to an accent on the last syllable. Don't you agree with me, Harry?"
"Oh! yes, it will do. Better than Bunker, and not so good as Le Breton. As for my Christian name, now?"
"There I ventured on one small variation."
"Am I not, then, even Harry?"
"Yes, yes, yes, you are—now; formerly you were Harry without the H. It is the custom of the neighborhood in which you were born."
"I see! If I go back among my own people, I shall be, then, once more 'Arry?"
"Yes; and shout on penny steamers, and brandish pint bottles of stout, and sing along the streets, in simple abandonment to Arcadian joy; and trample on flowers; and break pretty things for wantonness; and exercise a rude but effective wit, known among the ancients as Fescennine, upon passing ladies; and get drunk o' nights; and walk the streets with a pipe in your mouth. That is what you would be, if you went back, my dear child."
Harry laughed.
"After all," he said, "this is a very difficult position. I can no longer go about pretending anything; I must tell people."
"Is that absolutely necessary?"
"Quite necessary. It will be a deuce of a business, explaining."
"Shall we tell it to one person, and let him be the town-crier?"
"That, I suppose, would be the best plan; meantime, I could retire, while I made some plans for the future."
"Perhaps, if you really must tell the truth, it would be well to go out of town for a bit."
"As for myself," Harry continued, "I suppose I shall get over the wrench after a bit. Just for the moment I feel knocked out of time."
"Keep the secret, then; let it be one between you and me only, Harry; let no one know."
But he shook his head.
"Everybody must know. Those who refuse to keep up the acquaintance of a private soldier's son—well, then, a non-commissioned officer's son—will probably let me know their decision, some way or other. Those who do not——" He paused.
"Nonsense, boy; who cares nowadays what a man is by birth? Is not this great city full of people who go anywhere, and are nobody's sons? Look here, and here"—he tossed half a dozen cards of invitation across the table—"can you tell me who these people were twenty years ago—or these—or these?"
"No: I do not care in the least who they were. I care only that they shall know who I am; I will not, for my part, pretend to be what I am not."
"I believe you are right, boy. Let the world laugh if they please, and have done with it."
Harry began to walk up and down the room; he certainly did not look the kind of a man to give in; to try hiding things away. Quite the contrary. And he laughed—he took to laughing.
"I suppose it will sound comic at first," he said, "until people get used to it. Do you know what he turns out to be? That kind of thing: after all, we think too much about what people say—what does it matter what they say or how they say it? If they like to laugh, they can. Who shall be the town-crier?"
"I was thinking," said Lord Jocelyn slowly, "of calling to-day upon Lady Wimbledon."
The young man laughed, with a little heightening of his color.
"Of course—a very good person, an excellent person, and to-morrow it will be all over London. There are one or two things," he went on after a moment, "that I do not understand from the papers which you put into my hands last night."
"What are those things?" Lord Jocelyn for a moment looked uneasy.
"Well—perhaps it is impertinent to ask. But—when Mr. Bunker, the respectable Uncle Bunker, traded me away, what did he get for me?"
"Every bargain has two sides," said Lord Jocelyn. "You know what I got, you want to know what the honorable Bunker got. Harry, on that point I must refer you to the gentleman himself."
"Very good. Then I come to the next difficulty—a staggerer. What did you do it for? One moment, sir"—for Lord Jocelyn seemed about to reply. "One moment. You were rich, you were well born, you were young. What on earth made you pick a boy out of the gutter and bring him up like a gentleman?"
"You are twenty-three, Harry, and yet you ask for motives. My dear boy, have you not learned the golden rule? In all human actions look for the basest motive, and attribute that. If you see any reason for stopping short of quite the lowest spurs to action, such as revenge, hatred, malice, and envy, suppose the next lowest, and you will be quite safe. That next lowest is—son altesse, ma vanité."
"Oh!" replied Harry, "yet I fail to see how a child of the lowest classes could supply any satisfaction for even the next lowest of human motives."
"It was partly in this way. Mind, I do not for one moment pretend to answer the whole of your question. Men's motives, thank Heaven, are so mixed up, that no one can be quite a saint, while no one is altogether a sinner. Nature is a leveller, which is a comfort to us who are born in levelling times. In those days I was by way of being a kind of Radical. Not a Radical such as those who delight mankind in these happier days. But I had Liberal leanings, and thought I had ideas. When I was a boy of twelve or so, there were the '48 theories floating about the air; some of them got into my brain and stuck there. Men used to believe that a great time was coming—perhaps I heard a whisper of it; perhaps I was endowed with a greater faculty for credulity than my neighbors, and believed in humanity. However, I do not seek to explain. It may have occurred to me—I do not say it did—but I have a kind of recollection as if it did—one day after I had seen you, then in the custody of the respectable Bunker, that it would be an instructive and humorous thing to take a boy of the multitude and bring him up in all the culture, the tastes, the ideas of ourselves—you and me, for instance, Harry. This idea may have seized upon me, so that the more I thought of it, the better pleased I was with it. I may have pictured such a boy so taught, so brought up, with such tastes, returning to his own people. Disgust, I may have said, will make him a prophet; and such a prophet as the world has never yet seen. He would be like the follower of the Old Man of the Mountain. He would never cease to dream of the paradise he had seen: he would never cease to tell of it; he would be always leading his friends upward to the same levels on which he had once stood."
