Partial Recap of Work
I just can't finish the book. Too painful. Posting what I have so far and moving on to Transcendental Wild Oats.
Although published in 1872, LMA started Work in 1861, before Little Women, before Hospital Sketches.
November 1872 Got out the old manuscript of “Success,” and called it “Work.” Fired up the engine, and plunged into a vortex, with many doubts about getting out. Can't work slowly, the thing possesses me, and I must obey till it's done. One thousand dollars was sent as a seal on the bargain, so I was bound, and sat at the oar like a galley-slave.
March 1873
Finished “Work,” - twenty chapters. Not what it should be, - too many interruptions. Should like to do one book in peace, and see if it wouldn't be good.
"An endless significance lies in work; in idleness alone is there perpetual despair."--CARLYLE.
TO MY MOTHER, WHOSE LIFE HAS BEEN A LONG LABOR OF LOVE, THIS BOOK IS GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED BY HER DAUGHTER.
Warnings: suicide, prostitution
Christie
We begin with our heroine, Christie, telling her aunt that she is leaving home because she is a burden and she knows her uncle doesn’t love her. Said uncle predicts she will be a failure like her mother. Christie fires back. "Please, don't say that to me; I can't bear it, for I shall never think her life a failure, because she tried to help herself, and married a good man in spite of poverty, when she loved him! You call that folly; but I'll do the same if I can; and I'd rather have what my father and mother left me, than all the money you are piling up, just for the pleasure of being richer than your neighbors."
He’s like okay, whatever and she sits alone by the fire. She thought of her mother, so like herself, who had borne the commonplace life of home till she could bear it no longer. Then had gone away to teach, as most country girls are forced to do. Had met, loved, and married a poor gentleman, and, after a few years of genuine happiness, untroubled even by much care and poverty, had followed him out of the world, leaving her little child to the protection of her brother.
Servant
Christie boards with a Mrs. Flint, who she knows from somewhere. Very lucky how Jo in LW and Christie both know people who own boardinghouses and don’t have to cry themselves to sleep in hotel rooms because nobody will give them a place to live.
She took possession [of the room], feeling very rich with the hundred dollars Uncle Enos gave her, and delightfully independent, with no milk-pans to scald; no heavy lover to elude; no humdrum district school to imprison her day after day.
For a week she enjoyed her liberty heartily, then set about finding something to do. Her wish was to be a governess, that being the usual refuge for respectable girls who have a living to get. But Christie soon found her want of accomplishments a barrier to success in that line, for the mammas thought less of the solid than of the ornamental branches, and wished their little darlings to learn French before English, music before grammar, and drawing before writing.
So she takes a place as servant. She assumes it’s merely kitchen work, and is surprised when Mr. Stuart asks her to clean his boots. "It isn't the work; it's the degradation; and I won't submit to it," she says to her fellow servant Hepsey, who ran away from slavery five years ago.
She doesn’t mind the job, other than that, even though Mrs. Stuart is a snob. She observes the various party guests and listens to Hepsey’s stories. And there’s a library to read, which proves her downfall. She falls asleep while reading and drops her book and it knocks over the candle.
Sitting up she looked dizzily about her. The smoke was clearing fast, a window having been opened; and the tableau was a striking one. Mr. Stuart with an excited countenance was dancing frantically on a heap of half-consumed clothes pulled from the wall. He had not only drenched them with water from bowl and pitcher, but had also cast those articles upon the pile like extinguishers, and was skipping among the fragments with an agility which contrasted with his stout figure in full evening costume, and his besmirched face, made the sight irresistibly ludicrous.
Mrs. Stuart, though in her most regal array, seemed to have left her dignity downstairs with her opera cloak, for with skirts gathered closely about her, tiara all askew, and face full of fear and anger, she stood upon a chair and scolded like any shrew.
The comic overpowered the tragic, and being a little hysterical with the sudden alarm, Christie broke into a peal of laughter that sealed her fate.
Mrs. Stuart utters a line you may have heard before: “She is too fond of books, and it has turned her brain.”
