book_id
stringlengths 2
6
| title
stringclasses 1
value | author
stringclasses 1
value | conversations
listlengths 1
5.07k
|
|---|---|---|---|
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Get your embroidery, Sadie, and come down by me and Etta till the men get home to supper. I want her to show you that cut-work stitch she's putting in her lunch napkins."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ugh!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What?"
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You want to go sit a while by grandma, then?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No. Gee! can't--can't a girl just sit up in her room quiet? I'm all right."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I didn't say, Sadie, you wasn't all right. Only a young girl with everything to be thankful for don't need to sit up in her room like it was a funeral, with her mother and sister and grandma in the same house."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I--I--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Nothing."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sadie, you been crying again."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What if I have?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A fine answer from a girl to her mother."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I--you--you drive me to it--your questions--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I shouldn't have the interest of my own son's wife at heart!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Can't a girl get--get blue?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Blue?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, blue."
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sadie, ain't there just no way we can make you feel happy in St. Louis? Last night through the door to my room I couldn't help hear again you and Herman with a scene. Take your feet down off the plush, Sadie."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh yes, you heard, all right."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, I know, I know."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What maybe we felt in the beginning--well, wasn't it natural, an only son and coming such a surprise--all that's over now. Why, it's a pleasure to see how grandma she loves you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I--I'm all right, I tell you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Didn't we even fix it you should go in a flat on Waterman Avenue housekeeping for yourself, if you wanted it?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, and tie myself down to this dump yet. Not much!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, I only hope, Sadie Loeb, you never got in your life to live in a worse dump. I know this much, I have tried to do my part. Did I sign over this house to you and Herman for a wedding present, giving only to my own daughter the row of Grand Avenue stores?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I never said you didn't."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Have you got the responsibility even to run your own house, with me and Etta carrying it on like always?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Am I complaining?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do I ask of you one thing, Sadie, except maybe that you learn a little housekeeping and watch how I order from the butcher, things that every wife should know if she needs it or not? In the whole year you been my daughter, Sadie, have I asked of you more than you should maybe help the up-stairs girl a little mornings, and do a little embroidery for your linen-chest, and that maybe, instead of sleeping so late till noon every morning, you should get up and have breakfast with your husband?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If you begin going over all that again I--I'll just yell!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "With anybody pouting in the house I just 'ain't got heart to do nothing. I don't see, Sadie, that you had such fine connections in the East that you shouldn't be satisfied here."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You just leave my friends in the East out of it. If you wanna know it, they're a darn sight better than the wads of respectability I see waddlin' in here to swap Kaffee Klatsches with you!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Just let me tell you, Sadie Loeb, you can be proud such ladies call on you. A girl what don't think no more of her husband's business connections than not to come down-stairs when Mrs. Nathan Bamberger calls! Maybe our friends out here got being good wifes and good housekeepers on the brain more as high kicking in New York; but just the same Mrs. Nathan Bamberger, what can buy and sell you three times over, ain't ashamed to go in her Lindell Avenue kitchen, when her husband or her son likes red cabbage, what you can't hire cooked, or once in a while a miltz."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Say, if I've heard that once, I've--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Then, too, Sadie, since we're talking--it's a little thing--I haven't liked to talk about it, but I--I got the first time I should hear the word _ma_ on your lips. You think it's so nice that a daughter-in-law should always call me 'Say,' like a bed-post?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I--I can't, Mrs. Loeb--it--it just won't come--mother."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Don't tell me you don't know any better! A girl what can be so nice with poor old blind grandma, like you been, can be nice with her mother-in-law and sister-in-law, too, if she wants to be. I didn't want I should ever have to talk to you like this, Sadie, but sometimes a--a person she just busts out."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then let me go! Whatta you holding me here for? Let me go back, Mrs.--mother! Let me go! I don't deny it, you're too good for me round here. I don't fit! Let me go back to the old room and--my old room-mate where--where I belong with my--my crowd. You tell what you just said to Herm! Get him to let me go back with him on his trip to-morrow night. Please, Mrs.--mother--please!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You mean to New York with him on his business trip for a visit?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Call it that if you want to, only let me go! You--you can tell them later that--that I ain't coming back. I--I've begged him so! I don't belong here. You just said as much yourself. I don't belong here. Let me go, Mrs. Loeb. Let me go! You tell him, Mrs. Loeb, to let me go."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That I should live to see this day! My Herman's wife wants to leave him! Oh, my son, my son! What did you do to yourself! A di--a separation in the Loeb family! I knew last night when I heard through the door and how worried my poor boy has looked for months, that it didn't mean no good. Since her first month here I've seen it coming. I did my part to--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, Mrs. Loeb, and I done my part!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh--oh--oh, and how that boy of mine has catered to her! Humored her every whim to keep her contented! I always say it's the nix-nux wives get the most attentions and thanks from their husbands. I--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I done my part. I've tried as much as you to make myself fit in out here. I--I just ain't your kind, Mrs. Loeb. Yours and--Etta's. I--I can't be saving and economical when I see there's plenty to spend. I--I was raised with my brother down in Shefsky's theater, where nobody cares about monogramed guest towels and about getting up before noon if they don't want to. The evenings here kill me! Kill me! I hate pinochle! I gotta have life, Mrs. Loeb. I hate Kaffee Klatsches with a lot of--I--I tell you I got different blood in my veins, Mrs. Loeb, I--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, no, Sadie Mosher Loeb, that kind of talk don't go. You got just the same _shabbos_ like us. Saturday is your--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, yes, I'm in the right church, all right, Mrs. Loeb, but I'm in the wrong pew. Mrs. Loeb, please can't you understand I'm in the wrong pew!"
