PETER'S MOTHER NEW EDITION WITH INTRODUCTION BY MRS. HENRY DE LA PASTURE 1906 _And I left my youth behind For somebody else to find_. TO THE BELOVED MEMORY OF MY ONLY BROTHER LT. COLONEL WALTER FLOYD BONHAM, D.S.O. TO MY AMERICAN READERS The author of "Peter's Mother" has been bidden of the publishers, who have incurred the responsibility of presenting her to the American public, to write a preface to this edition of her novel. She does so with the more diffidence because it has been impressed upon her, by more than one wiseacre, that her novels treat of a life too narrow, an atmosphere too circumscribed, to be understood or appreciated by American readers. No one can please everybody; I suppose that no one, except the old man in Aesop's Fable, ever tried to do so. But I venture to believe that to some Americans, a sincere and truthful portrait of a typical Englishwoman of a certain class may prove attractive, as to us are the studies of a "David Harum," or others whose characteristics interest because--and not in spite of--their strangeness and unfamiliarity. We do not recognise the type; but as those who do have acknowledged the accuracy of the representation, we read, learn, and enjoy making acquaintance with an individuality and surroundings foreign to our own experience. There are hundreds of Englishwomen living lives as isolated, as guarded from all practical knowledge of the outer world, as entirely circumscribed as the life of Lady Mary Crewys; though they are not all unhappy. On the contrary, many diffuse content and kindness all around them, and take it for granted that their own personal wishes are of no account. Indeed it would seem that some cease to be aware what their own personal wishes are. With anxious eyes fixed on others--the husband, father, sons, who dominate them,--they live to please, to serve, to nurse, and to console; revered certainly as queens of their tiny kingdoms, but also helpless as prisoners. Calm, as fixed stars, they regard (perhaps sometimes a little wistfully) the orbits of brighter planets, and the flashing of occasional meteors, within their ken; knowing that their own place is unchangeable--immutable. That the views of such women are often narrow, their prejudices many, their conventions tiresome, who shall deny? That their souls are pure and tender, their hearts open to kindness as are their hands to charity, nobody who knows the type will dispute. They lack many advantages which their more independent sisters (no less gifted with noble and womanly qualities) enjoy, but they possess a peculiar gentleness, which is all their own, whether it be adored or despised. When one of their number happens to be cleverer, larger minded, more restless, and impatient, it may be, by nature than her sisters, tragedy may ensue. But not often. Habit and public opinion are strong restrainers, stronger sometimes than even the most carefully inculcated abstract principles.