MOLLY GIBSON'S CHILDHOOD.
Sixteen years this time, all Hollingford had been to its by the that Mr. Hall, the doctor, who had them all their days, was going to take a partner. It was no use to them on the subject; so Mr. Browning the vicar, Mr. Sheepshanks (Lord Cumnor's agent), and Mr. Hall himself, the of the little society, left off the attempt, that the Che sarà sarà would prove more to the than many arguments. Mr. Hall had told his that, with the spectacles, his was not to be upon; and they might have out for themselves that his was very defective, although, on this point, he to his own opinion, and was to the of people's nowadays, "like on blotting-paper, all the into each other," he would say. And more than once Mr. Hall had had of a nature,—"rheumatism" he used to call them, but he for himself as if they had been gout—which had his attention to summonses. But, and deaf, and as he might be, he was still Mr. Hall the doctor who all their ailments—unless they died meanwhile—and he had no right to speak of old, and taking a partner.
He very to work all the same; in medical journals, reading testimonials, and qualifications; and just when the ladies of Hollingford that they had their that he was as as ever, he them by his new partner, Mr. Gibson, to call upon them, and "slyly," as these ladies said, to him into practice. And "who was this Mr. Gibson?" they asked, and echo might answer the question, if she liked, for no one else did. No one in all his life anything more of his than the Hollingford people might have out the day they saw him: that he was tall, grave, than otherwise; thin to be called "a very figure," in those days, Christianity had come into vogue; speaking with a Scotch accent; and, as one good lady observed, "so very in his conversation," by which she meant sarcastic. As to his birth, parentage, and education,—the of Hollingford was, that he was the son of a Scotch duke, by a Frenchwoman; and the for this were these:—He spoke with a Scotch accent; therefore, he must be Scotch. He had a very appearance, an figure, and was apt—so his ill-wishers said—to give himself airs; therefore, his father must have been some person of quality; and, that granted, nothing was than to this up all the notes of the of the peerage,—baronet, baron, viscount, earl, marquis, duke. Higher they not go, though one old lady, with English history, the remark, that "she that one or two of the Stuarts—hem—had not always been,—ahem—quite in their—conduct; and she such—ahem—things ran in families." But, in popular opinion, Mr. Gibson's father always a duke; nothing more.
Then his mother must have been a Frenchwoman, his was so black; and he was so sallow; and he had been in Paris. All this might be true, or might not; nobody knew, or out anything more about him than what Mr. Hall told them, namely, that his professional were as high as his character, and that were above the average, as Mr. Hall had taken pains to him to his patients. The of this world is as as its glory, as Mr. Hall out the year of his partnership was over. He had of left to him now to nurse his and his eyesight. The doctor had the day; nearly every one sent for Mr. Gibson. Even at the great houses—even at the Towers, that of all, where Mr. Hall had his new partner with and trembling, with as to his behaviour, and the he might make on my lord the Earl, and my lady the Countess, Mr. Gibson was at the end of a with as much welcome respect for his professional skill as Mr. Hall himself had been. Nay—and this was a little too much for the old doctor's good temper—Mr. Gibson had been once to dinner at the Towers, to with the great Sir Astley, the of the profession! To be sure, Mr. Hall had been asked as well; but he was up just then with his (since he had had a partner the had been allowed to itself), and he had not been able to go. Poor Mr. Hall got over this mortification; after it he allowed himself to of and hard of hearing, and closely to the house the two that of his life. He sent for an grand-niece to keep him company in his old age; he, the woman-contemning old bachelor, for the presence of the pretty, Mary Pearson, who was good and sensible, and nothing more. She a close with the of the vicar, Mr. Browning, and Mr. Gibson time to very with all three. Hollingford much on which lady would Mrs. Gibson, and was sorry when the talk about possibilities, and the about probabilities, with to the surgeon's marriage, ended in the most natural manner in the world, by his marrying his predecessor's niece. The two Miss Brownings no of going into a on the occasion, although their looks and manners were watched. On the contrary, they were at the wedding, and Mrs. Gibson it was that died of consumption, four or five years after her marriage—three years after the death of her great-uncle, and when her only child, Molly, was just three years old.
Mr. Gibson did not speak much about the at the of his wife, which it was that he felt. Indeed, he all of sympathy, and got up and left the room when Miss Phœbe Browning saw him after his loss, and into an of tears, which to end in hysterics. Miss Browning she him for his hard-heartedness on that occasion; but a she came to very high with old Mrs. Goodenough, for out her Mr. Gibson was a man of feeling; by the of his hat-band, which ought to have his hat, there was at least three of to be seen. And, in of it all, Miss Browning and Miss Phœbe themselves as Mr. Gibson's most friends, in right of their for his wife, and would have taken a quasi-motherly in his little girl, had she not been by a in the shape of Betty, her nurse, who was of any her and her charge; and and all those ladies who, by age, rank, or propinquity, she of "casting sheep's at master."