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Herman, my son! Oh, my son!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What's wrong, ma? Sadie!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It's come, Herman, like I always predicted to Etta it would. Your wife, my poor boy, she wants to leave you. This should happen to a Loeb yet--a separation in the family! My poor boy! My poor boy!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why, ma, what--what's Sadie been telling you?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I didn't want to let out to her, Herman. I wanted to make a quiet get-away, you know I did. But she nagged me! She nagged me!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ma, you shouldn't--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "She heard us last night and Heaven knows how many nights before that. She's wise. She knows. She knows it's been a year of prison here for--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, my poor boy! Prison! A girl like her finds herself married into one of the most genteel families in St. Louis, a girl what never in her life was used to even decent sheets to sleep on!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ma!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Till three o'clock in the afternoon she told me herself how her and them girls used to sleep, two and three in a boarding-house room, and such a mess!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ma, if you and Sadie don't cut out this rowing I'll put on my hat and go back down-town where I came from. What is this, anyway, a barroom or a home out on Washington Boulevard? You want grandma to hear you? Ma! Sadie!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "My poor boy! My poor boy!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I didn't start it, Herm. I was sitting up here quiet. All I ask, Herm, is for you to take me back to New York to-morrow night on your trip. Let me go, Herm, for--for an indefinite stay. It ain't this house, Herm, and it ain't your mother or your sister and---and it ain't you--it ain't any one. It's all of you put together! I can't stand the speed out here! There ain't none!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I guess she wants, Hermie, for her bad-girl notions you should give up the best retail business in St. Louis and take her to live in New York, where she can always be in with that nix-nux theatri--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, no, he knows I don't want that!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "If she did, ma, we'd go!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Herm knows it was all a mistake with me. I didn't know my own mind. I wanna go back along where I came from and where I belong! It ain't like I was the kind of a girl with another man in the case--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "We should thank her, Hermie, that there ain't more scandal mixed up in it yet!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ma!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "My poor boy, what could have had his pick from the first girls in St.--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ma!"
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "There, there, Sadie! he said in his throat, and, stooping over her:"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I give in! I give in!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Herm!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "My son!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, no, ma, it's no use trying to put anything but a jingle-bell harness on poor little Jingle Bells. She don't understand us any more than we--we can understand her!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That's it, Herm; that's why I say if you'll only let me go!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, my God! A separation in the Loeb family? My poor dead husband! My daughter Etta, president of the Ladies' Auxiliary! Grandma--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "My son, the cleanest, finest--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ma! There were lines in his face as if a knot at his heart were tightening them."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You mustn't blame her, ma; and, Sadie, you mustn't feel this way toward my mother. Nobody's to blame. I've been thinking this thing over more than you think, Sadie, and I--I give in. She's a poor little thing, ma, that's been trapped into something she can't fit into."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, Herm, that's it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It's natural. My fault, too. I carried her off like a partridge. Don't cry, little Jingle Bells! To-morrow night we leave for New York, and when I come back you're going to stay on with--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sylvette says--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "With friends, indefinitely. Don't cry, little Jingle Bells, don't! 'Sh-h-h, ma! There, didn't I tell you you'd rouse grandma!"
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Nothing is the matter, grandma."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Come and get me, Herman."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, grandma."
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Bertha?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, mamma."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Here, grandma, by the window is your chair."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "So!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sadie?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, grandma."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "How you holler, children! Everything ain't right?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, grandma. Ma and Sadie and me been making plans. To-morrow night Sadie goes with me to New York on my trip. A little pleasure trip."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "So, little Sadie-sha, you got good times, not? A good husband and good times? New York! To New York she goes, Bertha?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, mamma."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "To New York! Nowadays young wives got it good. How long you stay, Hermie?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It's just my Pittsburgh-New York trip, grandma."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sadie, come here by grandma."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, grandma."