Actress
LMA’s anti-Irish feelings appear again. Christie decided not to try going out to service again. She knew very well that she would never live with Irish mates, and could not expect to find another Hepsey.
Two of the other boarders, a mother and daughter, get her a part at their theater. The manager calls her “my dear” and Christie says did you hear that? Lucy replies she’s lucky he didn’t kiss her. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Christie does well and gets more parts over the three years the chapter covers. She often plays lovers with an actor named St. George. Lucy grows jealous. At Christie’s first benefit a piece of scenery falls down and Christie is injured pushing Lucy out of the way.
Governess
While Christie recuperates all the actors visit her and are very kind. She thinks about her career. "I have no genius to glorify the drudgery, keep me from temptation, and repay me for any sacrifice I make. Other women can lead this life safely and happily: I cannot, and I must not go back to it, because, with all my past experience, and in spite of all my present good resolutions, I should do no better, and I might do worse. I'm not wise enough to keep steady there; I must return to the old ways, dull but safe, and plod along till I find my real place and work."
She applies to be a governess, having studied music and French since coming to Boston. Lucy’s mother warns her not to mention she was an actress, but Christie thinks it’s best to admit to it right away instead of having it discovered later. Then she accidentally forgets to mention it to Mrs. Saltonstall.
Mrs. S, her son and daughter, and her brother Mr. Fletcher spend the summer by the seaside. Christie enjoys herself until she gets a letter informing her of Aunt Betsey's death. Fletcher comforts her. After that he starts spending more time with her and a spinster, Miss Tudor, that she reads to. Ooh, they're reading Jane Eyre.
Mr. Fletcher sat down just where her hat-brim was no screen, pulled off his gloves, and leisurely composed himself for a comfortable lounge. "What is your opinion of Rochester?" he asked, presently.
"Not a very high one."
"Then you think Jane was a fool to love and try to make a saint of him, I suppose?"
'I like Jane, but never can forgive her marrying that man, as I haven't much faith in the saints such sinners make."
"But don't you think a man who had only follies to regret might expect a good woman to lend him a hand and make him happy?"
"If he has wasted his life he must take the consequences, and be content with pity and indifference, instead of respect and love. Many good women do 'lend a hand,' as you say, and it is quite Christian and amiable, I 've no doubt; but I cannot think it a fair bargain."
He asks her to join the family in Paris next winter and Christie demurs. He mentions that he won't care that his wife was once an actress, for he recognized her from the stage. She still says no, and he says he's disappointed in her.
Luckily for her it's the end of summer so nobody questions why Mrs. Saltonstall's governess is leaving.
Companion
Miss Tudor offers Christie a job as companion to an invalid girl, Helen Carrol. Christie wins her heart by telling her about the theater. She spends the winter with the Carrols, enjoying the job, and when spring comes they move to the family country-house.
Bella, the younger sister, begins to court a gentleman, and Helen confides to Christie that she doesn't approve. Insanity runs in the family, so Helen thinks she and Bella and their two brothers shouldn't marry. Augustine only told Helen when she was already in love, and she was so upset she tried to kill herself.
It's a little - well, no, more than a little melodramatic, but it's not too out of tone with the rest of the novel. IMO.
On New Year's Day Helen tries again, finding success.The blessed tranquillity of the girl's countenance was such as none but death, the great healer, can bring; and, as they looked, her eyes opened, beautifully clear and calm before they closed for ever. From face to face they passed, as if they looked for some one, and her lips moved in vain efforts to speak.
The Carrols return to the city and although they ask her to remain with them Christie declines.
Seamstress
If I recall correctly, this is when the book starts getting good.
Christie sends Hepsey money to buy freedom for her brothers. The rest of the money burned in her pocket, but she prudently put it by for a rainy day, and fell to work again when her brief vacation was over.
Hearing of a chance for a good needle-woman in a large and well-conducted mantua-making establishment, she secured it as a temporary thing, for she wanted to divert her mind from that last sad experience by entirely different employment and surroundings. She liked to return at night to her own little home, solitary and simple as it was, and felt a great repugnance to accept any place where she would be mixed up with family affairs again.