Several years the opening of this story, Mr. Gibson's position settled for life, and professionally. He was a widower, and likely to so; his were on little Molly, but to her, in their most private moments, he did not give way to much of his feelings; his most for her was "Goosey," and he took a in her mind with his badinage. He had a for people, from his medical into the to health of feeling. He himself into that still his was lord of all, he had into the of on any other than purely subjects. Molly, however, had her own to her. Though her papa laughed at her, her, at her, in a way which the Miss Brownings called "really cruel" to each other when they were alone, Molly took her little and pleasures, and them into her papa's ears, sooner than into Betty's, that kind-hearted termagant. The child to her father well, and the two had the most together—half banter, seriousness, but friendship. Mr. Gibson three servants; Betty, a cook, and a girl who was to be housemaid, but who was under the two, and had a life of it in consequence. Three would not have been if it had not been Mr. Gibson's habit, as it had been Mr. Hall's him, to take two "pupils" as they were called in the language of Hollingford, "apprentices" as they were in fact—being by indentures, and paying a premium to learn their business. They in the house, and an uncomfortable, ambiguous, or, as Miss Browning called it with some truth, "amphibious" position. They had their with Mr. Gibson and Molly, and were to be in the way; Mr. Gibson not being a man who make conversation, and the of talking under restraint. Yet something him him wince, as if his were not performed, when, as the cloth was drawn, the two rose up with alacrity, gave him a nod, which was to be as a bow, against each other in their to out of the dining-room quickly; and then might be along a passage which to the surgery, with half-suppressed laughter. Yet the he at this of only his on their inefficiency, or stupidity, or manners, more than before.
Beyond direct professional instruction, he did not know what to do with the of of men, mission to be, to be by their master consciously, and to him unconsciously. Once or twice Mr. Gibson had taking a fresh pupil, in the of himself free from the incubus, but his as a had spread so that his fees which he had prohibitory, were paid, in order that the man might make a start in life, with the of having been a of Gibson of Hollingford. But as Molly to be a little girl of a child, when she was about eight years old, her father the of her having her and dinners so often alone with the pupils, without his presence. To do away with this evil, more than for the she give, he a woman, the of a shopkeeper in the town, who had left a family, to come every breakfast, and to with Molly till he came home at night; or, if he was detained, until the child's bed-time.
"Now, Miss Eyre," said he, up his the day she entered upon her office, "remember this: you are to make good tea for the men, and see that they have their comfortably, and—you are five-and-thirty, I think you said?—try and make them talk,—rationally, I am is your or anybody's power; but make them talk without or giggling. Don't teach Molly too much: she must sew, and read, and write, and do her sums; but I want to keep her a child, and if I more learning for her, I'll see about it to her myself. After all, I'm not sure that reading or is necessary. Many a good woman married with only a of her name; it's a of mother-wit, to my fancy; but, however, we must to the of society, Miss Eyre, and so you may teach the child to read."
Miss Eyre in silence, but to be to the of the doctor, she and her family had good to know. She tea; she helped the men in Mr. Gibson's absence, as well as in his presence, and she the way to their tongues, their master was away, by talking to them on in her way. She Molly to read and write, but to keep her in every other branch of education. It was only by and hard, that by Molly her father to let her have French and lessons. He was always of her too much educated, though he need not have been alarmed; the masters who visited such small country as Hollingford years ago, were no such great in their arts. Once a week she joined a dancing class in the assembly-room at the in the town: the "George;" and, being by her father in every attempt, she read every book that came in her way, almost with as much as if it had been forbidden. For his station in life, Mr. Gibson had an good library; the medical of it was to Molly, being in the surgery, but every other book she had either read, or to read. Her place of study was that seat in the cherry-tree, where she got the green on her frock, that have already been mentioned as likely to wear Betty's life out. In of this "hidden i' th' bud," Betty was to all strong, alert, and flourishing. She was the one in Miss Eyre's lot, who was otherwise so happy in having met with a well-paid just when she needed it most. But Betty, though in with her master when he told her of the of having a for his little daughter, was to any of her authority and over the child who had been her charge, her plague, and her since Mrs. Gibson's death. She took up her position as of all Miss Eyre's and doings from the very first, and did not for a moment to her disapprobation. In her she not help the patience and of the good lady,—for a "lady" Miss Eyre was in the best of the word, though in Hollingford she only took rank as a shopkeeper's daughter. Yet Betty about her with the of a gnat, always to fault, if not to bite. Miss Eyre's only came from the it might least have been expected—from her pupil; on behalf, as an little personage, Betty always her attacks. But very early in the day Molly their injustice, and soon she to respect Miss Eyre for her of what gave her more pain than Betty imagined. Mr. Gibson had been a friend in need to her family, so Miss Eyre her complaints, sooner than him. And she had her reward. Betty would offer Molly all of small to neglect Miss Eyre's wishes; Molly resisted, and away at her of or her difficult sum. Betty at Miss Eyre's expense; Molly looked up with the gravity, as if the of an speech; and there is nothing so to a as to be asked to his into plain matter-of-fact English, and to the point lies. Occasionally Betty her entirely, and spoke to Miss Eyre; but when this had been done in Molly's presence, the girl out into such a of in of her governess, that Betty herself was daunted, though she to take the child's anger as a good joke, and to Miss Eyre herself to join in her amusement.
"Bless the child! one 'ud think I was a pussy-cat, and she a hen-sparrow, with her all fluttering, and her little aflame, and her to me just I to look near her nest. Nay, child! if lik'st to be in a close room, learning as is of no good when they is learnt, o' on Job Donkin's hay-cart, it's look-out, not mine. She's a little vixen, isn't she?" at Miss Eyre, as she her speech. But the saw no in the affair; the of Molly to a hen-sparrow was upon her. She was and conscientious, and knew, from home experience, the of an temper. So she to Molly for way to her passion, and the child it hard to be for what she her just anger against Betty. But, after all, these were the small of a very happy childhood.