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You got good times, not?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, grandma."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And you'm a good girl, Sadie. Eh? Eh?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Y-yes, grandma."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "When you come back from New York, you bring grandma a fine present, not?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, yes, grandma."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A quilted under jacket wholesale, for when grandma rides out in the wheel-chair."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Y-yes, grandma."
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, Sadie, you take good care of yourself, girl. No matter how we decide to--to end this thing, remember you're my wife--yet."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, Herman,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Don't stint, and remember how easily you get cold from draughts."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I won't. I will."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If you find yourself too crowded in that room with your friend, get a better one farther away from the theaters, where it isn't so noisy--maybe by yourself."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I'll see."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You won't be afraid to go back to that room now, with Sylvette still at the show?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "N-no."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If I was you--now mind, I'm only suggesting it--but if I was you I wouldn't be in such a hurry about getting back in that roof show, Sadie. Maybe in a few days something better may show up or--or you'll change your mind or something."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I gotta get back to work to keep from thinking. Anyway, I don't want to be sponging on you any longer than I can help."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You're my wife, aren't you?"
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Herman, I--I hate to see everything bust up like this--you--you such a prince and all--but like Syl says, I--I guess all fools ain't dead yet!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You've had time to work this thing out for yourself now, Sadie, but like I was saying before, anybody can play stubborn, but--but it's a wise person who ain't ashamed to change his mind. Eh, Sadie? Eh?"
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, no, not that! You carry that box, Herm. It's the padded underjacket for grandma. Tell her I--I sent it to her, Herm--with--with love."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, Sadie."
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, Sadie girl, three minutes more and--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh--oh, Herm!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If you feel as bad as that, it's not too late, Sadie. I--you--it takes a wise little girlie to change her mind. Eh? Eh?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No--no, Herm, I--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If you want to come, girl, for God's sake now's your time. Sadie honey, you want to?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, no. Herm, I--I can't stand it--it's only that I feel so bad at seeing you--No--no--not--not now."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I'll be in Pittsburgh to-morrow till seven, honey. Sleep over it, and if you change your mind, catch the eleven-forty-five St. Louis flyer out of here to-morrow morning, and that train'll pick me up at Pittsburgh--eleven forty-five."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, I--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You be the one to bring this box home, with your own little hands, to poor grandma, honey, and--and if you don't change your mind, why--why, you can send it. You be the one to bring it to her, honey. Remember, it's a wise girlie knows when to change her mind!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, Hermie--Hermie!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "All--aboard!"
}
] |
9864
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Don't cry, baby,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Jan Vedder's Wife,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A Daughter of Fife,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The Bow of Orange Ribbon,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "This happy breed of men, this little world."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "To know That which before us lies in daily life Is the prime wisdom."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "All that are lovers of virtue ... be quiet, and go a-angling."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "a dwelling; _dale_ from"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "a valley; _fell_ from"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "a mountain; _garth_ from"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "an enclosure; and _thwaite_, from"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "and enclosed"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "of greater or less extent; and, forgetting the world in his green paradise, was for centuries almost forgotten by the world. And if long descent and an ancient family have any special claim to be held honorable, it is among the Cumberland"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "can the English elemental resistance to fusion be seen. Only at the extreme point of necessity have they exchanged ideas with any other section, yet they have left their mark all over English history. In Cumberland and Westmoreland, the most pathetic romances of the Red Rose were enacted. In the strength of these hills, the very spirit of the Reformation was cradled. From among them came the Wyckliffite queen of Henry the Eighth, and the noble confessor and apostle Bernard Gilpin. No lover of Protestantism can afford to forget the man who refused the bishopric of Carlisle, and a provostship at Oxford, that he might traverse the hills and dales, and read to the simple"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "In the solemn"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "forward, and knew how"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Nay, then, was his answer,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I salute thee, mother."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I don't know what Sophia will say if she sees me, father; I don't, indeed."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Never you mind her, dear. Sophia's rather high, you know. And we've had a rare good time. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I should think we have! There are not many pleasures in life better than persuading a fine trout to go a little way down stream with you. Are there, father?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You are right, Charlotte. Trout are the kind of company you want on an outing. And then, you know, if you can only persuade one to go down stream a bit with you, there's not much difficulty in persuading him to let you have the pleasure of seeing him to dinner. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I think I will go round by the side-door, father. I might meet some one in the hall."