She's only interested in one of her coworkers, Rachel, who seems interested but reluctant. Alcott actually describes Christie as wooing Rachel. Seriously.
"Why can't we be friends? I want one sadly, and so do you, unless your looks deceive me. We both seem to be alone in the world, to have had trouble, and to like one another. I won't annoy you by any impertinent curiosity, nor burden you with uninteresting confidences; I only want to feel that you like me a little and don't mind my liking you a great deal. Will you be my friend, and let me be yours?"
A great tear rolled down upon the shining silk in Rachel's hands as she looked into Christie's earnest face, and answered with an almost passionate gratitude in her own: "You can never need a friend as much as I do, or know what a blessed thing it is to find such an one as you are."
"Then I may love you, and not be afraid of offending?" cried Christie, much touched.
"Yes. But remember I didn't ask it first," said Rachel, half dropping the hand she had held in both her own.
"You proud creature! I'll remember; and when we quarrel, I'll take all the blame upon myself."
Oh, this is even better than I remembered! Christie suggests that Rachel move in with her and Rachel declines. They spend a happy together until Christie arrives at work. One of the matrons, Miss Cotton, has found out Rachel's secret past.
"It is true that I once went astray, but God knows I have repented; that for years I've tried to be an honest girl again, and that but for His help I should be a far sadder creature than I am this day. Christie, you can never know how bitter hard it is to outlive a sin like mine, and struggle up again from such a fall. It clings to me; it won't be shaken off or buried out of sight. No sooner do I find a safe place like this, and try to forget the past, than some one reads my secret in my face and hunts me down. It seems very cruel, very hard, yet it is my punishment, so I try to bear it, and begin again. What hurts me now more than all the rest, what breaks my heart, is that I deceived you. I never meant to do it. I did not seek you, did I? I tried to be cold and stiff; never asked for love, though starving for it, till you came to me, so kind, so generous, so dear,--how could I help it? Oh, how could I help it then?"
Christie entreats them to forgive Rachel, and Mrs. King seems ready to allow her to stay, but Miss Cotton threatens to leave. Christie declares, “Come, dear, we'll go together,” and takes Rachel with her. But Rachel refuses to associate with her any longer.
Then Christie, remembering only that they were two loving women, alone in a world of sin and sorrow, took Rachel in her arms, kissed and cried over her with sisterly affection, and watched her prayerfully, as she went away to begin her hard task anew, with nothing but the touch of innocent lips upon her cheek, the baptism, of tender tears upon her forehead to keep her from despair.
Poor Rachel. Poor Christie too - she spends the rest of the year alone. On Christmas she walks through the streets and buys children fruit. When she gets back to her room she finds a note from Rachel and a rosebush that she gave her earlier.
Never had sweeter tears fallen than those that dropped upon the little tree as Christie took it in her arms, and all the rosy clusters leaned toward her as if eager to deliver tender messages. Surely her wish was granted now, for friendly hands had been at work for her. Warm against her heart lay words as precious as if uttered by a loving voice, and nowhere, on that happy night, stood a fairer Christmas tree than that which bloomed so beautifully from the heart of a Magdalen who loved much and was forgiven.
Through the Mist
Christie decides she must make friends with God before she can find another human one. “She went to many churches, studied many creeds, and watched their fruits as well as she could; but still remained unsatisfied. Some were cold and narrow, some seemed theatrical and superficial, some stern and terrible, none simple, sweet, and strong enough for humanity's many needs. There was too much machinery, too many walls, laws, and penalties between the Father and His children. Too much fear, too little love; too many saints and intercessors; too little faith in the instincts of the soul which turns to God as flowers to the sun. Too much idle strife about names and creeds; too little knowledge of the natural religion which has no name but godliness, whose creed is boundless and benignant as the sunshine, whose faith is as the tender trust of little children in their mother's love.”
Her quest is interrupted by a fever, which leaves her in debt. She tries to find sewing but there is none available. She wanders to a lumber wharf and stares down into the water.
