Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

My Lady Ludlow Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

I am an old woman now, and things are very different to what they were in my youth. Then we, who travelled, travelled in coaches, carrying six inside, and making a two days' journey out of what people now go over in a couple of hours with a whizz and a flash, and a screaming whistle, enough to deafen one. Then letters came in but three times a week: indeed, in some places in Scotland where I have stayed when I was a girl, the post camein but once a month;-but letters were letters then; and we made great prizes of them, andread them and studied them like books. Now the post comes rattling in twice a day, bringing short jerky notes, some without beginning or end, but just a little sharp sentence, which well-bred folks would think too abrupt to be spoken. Well, well! they may all be improvements, -I dare say they are; but you will never meet with a Lady Ludlow in these days. I will try and tell you about her. It is no story: it has, as I said, neither beginning, middle, nor end. My father was a poor clergyman with a large family. My mother was always said tohave good blood in her veins; and when she wanted to maintain her position wit