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Nay, don't do that. There isn't any need to shab off. You've done nothing wrong, and I'm ready to stand by you, my dear; and you know what a good time we've been having all day. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Showers and clouds and winds, All things well and proper; Trailer, red and white, Dark and wily dropper. Midges true to fling Made of plover hackle, With a gaudy wing, And a cobweb tackle."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Cobweb tackle, eh, Charlotte? Yes, certainly; for a hand that can manage it. Lancie Crossthwaite will land you a trout, three pounds weight, with a line that wouldn't lift a dead weight of one pound from the floor to the table. I'll uphold he will. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I'll do it myself, some day; see if I don't, father."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I've no doubt of it, Charlotte; not a bit."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Come in, Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "How did you know it was I?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I know your knock, however you vary it. Nobody knocks like you. I suppose no two people would make three taps just the same."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Where have you been, you and father, ever since daybreak?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Up to Blaeberry Tarn, and then home by Holler Beck. We caught a creel full of trout, and had a very happy day."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Really, you know?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, really; why not?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I cannot understand it, Charlotte. I suppose we never were sisters before."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I mean that our relationship in this life does not touch our anterior lives."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, you know you are talking nonsense, Sophia! It gives me such a feel, you can't tell, to think of having lived before; and I don't believe it. There, now! Come, dear, let us go to dinner; I'm that hungry I'm fit to drop."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Izaak Walton,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Any news, mother?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "None, squire; only the sheep-shearing at the Up-Hill Farm to-morrow. John of Middle Barra called with the statesman's respects. Will you go, squire?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Certainly. My men are all to lend a hand. Barf Latrigg is ageing fast now; he was my father's crony; if I slighted him, I should feel as if father knew about it. Which of you will go with me? Thou, mother?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That, I cannot, squire. The servant lasses are all promised for the fleece-folding; and it's a poor house that won't keep one woman busy in it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sophia and Charlotte will go then?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Excuse me, father, answered Sophia languidly."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I shall have a headache to-morrow, I fear; I have been nervous and poorly all the afternoon."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why, Sophia, I didn't think I had such a foolish lass! Taking fancies for she doesn't know what. If you plan for to-morrow, plan a bit of pleasure with it; that's a long way better than expecting a headache. Charlotte will go then. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, father; I will go. Sophia never could bear walking in the heat. I like it; and I think there are few things merrier than a sheep-shearing."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "So poetic! So idyllic!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Many people think so, Sophia. Mr. Wordsworth would remember Pan and Arcadian shepherds playing on reedy pipes, and Chaldæan shepherds studying the stars, and those on Judæa's hills who heard the angels singing. He would think of wild Tartar shepherds, and handsome Spanish and Italian."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And still handsomer Cumberland ones. And Sophia, having given this little sisterly reminder, added calmly,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I met Mr. Wordsworth to-day, father. He had come over the fells with a party, and he looked very much bored with his company."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I shouldn't wonder if he were. He likes his own company best. He is a great man now, but I remember well when people thought he was just a little off-at-side. You knew Nancy Butterworth, mother?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Certainly I did, squire. She lived near Rydal."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes. Nancy wasn't very bright herself. A stranger once asked her what Mr. Wordsworth was like; and she said, 'He's canny enough at times. Mostly he's wandering up and down t' hills, talking his po-et-ry; but now and then he'll say, How do ye do, Nancy?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mr. Wordsworth speaks foolishness to a great many people besides Nancy Butterworth, said Sophia warmly;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, well, Mr. Wordsworth is neither here nor there in our affairs. We'll go up to Latriggs in the afternoon, Charlotte. I'll be ready at two o'clock."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And I, also, father. Her face was flushed and thoughtful, and she had become suddenly quiet. The squire glanced at her, but without curiosity; he only thought,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What a pity she is a lass! I wish Harry had her good sense and her good heart; I do that."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Plain living and high thinking ... The homely beauty of the good old cause, ...our peace, our fearful innocence, And pure religion breathing household laws."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A happy youth, and their old age Is beautiful and free."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I wonder why it is, father? asked Charlotte;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I'm not at all tired, and how can fresh air and sunshine make one melancholy?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Maybe, now, sad thoughts are catching. I was having a few. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I don't know. Why were you having sad thoughts?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, then, I really can't understand why. There's no need to fret over changes. At the long end the great change puts all right. Charlotte, I have been coming to Barf Latrigg's shearings for about half a century. I remember the first. I held my nurse's hand, and wore such a funny little coat, and such a big lace collar. And, dear me! it was just such a day as this, thirty-two years ago, that your mother walked up to the shearing with me, Charlotte; and I asked her if she would be my wife, and she said she would. Thou takes after her a good deal; she had the very same bright eyes and bonny face, and straight, tall shape thou has to-day. Barf Latrigg was sixty then, turning a bit gray, but able to shear with any man they could put against him. He'll be ninety now; but his father lived till he was more than a hundred, and most of his fore-elders touched the century. He's had his troubles too."