For an instant every thing grew black before her eyes, and the earth seemed to slip away from underneath her feet. Then she was herself again, and found that she was sitting on a pile of lumber, with her head uncovered, and a woman's arm about her.
"Was I going to drown myself?" she asked, slowly, with a fancy that she had been dreaming frightfully, and some one had wakened her.
It's Rachel. She's been in New York City (or so I assume by the description “larger and wickeder”) working to save other women like herself. She tells Christie to go to the house of a woman “who often befriends such as you and I.”
The woman is Cynthia Wilkins, a laundress with several children. Her open manner and accent make me think of Mrs. Sowerby from The Secret Garden and also Mrs. Bagnett from Bleak House. Christie has dinner and plays with the baby. She begins to tell her story but Mrs. Wilkins tells her to go to bed first.
A Cure for Despair
You're one of them that can't live alone without starvin' somehow, so I'm jest goin' to turn you in among them children to paster, so to speak. This is so un-understandable to me. I would do anything to live alone til I die..
Mrs. Wilkins goes to visit a sick woman and Christie teaches the kids some hymns. She plays with them until Mrs. Wilkins returns and tells her a story from her early married days. She and Lisha argued and she left the house and the river flooded and she heard he drowned, but in fact it was their pig. It sounds better in the book.
Mrs. Wilkins's Minister
Christie goes to hear Thomas Power, who is based on the minister Theodore Parker.
Christie went rapidly home because she could not help it, and burst in upon Mrs. Wilkins with a face full of enthusiasm, exclaiming, while she cast off her bonnet as if her head had outgrown it since she left: "It was splendid! I never heard such a sermon before, and I'll never go to church anywhere else."
"I knew it! ain't it fillin'? don't it give you a kind of spirital h'ist, and make things wuth more somehow?" cried Mrs. Wilkins, gesticulating with the pepper-pot in a way which did not improve the steak she was cooking, and caused great anguish to the noses of her offspring, who were watching the operation.
This entry was originally posted at https://nocowardsoul.dreamwidth.org/41421.html
Although published in 1872, LMA started Work in 1861, before Little Women, before Hospital Sketches.
November 1872 Got out the old manuscript of “Success,” and called it “Work.” Fired up the engine, and plunged into a vortex, with many doubts about getting out. Can't work slowly, the thing possesses me, and I must obey till it's done. One thousand dollars was sent as a seal on the bargain, so I was bound, and sat at the oar like a galley-slave.
March 1873
Finished “Work,” - twenty chapters. Not what it should be, - too many interruptions. Should like to do one book in peace, and see if it wouldn't be good.
"An endless significance lies in work; in idleness alone is there perpetual despair."--CARLYLE.
TO MY MOTHER, WHOSE LIFE HAS BEEN A LONG LABOR OF LOVE, THIS BOOK IS GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED BY HER DAUGHTER.
Warnings: suicide, prostitution
Christie
We begin with our heroine, Christie, telling her aunt that she is leaving home because she is a burden and she knows her uncle doesn’t love her. Said uncle predicts she will be a failure like her mother. Christie fires back. "Please, don't say that to me; I can't bear it, for I shall never think her life a failure, because she tried to help herself, and married a good man in spite of poverty, when she loved him! You call that folly; but I'll do the same if I can; and I'd rather have what my father and mother left me, than all the money you are piling up, just for the pleasure of being richer than your neighbors."
He’s like okay, whatever and she sits alone by the fire. She thought of her mother, so like herself, who had borne the commonplace life of home till she could bear it no longer. Then had gone away to teach, as most country girls are forced to do. Had met, loved, and married a poor gentleman, and, after a few years of genuine happiness, untroubled even by much care and poverty, had followed him out of the world, leaving her little child to the protection of her brother.
Servant
Christie boards with a Mrs. Flint, who she knows from somewhere. Very lucky how Jo in LW and Christie both know people who own boardinghouses and don’t have to cry themselves to sleep in hotel rooms because nobody will give them a place to live.
