Woman Who Did

Grant Allen

Description

Canadian scholar and writer Grant Allen held many progressive views, and he saw himself as a proponent of women's rights. He penned the novel The Woman Who Did as a means of shedding light on the many social strictures and constraints facing women in the late nineteenth century. The story follows a middle-class young woman who deliberately flouts convention and eventually bears a child out of wedlock. Met with a firestorm of criticism in its day, The Woman Who Did remains an intriguing read more than 100 years later.

Sujets

• Romance

Informations

• Publié par: The Floating Press
• Date de parution: 01 juillet 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781776581955
• Langue: English

Extrait

THE WOMAN WHO DID
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GRANT ALLEN
 
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The Woman Who Did First published in 1895 Epub ISBN 978-1-77658-195-5 Also available: PDF ISBN 978-1-77658-196-2 © 2013 The Floating Press and its licensors. All rights reserved. While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in The Floating Press edition of this book, The Floating Press does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. The Floating Press does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Many suitcases look alike. Visit www.thefloatingpress.com
Contents
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Preface I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX X XI XII XIII XIV XV XVI XVII XVIII XIX XX XXI XXII XXIII XXIV
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TO MY DEAR WIFE
TO WHOM I HAVE DEDICATED MY TWENTY HAPPIEST YEARS
I DEDICATE ALSO
THIS BRIEF MEMORIAL OF A LESS FORTUNATE LOVE
WRITTEN AT PERUGIA
SPRING 1893
FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE
WHOLLY AND SOLELY TO SATISFY
MY OWN TASTE
AND MY OWN CONSCIENCE
Preface
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"But surely no woman would ever dare to do so," said my friend.
"I knew a woman who did," said I; "and this is her story."
I
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Mrs. Dewsbury's lawn was held by those who knew it the loveliest inSurrey. The smooth and springy sward that stretched in front ofthe house was all composed of a tiny yellow clover. It gavebeneath the foot like the pile on velvet. One's gaze looked forthfrom it upon the endless middle distances of the oak-clad Weald,with the uncertain blue line of the South Downs in the background.Ridge behind ridge, the long, low hills of paludina limestone stoodout in successive tiers, each thrown up against its neighbor by themisty haze that broods eternally over the wooded valley; till,roaming across them all, the eye rested at last on the rearingscarp of Chanctonbury Ring, faintly pencilled on the furthest skyline.Shadowy phantoms of dim heights framed the verge to east andwest. Alan Merrick drank it in with profound satisfaction. Afterthose sharp and clear-cut Italian outlines, hard as lapis lazuli,the mysterious vagueness, the pregnant suggestiveness, of ourEnglish scenery strikes the imagination; and Alan was fresh homefrom an early summer tour among the Peruginesque solidities of theUmbrian Apennines. "How beautiful it all is, after all," he said,turning to his entertainer. "In Italy 'tis the background thepainter dwells upon; in England, we look rather at the middledistance."
Mrs. Dewsbury darted round her the restless eye of a hostess, tosee upon whom she could socially bestow him. "Oh, come this way,"she said, sweeping across the lawn towards a girl in a blue dressat the opposite corner. "You must know our new-comer. I want tointroduce you to Miss Barton, from Cambridge. She's SUCH a nicegirl too,—the Dean of Dunwich's daughter."
Alan Merrick drew back with a vague gesture of distaste. "Oh,thank you," he replied; "but, do you know, I don't think I likedeans, Mrs. Dewsbury." Mrs. Dewsbury's smile was recondite anddiplomatic. "Then you'll exactly suit one another," she answeredwith gay wisdom. "For, to tell you the truth, I don't think SHEdoes either."
The young man allowed himself to be led with a passive protest inthe direction where Mrs. Dewsbury so impulsively hurried him. Heheard that cultivated voice murmuring in the usual inaudible toneof introduction, "Miss Barton, Mr. Alan Merrick." Then he raisedhis hat. As he did so, he looked down at Herminia Barton's facewith a sudden start of surprise. Why, this was a girl of mostunusual beauty!
She was tall and dark, with abundant black hair, richly waved abovethe ample forehead; and she wore a curious Oriental-looking navy-bluerobe of some soft woollen stuff, that fell in natural foldsand set off to the utmost the lissome grace of her rounded figure.It was a sort of sleeveless sack, embroidered in front witharabesques in gold thread, and fastened obliquely two inches belowthe waist with a belt of gilt braid, and a clasp of Moorish jewel-work.Beneath it, a bodice of darker silk showed at the arms andneck, with loose sleeves in keeping. The whole costume, thoughquite simple in style, a compromise either for afternoon orevening, was charming in its novelty, charming too in the way itpermitted the utmost liberty and variety of movement to the lithelimbs of its wearer. But it was her face particularly that struckAlan Merrick at first sight. That face was above all things theface of a