"Humph!" said Harry.
"Yes, I know," Lord Jocelyn went on. "I ought to have foretold that the education I prepared for you would have unfitted you for the rôle of prophet. I am not disappointed in you, Harry—quite the reverse. I now see that what has happened has been only what I should have expected. By some remarkable accident, you possess an appearance such as is generally believed to belong to persons of long-continued gentle descent. By a still more remarkable accident, all your tastes prove to be those of the cultured classes; the blood of the Bunkers has, in yourself, assumed the most azure hue."
"That is very odd," said Harry.
"It is a very remarkable thing, indeed," continued Lord Jocelyn gravely. "I have never ceased to wonder at this phenomenon. However, I was unable to send you to a public school on account of the necessity, as I thought, of concealing your parentage. But I gave you instruction of the best, and found for you companions—as you know, among the——"
"Yes," said Harry. "My companions were gentlemen, I suppose; I learned from them."
"Perhaps. Still, the earthenware pot cannot become a brass pot, whatever he may pretend. You were good metal from the beginning."
"You are now, Harry," he went on, "three-and-twenty. You are master of three foreign languages; you have travelled on the Continent and in America; you are a good rider, a good shot, a good fencer, a good dancer. You can paint a little, fiddle a little, dance a great deal, act pretty well, speak pretty well; you can, I dare say, make love as becomes a gentleman; you can write very fair verses; you are good-looking, you have the air noble; you are not a prig; you are not an æsthete; you possess your share of common sense."
"One thing you have omitted which, at the present juncture, may be more useful than any of these things."
"What is that?"
"You were good enough to give me a lathe, and to have me instructed in the mysteries of turning. I am a practical cabinet-maker, if need be."
"But why should this be of use to you?"
"Because, Lord Jocelyn"—Harry ran and leaned over the table with a sweet smile of determination on his face—"because I am going back to my own people for a while, and it may be that the trade of cabinet-making may prove a very backbone of strength to me among them——"
"Harry—you would not—indeed, you could not go back to Bunker?" Lord Jocelyn asked this question with every outward appearance of genuine alarm.
"I certainly would. My very kind guardian and patron, would you stand in my way? I want to see those people from where I am sprung: I want to learn how they differ from you and your kin. I must compare myself with them—I must prove the brotherhood of humanity."
"You will go? Yes—I see you will—it is in your eyes. Go, then, Harry. But return to me soon. The slender fortune of a younger son shall be shared with you so long as I live, and given to you when I die. Do not stay among them. There are, indeed—at least, I suppose so—all sorts and conditions of men. But to me, and to men brought up like you and me, I do not understand how there can be any but one sort and one condition. Come back soon, boy. Believe me—no—do not believe me—prove it yourself: in the social pyramid, the greatest happiness, Harry, lies near the top."
CHAPTER I.NEWS FOR HIS LORDSHIP.
"I have news for your lordship," said Mrs. Bormalack, at the breakfast-table, "something that will cheer you up a bit. We are to have an addition to our family."
His lordship nodded his head, meaning that he would receive her news without more delay than was necessary, but that at present his mind was wholly occupied with a contest between one of his teeth and a crust. The tooth was an outlying one, all its lovely companions having withered and gone, and it was undefended; the crust was unyielding. For the moment no one could tell what might be the result.
Her ladyship replied for him.
Lady Davenant was a small woman, if you go by inches; her exalted rank gave her, however, a dignity designed for very much larger persons; yet she carried it with ease. She was by no means young, and her hair was thin as well as gray; her face, which was oval and delicately curved, might formerly have been beautiful; the eyes were bright and eager, and constantly in motion, as is often the case with restless and nervous persons; her lips were thin and as full of independent action as her eyes; she had thin hands, so small that they might have belonged to a child of eight, when inclined for vaunting, the narrowest and most sloping shoulders that ever were seen, so sloping that people unaccustomed to her were wont to tremble lest the whole of her dress should suddenly slide straight down those shoulders, as down a slope of ice; and strange ladies, impelled by this apprehension, had been known to ask her in a friendly whisper if she could thoroughly depend upon the pins at her throat. As Mrs. Bormalack often said, speaking of her noble boarders among her friends, those shoulders of her ladyship were "quite a feature." Next to the pride of having at her table such guests—who, however, did not give in to the good old English custom of paying double prices for having a title—was the distinction of pointing to those unique shoulders and of talking about them.
Her ladyship had a shrill, reedy voice, and spoke loudly. It was remarked by the most superficial observer, moreover, that she possessed a very strong American accent.