She took possession [of the room], feeling very rich with the hundred dollars Uncle Enos gave her, and delightfully independent, with no milk-pans to scald; no heavy lover to elude; no humdrum district school to imprison her day after day.
For a week she enjoyed her liberty heartily, then set about finding something to do. Her wish was to be a governess, that being the usual refuge for respectable girls who have a living to get. But Christie soon found her want of accomplishments a barrier to success in that line, for the mammas thought less of the solid than of the ornamental branches, and wished their little darlings to learn French before English, music before grammar, and drawing before writing.
So she takes a place as servant. She assumes it’s merely kitchen work, and is surprised when Mr. Stuart asks her to clean his boots. "It isn't the work; it's the degradation; and I won't submit to it," she says to her fellow servant Hepsey, who ran away from slavery five years ago.
She doesn’t mind the job, other than that, even though Mrs. Stuart is a snob. She observes the various party guests and listens to Hepsey’s stories. And there’s a library to read, which proves her downfall. She falls asleep while reading and drops her book and it knocks over the candle.
Sitting up she looked dizzily about her. The smoke was clearing fast, a window having been opened; and the tableau was a striking one. Mr. Stuart with an excited countenance was dancing frantically on a heap of half-consumed clothes pulled from the wall. He had not only drenched them with water from bowl and pitcher, but had also cast those articles upon the pile like extinguishers, and was skipping among the fragments with an agility which contrasted with his stout figure in full evening costume, and his besmirched face, made the sight irresistibly ludicrous.
Mrs. Stuart, though in her most regal array, seemed to have left her dignity downstairs with her opera cloak, for with skirts gathered closely about her, tiara all askew, and face full of fear and anger, she stood upon a chair and scolded like any shrew.
The comic overpowered the tragic, and being a little hysterical with the sudden alarm, Christie broke into a peal of laughter that sealed her fate.
Mrs. Stuart utters a line you may have heard before: “She is too fond of books, and it has turned her brain.”
Actress
LMA’s anti-Irish feelings appear again. Christie decided not to try going out to service again. She knew very well that she would never live with Irish mates, and could not expect to find another Hepsey.
Two of the other boarders, a mother and daughter, get her a part at their theater. The manager calls her “my dear” and Christie says did you hear that? Lucy replies she’s lucky he didn’t kiss her. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Christie does well and gets more parts over the three years the chapter covers. She often plays lovers with an actor named St. George. Lucy grows jealous. At Christie’s first benefit a piece of scenery falls down and Christie is injured pushing Lucy out of the way.
Governess
While Christie recuperates all the actors visit her and are very kind. She thinks about her career. "I have no genius to glorify the drudgery, keep me from temptation, and repay me for any sacrifice I make. Other women can lead this life safely and happily: I cannot, and I must not go back to it, because, with all my past experience, and in spite of all my present good resolutions, I should do no better, and I might do worse. I'm not wise enough to keep steady there; I must return to the old ways, dull but safe, and plod along till I find my real place and work."
She applies to be a governess, having studied music and French since coming to Boston. Lucy’s mother warns her not to mention she was an actress, but Christie thinks it’s best to admit to it right away instead of having it discovered later. Then she accidentally forgets to mention it to Mrs. Saltonstall.
Mrs. S, her son and daughter, and her brother Mr. Fletcher spend the summer by the seaside. Christie enjoys herself until she gets a letter informing her of Aunt Betsey's death. Fletcher comforts her. After that he starts spending more time with her and a spinster, Miss Tudor, that she reads to. Ooh, they're reading Jane Eyre.
Mr. Fletcher sat down just where her hat-brim was no screen, pulled off his gloves, and leisurely composed himself for a comfortable lounge. "What is your opinion of Rochester?" he asked, presently.
"Not a very high one."
"Then you think Jane was a fool to love and try to make a saint of him, I suppose?"
'I like Jane, but never can forgive her marrying that man, as I haven't much faith in the saints such sinners make."
"But don't you think a man who had only follies to regret might expect a good woman to lend him a hand and make him happy?"