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I never heard of them."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No. They are dead and buried. A dead trouble may be forgot: it is the living troubles that make the eyes dim, and the heart fail. Yes, yes; Barf is as happy as a boy now, but I remember when he was back-set and fore-set with trouble. In life every thing goes round like a cart-wheel. Eh? What?"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Welcome, Sandal! I have been watching for thee. There would be little prosperation in a shearing if thou wert absent. And a good day to thee, Charlotte. My Ducie was speaking of thee a minute ago. Here she comes to help thee off with thy things."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Come in; I'm right glad to see you, Charlotte. Come into t' best room, and cool your face a bit. And how is Mrs. Sandal and Sophia? Be things at their usual, dear?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Thank you, Ducie; all and every thing is well,--I hope. We have not heard from Harry lately. I think it worrits father a little, but he is never the one to show it. Oh, how sweet this room is!"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "How sweet this room is! and the shadow of a frown crossed her face."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I would not do it, Ducie, for any one, she said."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Poor herbs of grace! What sin have they committed to be trodden under foot? I would not do it, Ducie: I feel as if it hurt them."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Nay, now; flowers grow to be pulled dear, just as lasses grow to be loved and married."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Is that what you think, Ducie? Some cherished in the jar; some thrown under the feet, and bruised to death,--the feet of wrong and sorrow,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Don't you talk that way, Charlotte. It isn't lucky for girls to talk of wrong and sorrow. Talking of things bespeaks them. There's always _them_ that hear; _them_ that we don't see. And everybody pulls flowers, dearie."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I don't. If I pull a rose, I always believe every other rose on that tree is sad about it. They may be in families, Ducie, who can tell? And the little roses may be like the little children, and very dear to the grown roses."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why, what fancies! Let us go into the yard, and see the shearing. You've made me feel as if I'd never like to pull a posy again. You shouldn't say such things, indeed you shouldn't: you've given me quite a turn, I'm sure."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I had two thousand sheep to get over, said Latrigg,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "and the old man shook his head slowly,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "and Charlotte said, as she sat down in the breezy shadow beside him,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Who is first, grandfather?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why, our Stephen, to be sure! They'll have to be up before day-dawn to keep sidey with our Steve.--Steve, how many is thou ahead now?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Fifteen ahead, grandfather."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, I'm so glad!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Charlotte Sandal says 'she's so glad.' Now then, if thou loses ground, I wouldn't give a ha'penny for thee."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Latrigg owned, and the scrambling, black-faced breed whose endurance made them so profitable. Something was also said of other shearings to which Stephen must go, if he would assure his claim to be"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "If I were a younger man, I'd be in with them, said Latrigg."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I'd spin and weave my own fleeces, and send them to Leeds market, with no go-between to share my profits."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Smoke one pipe with me Sandal,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Steve will have all that is mine. It's a deal easier to die, Sandal, when you have a fine lad like Steve to leave the old place to."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Steve is in the female line. That's a deal different to having sons. Lasses are cold comfort for sons. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "To be sure; but I've given Steve my name. Any one not called Latrigg at Up-Hill would seem like a stranger."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I know how you feel about that. A squire in Seat-Sandal out of the old name would have a very middling kind of time, I think. He'd have a sight of ill-will at his back."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Thou means with _them_!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It stands to reason _they_ take an interest. I do in them. When I think of this or that Sandal, or when I look up at their faces as I sit smoking beside them, I'm sure I feel like their son; and I wouldn't grieve them any more than if they were to be seen and talked to. It's none likely, then, that _they_ forget. I know they don't."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I'm quite of thy way of thinking, Sandal; but Steve will be called Latrigg. He has never known any other name, thou sees."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "To be sure. Is Ducie willing?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Poor lass! She never names Steve's father. He'd no business in her life, and he very soon went out of it. Stray souls will get into families they have no business in, sometimes. They make a deal of unhappiness when they do."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, well, Latrigg, good-by. I'll go down the fell now. Come, Charlotte."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is like to be my last shearing. Very soon this life will _have been_, but through Christ's mercy I have the over-hand of the future."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Maybe, many a year after this, you'll see the hills look just that way, dearie; then think on this evening and on me."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What is the matter with you, squire?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is the matter, indeed? Love-making. That is the matter, Alice."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Charlotte?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And Stephen Latrigg?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I thought as much. Opportunity is a dangerous thing."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "My word! To hear you talk, one would think it was matterless how our girls married."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is never matterless how any girl marries, squire; and our Charlotte"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, I thought Charlotte was a child yet! How could I tell there was danger at Up-Hill? You ought to have looked better after your daughters. See that she doesn't go near-hand Latrigg's again."