free woman. Something so frank and fearless shone inHerminia's glance, as her eye met his, that Alan, who respectedhuman freedom above all other qualities in man or woman, was takenon the spot by its perfect air of untrammelled liberty. Yet it wassubtle and beautiful too, undeniably beautiful. Herminia Barton'sfeatures, I think, were even more striking in their way in laterlife, when sorrow had stamped her, and the mark of her willingmartyrdom for humanity's sake was deeply printed upon them. Buttheir beauty then was the beauty of holiness, which not all canappreciate. In her younger days, as Alan Merrick first saw her,she was beautiful still with the first flush of health and strengthand womanhood in a free and vigorous English girl's body. Acertain lofty serenity, not untouched with pathos, seemed to strikethe keynote. But that was not all. Some hint of every element inthe highest loveliness met in that face and form,—physical,intellectual, emotional, moral.
"You'll like him, Herminia," Mrs. Dewsbury said, nodding. "He'sone of your own kind, as dreadful as you are; very free andadvanced; a perfect firebrand. In fact, my dear child, I don'tknow which of you makes my hair stand on end most." And with thatintroductory hint, she left the pair forthwith to their owndevices.
Mrs. Dewsbury was right. It took those two but little time to feelquite at home with one another. Built of similar mould, eachseemed instinctively to grasp what each was aiming at. Two orthree turns pacing up and down the lawn, two or three steps alongthe box-covered path at the side, and they read one anotherperfectly. For he was true man, and she was real woman.
"Then you were at Girton?" Alan asked, as he paused with one handon the rustic seat that looks up towards Leith Hill, and theheather-clad moorland.
"Yes, at Girton," Herminia answered, sinking easily upon the bench,and letting one arm rest on the back in a graceful attitude ofunstudied attention. "But I didn't take my degree," she went onhurriedly, as one who is anxious to disclaim some too great honorthrust upon her. "I didn't care for the life; I thought itcramping. You see, if we women are ever to be free in the world,we must have in the end a freeman's education. But the educationat Girton made only a pretence at freedom. At heart, our girlswere as enslaved to conventions as any girls elsewhere. The wholeobject of the training was to see just how far you could manage topush a woman's education without the faintest danger of heremancipation."
"You are right," Alan answered briskly, for the point was a pet onewith him. "I was an Oxford man myself, and I know that servitude.When I go up to Oxford now and see the girls who are being groundin the mill at Somerville, I'm heartily sorry for them. It's worsefor them than for us; they miss the only part of university lifethat has educational value. When we men were undergraduates, welived our whole lives, lived them all round, developing equallyevery fibre of our natures. We read Plato, and Aristotle, and JohnStuart Mill, to be sure,—and I'm not quite certain we got muchgood from them; but then our talk and thought were not all ofbooks, and of what we spelt out in them. We rowed on the river, weplayed in the cricket-field, we lounged in the billiard-rooms, weran up to town for the day, we had wine in one another's roomsafter hall in the evening, and behaved like young fools, and threworanges wildly at one another's heads, and generally enjoyedourselves. It was all very silly and irrational, no doubt, but itwas life, it was reality; while the pretended earnestness of thosepallid Somerville girls is all an affectation of one-sidedculture."
"That's just it," Herminia answered, leaning back on the rusticseat like David's Madame Recamier. "You put your finger on thereal blot when you said those words, developing equally every fibreof your natures. That's what nobody yet wants us women to do.They're trying hard enough to develop us intellectually; butmorally and socially they want to mew us up just as close as ever.And they won't succeed. The zenana must go. Sooner or later, I'msure, if you begin by educating women, you must end by emancipatingthem."
"So I think too," Alan answered, growing every moment moreinterested. "And for my part, it's the emancipation, not the mereeducation, that most appeals to me."
"Yes, I've always felt that," Herminia went on, letting herself outmore freely, for she felt she was face to face with a sympatheticlistener. "And for that reason, it's the question of social andmoral emancipation that interests me far more than the merepolitical one,—woman's rights as they call it. Of course I'm amember of all the woman's franchise leagues and everything of thatsort,—they can't afford to do without a single friend's name ontheir lists at present; but the vote is a matter that troubles melittle in itself, what I want is to see women made fit to use it.After all, political life fills but a small and unimportant part inour total existence. It's the perpetual pressure of social andethical restrictions that most weighs down women."
Alan paused and looked hard at her. "And they tell me," he said ina slow voice, "you're the Dean of Dunwich's daughter!"
Herminia laughed lightly,—a ringing girlish laugh. Alan noticedit with pleasure. He felt at once that the iron of Girton had notentered into her soul, as into so many of our modern young women's.Ther