"If he has wasted his life he must take the consequences, and be content with pity and indifference, instead of respect and love. Many good women do 'lend a hand,' as you say, and it is quite Christian and amiable, I 've no doubt; but I cannot think it a fair bargain."
He asks her to join the family in Paris next winter and Christie demurs. He mentions that he won't care that his wife was once an actress, for he recognized her from the stage. She still says no, and he says he's disappointed in her.
Luckily for her it's the end of summer so nobody questions why Mrs. Saltonstall's governess is leaving.
Companion
Miss Tudor offers Christie a job as companion to an invalid girl, Helen Carrol. Christie wins her heart by telling her about the theater. She spends the winter with the Carrols, enjoying the job, and when spring comes they move to the family country-house.
Bella, the younger sister, begins to court a gentleman, and Helen confides to Christie that she doesn't approve. Insanity runs in the family, so Helen thinks she and Bella and their two brothers shouldn't marry. Augustine only told Helen when she was already in love, and she was so upset she tried to kill herself.
It's a little - well, no, more than a little melodramatic, but it's not too out of tone with the rest of the novel. IMO.
On New Year's Day Helen tries again, finding success.The blessed tranquillity of the girl's countenance was such as none but death, the great healer, can bring; and, as they looked, her eyes opened, beautifully clear and calm before they closed for ever. From face to face they passed, as if they looked for some one, and her lips moved in vain efforts to speak.
The Carrols return to the city and although they ask her to remain with them Christie declines.
Seamstress
If I recall correctly, this is when the book starts getting good.
Christie sends Hepsey money to buy freedom for her brothers. The rest of the money burned in her pocket, but she prudently put it by for a rainy day, and fell to work again when her brief vacation was over.
Hearing of a chance for a good needle-woman in a large and well-conducted mantua-making establishment, she secured it as a temporary thing, for she wanted to divert her mind from that last sad experience by entirely different employment and surroundings. She liked to return at night to her own little home, solitary and simple as it was, and felt a great repugnance to accept any place where she would be mixed up with family affairs again.
She's only interested in one of her coworkers, Rachel, who seems interested but reluctant. Alcott actually describes Christie as wooing Rachel. Seriously.
"Why can't we be friends? I want one sadly, and so do you, unless your looks deceive me. We both seem to be alone in the world, to have had trouble, and to like one another. I won't annoy you by any impertinent curiosity, nor burden you with uninteresting confidences; I only want to feel that you like me a little and don't mind my liking you a great deal. Will you be my friend, and let me be yours?"
A great tear rolled down upon the shining silk in Rachel's hands as she looked into Christie's earnest face, and answered with an almost passionate gratitude in her own: "You can never need a friend as much as I do, or know what a blessed thing it is to find such an one as you are."
"Then I may love you, and not be afraid of offending?" cried Christie, much touched.
"Yes. But remember I didn't ask it first," said Rachel, half dropping the hand she had held in both her own.
"You proud creature! I'll remember; and when we quarrel, I'll take all the blame upon myself."
Oh, this is even better than I remembered! Christie suggests that Rachel move in with her and Rachel declines. They spend a happy together until Christie arrives at work. One of the matrons, Miss Cotton, has found out Rachel's secret past.
"It is true that I once went astray, but God knows I have repented; that for years I've tried to be an honest girl again, and that but for His help I should be a far sadder creature than I am this day. Christie, you can never know how bitter hard it is to outlive a sin like mine, and struggle up again from such a fall. It clings to me; it won't be shaken off or buried out of sight. No sooner do I find a safe place like this, and try to forget the past, than some one reads my secret in my face and hunts me down. It seems very cruel, very hard, yet it is my punishment, so I try to bear it, and begin again. What hurts me now more than all the rest, what breaks my heart, is that I deceived you. I never meant to do it. I did not seek you, did I? I tried to be cold and stiff; never asked for love, though starving for it, till you came to me, so kind, so generous, so dear,--how could I help it? Oh, how could I help it then?"