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I wouldn't be so foolish, William. It's a deal better not to notice. Make no words about it; and, if you don't like Stephen, send Charlotte away a bit. Half of young people's love-affairs is just because they are handy to each other."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You mean, you have been writing to Tom about a marriage? I would have been above a thing like that, William. I suppose you did it to please your mother. She always did hanker after Tom, and she always did dislike the Latriggs. I have heard that when people were in the grave they 'ceased from troubling,' but"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Alice!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I meant no harm, squire, I'm sure; and I would not say wrong of the dead for any thing, specially of your mother; but I think about my own girls."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "There, now, Alice, don't whimper and cry. I am not going to harm your girls, not I. Only mother was promised that Tom's son should have the first chance for their favor. I'm sure there's nothing amiss in that. Eh?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A young man born in a foreign country among blacks, or very near blacks. And nobody knows who his mother was."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, yes! his mother was a judge's daughter, and she had a deal of money. Her son has been well done to; sent to the very best German and French schools, and now he is at Oxford. I dare say he is a very good young man, and at any rate he is the only Sandal of this generation except our own boy."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Your sisters have sons."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, Mary has three: they are _Lockerbys_. Elizabeth has two: they are _Piersons_. My poor brother Launcie was drowned, and never had son or daughter; so that Tom's Julius is the nearest blood we have."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Julius! I never heard tell of such a name."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, it is a silly kind of a foreign name. His mother is called Julia: I suppose that is how it comes. No Sandal was ever called such a name before, but the young man mustn't be blamed for his godfather's foolishness, Alice. Eh?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I'm not so unjust. Poor Launcie! I saw him once at a ball in Kendal. Are you sure he was drowned?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I followed him to Whitehaven, and found out that he had gone away in a ship that never came home. Mother and Launcie were in bad bread when he left, and she never fretted for him as she did for Tom."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why did you not tell me all this before?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I said to myself, there's time enough yet to be planning husbands for girls that haven't a thought of the kind. We were very happy with them; I couldn't bear to break things up; and I never once feared about Steve Latrigg, not I."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What does your brother and his wife say?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Tom is with me. As for his wife, I know nothing of her, and she knows nothing of us. She has been in England a good many times, but she never said she would like to come and see us, and my mother never wanted to see her; so there wasn't a compliment wasted, you see. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, I don't see, William. All about it is in a muddle, and I must say I never heard tell of such ways. It is like offering your own flesh and blood for sale. And to people who want nothing to do with us. I'm astonished at you, squire."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Don't go on so, Alice. Tom and I never had any falling out. He just got out of the way of writing. He likes India, and he had his own reasons for not liking England in any shape you could offer England to him. There's no back reckonings between Tom and me, and he'll be glad for Julius to come to his own people. We will ask Julius to Sandal; and you say, yourself, that the half of young folks' loving is in being handy to each other. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I never thought you would bring my words up that way. But I'll tell you one thing, my girls are not made of melted wax, William. You'll be a wise man, and a strong man, if you get a ring on their fingers, if they don't want it there. Sophia will say very soft and sweet, 'No, thank you, father;' and you'll move Scawfell and Langdale Pikes before you get her beyond it. As for Charlotte, you yourself will stand 'making' better than she will. And you know that nothing short of an earthquake can lift you an inch outside your own way."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "saying something about"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Greek meeting Greek as he did so. Mrs. Sandal did not in the least understand him: she wondered a little over the remark, and then dismissed it as"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Variety's the very spice of life That gives it all its flavor."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Domestic happiness, thou only bliss Of Paradise that has survived the fall."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "O goddess, let the days of my prosperity continue! But he had the self-sufficiency and impatience of a man who is without peer in his own small arena. He believed himself to be as capable of ordering his daughters' lives as of directing his sheep"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I love Charlotte, and I ask for your sanction to my love."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A presumptuous young coxcomb, he muttered."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Does he think that being 'top-shearer' gives him a right to make love to Charlotte Sandal?"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What do you think of that, Alice? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I don't think over much of it, William. Good-fortune won't bear hurrying. Can't you wait till events ripen naturally?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And have all my plans put out of the way?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Are you sure that your plans are the best plans?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "They will be a bit better than any Charlotte and Stephen Latrigg have made."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I don't believe they have such a thing as a plan between them. But if you think so, send Charlotte to her aunt Lockerby for a few months. Love is just like fire: it goes out if it hasn't fuel."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Nay, I want Charlotte here. After our Harry, Julius is the next heir, and I'm set on him marrying one of the girls. If he doesn't like Sophia he may like Charlotte. I have two chances then, and I'm not going to throw one away for Steve Latrigg's liking or loving. Don't you see, Alice? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No: I never was one to see beyond the horizon. But if you must have to-morrow in to-day, why then send off your letter. I would let 'well' alone. When change comes to the door, it is time enough to ask it over the threshold. We are very happy now, William, and every happy day is so much certain gain in life."