Because he was an Englishman, and I liked him, I withheld from my excited harangue many and yet more atrocious absurdities uttered in my hearing by his compatriots. At this distance and time, and under the shelter of a _nom de plume_, I may relate an incident I forebore religiously from giving to my transatlantic acquaintances, albeit sorely tempted, occasionally, by their unconscious condescension and simplicity of arrogance—too amusing to be always offensive.
We were taking a cup of “_arf_ternoon tea” with some agreeable English people, who had invited their rector and his wife to meet us. My seat was next the wife, a pretty, refined little woman, who graciously turned the talk into a channel where she fancied I would be at ease. She began to question me about America. Perceiving her motive, and being by this time somewhat weary of cruising in one strait, I, as civilly, fought shy of my native shores, and plied her with queries in my turn. I asked information, among other things, concerning Yorkshire and Haworth, stating our intention of visiting the home and church of the Brontës. The rectoress knew nothing about the topography of Yorkshire, but had heard of the Brontë novels.
“Wasn’t ‘Jane Eyre’ just a little—_naughty_? I fancy I have heard something of the kind.”
Our English cousins “farncy” quite as often as we “guess,” or “reckon,” or “presume,” and sometimes as incorrectly.
I waived the subject of Jane Eyre’s morals by a brief tribute to the author’s genius, and passed to Mrs. Gaskell’s description of the West Riding town, Haworth. Our hostess caught the word “Keighley.”
“I was in Keighley last year, at a wedding,” she interpolated. “It is near Haworth—did you say? And you have friends in Haworth?”
“Ah!” politely. “I did not know Charlotte Brontë ever lived there. Her ‘Jane Eyre’ was a good deal talked about when I was a girl. She was English—did you say?”
Dropping the topic for that of certain local antiquities, I discussed these with my gentle neighbor until I happened to mention the name of an early Saxon king.
“The familiarity, of Americans with early English history quite astonishes me,” she remarked. “I cannot understand why they should be conversant with what concerns them so remotely.”