Christie entreats them to forgive Rachel, and Mrs. King seems ready to allow her to stay, but Miss Cotton threatens to leave. Christie declares, “Come, dear, we'll go together,” and takes Rachel with her. But Rachel refuses to associate with her any longer.
Then Christie, remembering only that they were two loving women, alone in a world of sin and sorrow, took Rachel in her arms, kissed and cried over her with sisterly affection, and watched her prayerfully, as she went away to begin her hard task anew, with nothing but the touch of innocent lips upon her cheek, the baptism, of tender tears upon her forehead to keep her from despair.
Poor Rachel. Poor Christie too - she spends the rest of the year alone. On Christmas she walks through the streets and buys children fruit. When she gets back to her room she finds a note from Rachel and a rosebush that she gave her earlier.
Never had sweeter tears fallen than those that dropped upon the little tree as Christie took it in her arms, and all the rosy clusters leaned toward her as if eager to deliver tender messages. Surely her wish was granted now, for friendly hands had been at work for her. Warm against her heart lay words as precious as if uttered by a loving voice, and nowhere, on that happy night, stood a fairer Christmas tree than that which bloomed so beautifully from the heart of a Magdalen who loved much and was forgiven.
Through the Mist
Christie decides she must make friends with God before she can find another human one. “She went to many churches, studied many creeds, and watched their fruits as well as she could; but still remained unsatisfied. Some were cold and narrow, some seemed theatrical and superficial, some stern and terrible, none simple, sweet, and strong enough for humanity's many needs. There was too much machinery, too many walls, laws, and penalties between the Father and His children. Too much fear, too little love; too many saints and intercessors; too little faith in the instincts of the soul which turns to God as flowers to the sun. Too much idle strife about names and creeds; too little knowledge of the natural religion which has no name but godliness, whose creed is boundless and benignant as the sunshine, whose faith is as the tender trust of little children in their mother's love.”
Her quest is interrupted by a fever, which leaves her in debt. She tries to find sewing but there is none available. She wanders to a lumber wharf and stares down into the water.
For an instant every thing grew black before her eyes, and the earth seemed to slip away from underneath her feet. Then she was herself again, and found that she was sitting on a pile of lumber, with her head uncovered, and a woman's arm about her.
"Was I going to drown myself?" she asked, slowly, with a fancy that she had been dreaming frightfully, and some one had wakened her.
It's Rachel. She's been in New York City (or so I assume by the description “larger and wickeder”) working to save other women like herself. She tells Christie to go to the house of a woman “who often befriends such as you and I.”
The woman is Cynthia Wilkins, a laundress with several children. Her open manner and accent make me think of Mrs. Sowerby from The Secret Garden and also Mrs. Bagnett from Bleak House. Christie has dinner and plays with the baby. She begins to tell her story but Mrs. Wilkins tells her to go to bed first.
A Cure for Despair
You're one of them that can't live alone without starvin' somehow, so I'm jest goin' to turn you in among them children to paster, so to speak. This is so un-understandable to me. I would do anything to live alone til I die..
Mrs. Wilkins goes to visit a sick woman and Christie teaches the kids some hymns. She plays with them until Mrs. Wilkins returns and tells her a story from her early married days. She and Lisha argued and she left the house and the river flooded and she heard he drowned, but in fact it was their pig. It sounds better in the book.
Mrs. Wilkins's Minister
Christie goes to hear Thomas Power, who is based on the minister Theodore Parker.
Christie went rapidly home because she could not help it, and burst in upon Mrs. Wilkins with a face full of enthusiasm, exclaiming, while she cast off her bonnet as if her head had outgrown it since she left: "It was splendid! I never heard such a sermon before, and I'll never go to church anywhere else."
"I knew it! ain't it fillin'? don't it give you a kind of spirital h'ist, and make things wuth more somehow?" cried Mrs. Wilkins, gesticulating with the pepper-pot in a way which did not improve the steak she was cooking, and caused great anguish to the noses of her offspring, who were watching the operation.
This entry was originally posted at https://nocowardsoul.dreamwidth.org/41421.html