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is a woman's way of talking. A man looks for the future."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And how seldom does he get what he looks for. But I know you, William Sandal. You will take your own way, be it good or bad; and what is more, you will make others take it with you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am inviting my own nephew, Alice. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You know nothing about it. There are kin that are not kindred. You are inviting you know not who or what. But, --and she pushed the letter towards him, with a gesture which seemed to say,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am not responsible for the consequences."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The Bay of Biscay, and gave the letter to a groom, with orders to take it at once to the post-office. Then he called Charlotte from the rose-walk."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The horses are saddled, he said,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And so you see, Sophia, we may have a strange young man in the house for weeks, and where to put him I can't decide. And I wanted to begin the preserving and the raspberry vinegar next week, but your father is as thoughtless as ever was; and I am sure if Julius is like _his_ father he'll be no blessing in a house, for I have heard your grandmother speak in such a way of her son Tom."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I thought uncle Tom was grandmother's favorite."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I mean of his high temper and fine ways, and his quarrels with his eldest brother Launcelot."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh! What did they quarrel about?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A good many things; among the rest, about the Latriggs. There was more than one pretty girl at Up-Hill then, and the young men all knew it. Tom and his mother were always finger and thumb. He was her youngest boy, and she fretted after him all her life."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And uncle Launcelot, did she not fret for him?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Not so much. Launcelot was the eldest, and very set in his own way: she couldn't order him around."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The eldest? Then father would not have been squire of Sandal-Side if Launcelot had lived?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, indeed. Launcelot's death made a deal of difference to your father and me. Father was very solemn and set about his brother's rights; and even after grandfather died, he didn't like to be called 'squire' until every hope was long gone. But I would as soon have thought of poor Launcie coming back from the dead as of Tom's son visiting here; and it is inconvenient right now, exceedingly so; harvesting coming on, and preserving time, and none of the spare rooms opened since the spring cleaning."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is trying for you, mother, but perhaps Julius may not be very much trouble. He'll be with father all the time, and he'll make a change."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Change! That is just what I dread. Young people are always for change. They are certain that every change must be a gain. Old people know that changes mean loss of some kind or other. After one is forty years old, Sophia, the seasons bring change enough."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I dare say they do, mother. I don't care much for change, even at my age. Have you told Charlotte?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, I haven't told her yet. I think she is off to Dalton. Father said he was going this morning, and he never would go without her."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Father, why did you do that?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Do what, Charlotte? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Send Steve away. I am sure I do not know what to make of you doing such a thing. Poor Steve!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, then, I had my reason for it. Did you see the way he looked at you? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Dear me! A cat may look at a king. Did you send Steve away for a look? You have put me about, father."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "There's looks and other looks, my lass. Cats don't look at kings the way Steve looked at you. Now, then, I want no love-making between you and Steve Latrigg."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What nonsense! Steve hasn't said a word of love-making, as you call it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I thought you had all your woman-senses, Charlotte. Bethink you of the garden walk last night."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We were talking all the time of the sweetbrier and hollyhocks,--and things like that."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You might have talked of the days of the week or the multiplication-table: one kind of words was just as good as another. Any thing Steve said last night could have been spelled with four letters."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Four letters?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "To be sure. L-o-v-e."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You used to like Stephen."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I like all bright, honest, good lads; but when they want to make love to Miss Charlotte Sandal, they think one thing, and I think another. There has been ill-luck with love-making between the Sandals and the Latriggs. My brothers Launcie and Tom quarrelled about one of Barf Latrigg's daughters, and mother lost them both through her. There is no love-line between the two houses, or if there is nothing can make it run straight. Don't you try to, Charlotte; neither the dead nor the living will like it or have it."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Those old Cistercian monks that built Furness Abbey knew how to choose a bit of good land, Charlotte. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I suppose so. What did they do with it?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Let it out."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I wonder who would want to come here seven hundred years ago."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You don't know what you are saying, Charlotte. There were great men here then, and great deeds doing. King Stephen kept things very lively; and the Scots were always running over the Border for cattle and sheep, and any thing else they could lay their hands on. And the monks had great flocks, so they rented their lands to companies of four fighting men; and one of the four was to be ready day and night to protect the sheep, and the Scots kept them busy. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The Musgraves and Armstrongs and Netherbys, I know,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The mountain sheep were sweeter, But the valley sheep were fatter; We therefore deemed it meeter To carry off the latter. We made an expedition; We met a force, and quelled it; We took a strong position, And killed the men who held it."