Country life -- England -- Fiction; Pastoral fiction; Villages -- England -- Fiction
Her domestic management prospered equally. Her father, who retained the
perfect use of his hands, began a manufacture of mats and baskets, which
he constructed with great nicety and adroitness; the eldest boy, a sharp
and clever lad, cut for him his rushes and osiers; erected, under his
sister's direction, a shed for the cow, and enlarged and cultivated the
garden (always with the good leave of her kind patron the lord of the
manor) until it became so ample, that the produce not only kept the pig,
and half kept the family, but afforded another branch of merchandise to
the indefatigable directress of the establishment. For the younger boy,
less quick and active, Hannah contrived to obtain an admission to the
charity-school, where he made great progress--retaining him at home,
however, in the hay-making and leasing season, or whenever his services
could be made available, to the great annoyance of the schoolmaster,
whose favourite he is, and who piques himself so much on George's
scholarship (your heavy sluggish boy at country work often turns
out quick at his book), that it is the general opinion that this
much-vaunted pupil will, in process of time, be promoted to the post of
assistant, and may, possibly, in course of years, rise to the dignity of
a parish pedagogue in his own person; so that his sister, although still
making him useful at odd times, now considers George as pretty well off
her hands, whilst his elder brother, Tom, could take an under-gardener's
place directly, if he were not too important at home to be spared even
for a day.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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