"ElizabethGaskell-HalfALifeTimeAgo" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gaskell Elizabeth C)

roads, but walked miles and miles, lantern in hand, in the dead of
night, to discover and guide the solemnly-drunken husband home; who
had a dreadful headache the next day, and the day after that came
forth as grave, and sober, and virtuous looking as if there were no
such thing as malt and spirituous liquors in the world; and who were
seldom reminded of their misdoings by their wives, to whom such
occasional outbreaks were as things of course, when once the
immediate anxiety produced by them was over. Such were--such are--
the characteristics of a class now passing away from the face of the
land, as their compeers, the yeomen, have done before them. Of such
was William Dixon. He was a shrewd clever farmer, in his day and
generation, when shrewdness was rather shown in the breeding and
rearing of sheep and cattle than in the cultivation of land. Owing
to this character of his, statesmen from a distance from beyond
Kendal, or from Borrowdale, of greater wealth than he, would send
their sons to be farm-servants for a year or two with him, in order
to learn some of his methods before setting up on land of their own.
When Susan, his daughter, was about seventeen, one Michael Hurst was
farm-servant at Yew Nook. He worked with the master, and lived with
the family, and was in all respects treated as an equal, except in
the field. His father was a wealthy statesman at Wythburne, up
beyond Grasmere; and through Michael's servitude the families had
become acquainted, and the Dixons went over to the High Beck sheep-
shearing, and the Hursts came down by Red Bank and Loughrig Tarn and
across the Oxenfell when there was the Christmas-tide feasting at Yew
Nook. The fathers strolled round the fields together, examined
cattle and sheep, and looked knowing over each other's horses. The
mothers inspected the dairies and household arrangements, each openly
admiring the plans of the other, but secretly preferring their own.
Both fathers and mothers cast a glance from time to time at Michael
and Susan, who were thinking of nothing less than farm or dairy, but
whose unspoken attachment was, in all ways, so suitable and natural a
thing that each parent rejoiced over it, although with characteristic
reserve it was never spoken about--not even between husband and wife.

Susan had been a strong, independent, healthy girl; a clever help to
her mother, and a spirited companion to her father; more of a man in
her (as he often said) than her delicate little brother ever would
have. He was his mother's darling, although she loved Susan well.
There was no positive engagement between Michael and Susan--I doubt
whether even plain words of love had been spoken; when one winter-
time Margaret Dixon was seized with inflammation consequent upon a
neglected cold. She had always been strong and notable, and had been
too busy to attend to the early symptoms of illness. It would go
off, she said to the woman who helped in the kitchen; or if she did
not feel better when they had got the hams and bacon out of hand, she
would take some herb-tea and nurse up a bit. But Death could not
wait till the hams and bacon were cured: he came on with rapid
strides, and shooting arrows of portentous agony. Susan had never
seen illness--never knew how much she loved her mother till now, when