THE PROFESSIONAL AUNT.
TWO or three Sundays ago a lady known to the present writer was walking in Regent's Park. She paused for a few moments on the outskirts of a small crowd which had gathered round a preacher. The sermon was not interesting, and her attention was soon distracted by the conversation of two working men standing near her. "I don't 'old very much with religion myself," said the first. " My 'ome is my 'eaves, my wife is my Gawd, my children are my angels." "Damned good religion, I call it," ejaculated his friend; and they walked on out of earshot. It is rather startling that such an uncompromising expression of domesticity should have come from the mouth of a man, and should have been warmly approved by the man to whom it was spoken. That a woman's ideals should be bounded by her home is what we all expect. But this workman went further than we think any woman would go. Substitute the word " husband " for "wife" in the second clause of this man's creed, and where could you find a woman to say it? We commend the story to the suffragettes and to all upholders of the rights of the down-trodden woman of the working class ! The truth we believe to be that men and women are very much more alike than it is the fashion to suppose in these days of sei problems. An immense number of men live entirely for their families. Still, woman no doubt is on the whole the more domestic of the two creatures. The matter is provable. If a woman has no home life of her own, she can make a centre of interest in the home life of some other woman. This is beyond the power of the most domestic man. Mrs. George Wemyss has just written a remarkably pretty book called "The Profes- sional Aunt" (Constable and Co., 5s.) The character she depicts is common, but there are no professional uncles ! " Aunt Woggles" is a fairly young and quite charming lady who lives by herself in a flat,—that is, she lives there when not called upon to perform the duties of that state of life to which her sisters-in-law have called her. At every domestic crisis, however, great or small, she is summoned by telegram to their aid, and she is ready for any emergency, from a children's party to a serious illness. One sister-in-law is delightful, and one is disagreeable, but in the service of both the professional aunt is equally indefatigable. Both feel towards her that something of condescension which a married woman feels always towards an unmarried woman, but in one instance the condescension is akin to love and in the other to contempt. One is grateful for the devotion of the aunt to the children, the other is only gratified by it.
The description of the party consisting of small children and governesses for which the selfish Zerlina, who had just accepted a desirable invitation, lets the professional aunt in without warning is pretty and humorous to a degree. On the other hand, the scene in Diana's nursery where poor little Sara lies upon what they fear will prove her deathbed is, perhaps happily, less convincing. Sara. becomes con- valescent, and we feel the illness was a dream ; bat " the back view of Sara paddling with her petticoats tucked into her bathing drawers " is entirely real. But let us leave the sick-room and the seaside and go with Mrs. Wemyss to the breaking up of the dancing class. Mothers, "Frauleins," and " mademoiselles " are ranged round the room in a sort of dado, while poor "Aunt Woggles" works among the children and introduces us to all the little boys and girls who are walking about "looking for an empty partner." At last "the children began to dance. There was a particularly painstaking little boy in a white silk shirt and black velvet knickerbockers, very tight in places, who danced assiduously, looking neither to the right nor to the left. ' Right leg, To-mus, left leg, To-mus; came in stentorian tones from a Fraulein in the corner, who suited her actions to her words by the uplifting of the leg corresponding to that recommended to Tomus's oonsideration, and bringing it down with emphasis on the parquet floor. By the sudden quicken- ing of leg action on the part of my painstaking friend I knew him to be Tom us, and by that only, so many of the boys looked as if they might be Tomus. The real Tomus asserted himself manfully, however, by using exactly the opposite leg to that ordered by Friinlein. I liked this spirit of independ- ence." Mrs. Wemyss can describe big as well as little children. We make acquaintance at the party with a friendly schoolboy of the kind so easily drawn out by a woman, and
with a " big-little " girl who has the strange capacity which some girls have in the middle of their teens for making their elders feel shy. There is something about them of a resplendent newness which produces in the " grown-up " world a consciousness of the mental and physical effects of wear-and-tear, and makes one ashamed of maturity.
London, the professional aunt is convinced, is the best place for all "professionals" to live in. It is the best place from which to start upon any journey anywhere. Moreover, it is very convenient for nephews and nieces and young country cousins to have a room in London always at their disposal. This habit of her heroine of entertaining her young relations affords Mrs. Wemyss an excellent opportunity for making a sketch of a country girl just out of childhood,—another instance of the wholly domestic type who comes to stay and falls in love, and for whom fate has a better lot in store than that of a professional aunt. She is a very sentimental young woman, but it is im- possible not to like her. " Being as pretty as she undoubtedly is, I often wonder why she is not more effective. The right kind of country beauty is very convincing to the jaded Londoner, but to convince one must be convinced, and that is exactly what Pauline is not." To be thought beautiful a woman must be either absolutely unconscious or quite certain of the fact. It does not do to doubt. " I am sure it often lies with the woman herself how beautiful people think her." Faith produces faith in this particular, and that over a long term of years. Being accustomed to know every one whom she meets, Pauline takes a dramatic and philanthropic interest in every one she sees. "Even the cab- runner interested her. Hadn't I noticed what a sad face he had?" She finds out the private troubles of the girls who wait on her in shops, she makes friends with children in the street, "and where a baby is concerned she has no self- control." "Pauline is not meant to live in London. She thanks people in a crowd for letting her pass," and " she never gets into a 'bus, or takes any vehicular advantage over a widow, and she feels choky if she sees any one very old." How Dick Dudley, who has had a somewhat chequered career, comes to worship this domestic young lady is charmingly told, and the reader feels some hope that Dick's " 'ome " will become his " 'eaven" is the end. Pauline's mother, too, is well drawn. She is very kind and rather silly, wholly interested in the country and the poor. The sketch suggests a woman who lives upon that plane of stupidity where her own happiness forms a sufficient explanation of other people's sorrows ; not so slow, however, but that she has an unerring instinct for detecting social position, and more knowledge of the way to behave in every social situation than is usually found in such a " goose."
The funny sayings of the children are not quite so funny as they ought to be, but that is perhaps because they are true. One phase of the childish mind is, however, admirably suggested. There is no doubt that childhood is a bore to children. They want to get through it. Probably no one in after life has ever wished the time away as he wished it away in his childhood.
As we get older the quick flight of time is one of the sad sensations which never leave us, but with children it is not so. " The days pass by, Betty, and we don't grow up !" says the professional aunt's little nephew to her little niece.
In the last chapter the professional aunt is married. The ending seems a little conventional, but it is so well managed that one does not mind. A former lover who has spent years abroad returns to England. She sees the fact in a newspaper, and wonders sadly whether he will come to see her. Even as she reads comes a message from a sister-in-law. One of the children is ill; she must go. When after days of work and anxiety she returns to her flat, the old nurse who acts as her maid tells her that a gentleman is in the drawing-room. The conclusion is foregone, and when all is happily settled it turns out that the old nurse has opened a telegram saying, " Will you see me P " and has taken upon herself to answer i t- in these words : " Come. Been waiting for you for years "I
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