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sandal turns the new leaf for me, he murmured;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Your nephew Julius Sandal, from Calcutta, is coming to pay us a visit, Alice,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "When is he coming? asked Mrs. Sandal without enthusiasm; and Sophia supplemented the question by remarking,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I suppose he has nowhere else to go."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I wouldn't say such things, Sophia; I would not."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He has been in England some months, father."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, then, he was only waiting till he was asked to come. I'm sure that was a proper thing. If there is any blame between us, it is my fault. I sent him a word of welcome last Wednesday morning, and it is very likely he will be here to-morrow. I'm sure he hasn't let any grass grow under his feet. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "She was quite capable of putting this and that together, and by a momentary mental process she arrived at an exceedingly correct estimate of her father's invitation. Her blue eyes scintillated beneath her dropped lids; and, though she went calmly on tying the feather to the fishing-fly she was making, she said, in a hurried and unsteady voice,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I know he will be disagreeable, and I have made up my mind to dislike him."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Let me introduce you, first of all, to your father's mother. I greet you in her name as well as in my own."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We shall be ready for church in a quarter of an hour, Julius; will you remain at home, or go with us?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I should like to go with you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That's good. It is but a walk through the park: the church is almost at its gates."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "O come let us sing unto the Lord: let us heartily rejoice in the strength of our salvation. Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving: and shew ourselves glad in him with Psalms,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That is a Psalm one could sing oftener than once in seven days."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Is he not handsome, Alice?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Some people would think so, William. I like a face I can read."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I'm sure it is a long way better to keep yourself to yourself. Say what you will, I am sure he will have plenty of good qualities. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "For instance, a great deal of money."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Treat him fair, Alice; treat him fair. You never were one to be unfair, and I don't think you'll begin with my nephew."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, I'll never be unfair, not as long as I live; and I'll take up for Julius Sandal as soon as I am half sure he deserves it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You can't think what a pleasure it would be to me if he fancied one of our girls. I've planned it this many a long day, Alice."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, then, William, if you have a wish as strong as that, it is something more than a wish, it is a kind of right; and I'll never go against you in any fair matter."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And though you spoke scornful of money, it is a good thing; and the girl Julius marries will be a rich woman. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Perhaps; but it is the happiness and not the riches of her child that is a good mother's reward, and a good father's too. Eh, William?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Certainly, Alice, certainly. But his unspoken reflection was,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "and the"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Counsellor thought one day's joys and sorrows"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But we mortals Planted so lowly, with death to bless us, Sorrow no longer."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Our choices are our destiny. Nothing is ours that our choices have not made ours."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He knows about every thing, said Sandal to the clergyman, at the close of an evening spent together,--an evening in which Julius had been particularly interesting."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Don't you think so, sir?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He has a great many ideas, squire; but they are second-hand, and do not fit his intellect."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He believes in every thing, and he might as well believe in nothing. Confucius and Christ are about the same to him, and he thinks Juggernaut only 'a clumsier spelling of a name which no man spells correctly.'"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "His mind is like a fine mosaic, Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, indeed, Sophia, I don't think so! Mosaics have a design and fit it. The mind of Julius is more like that quilt of a thousand pieces which grandmother patched. There they are, the whole thousand, just bits of color, all sizes and shapes. I would rather have a good square of white Marseilles."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I don't think you ought to speak in such a way, Charlotte. You can't help seeing how much he admires you."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I should be very sorry if that were the case, Sophia."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Because I do not admire Julius in any way. I never could admire him. I don't want to be in debt to him for even one-half hour of sentimental affection."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You should let him understand that, Charlotte, if it be so."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He must be very dull if he does not understand."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "When father and you went fishing yesterday, he went with you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why did you not come also? We begged you to do so."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Because I hate to be hot and untidy, and to get my hands soiled, and my face flushed. That was your condition when you returned home; but all the same, he said you looked like a water-nymph or a wood-nymph."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I think very little of him for such talk. There is nothing 'nymphy' about me. I should hate myself if there were. I am going to write, and ask Harry to get a furlough for a few weeks. I want to talk sensibly to some one. I am tired of being on the heights or in the depths all the time; and as for poetry, I wish I might never hear words that rhyme again. I've got to feel that way about it, that if I open a book, and see the lines begin with capitals, my first impulse is to tear it to pieces. There, now, you have my opinions, Sophia!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Where are you going? I see you have your bonnet on."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am going to Up-Hill. Grandfather Latrigg had a fall yesterday, and that's a bad thing at his age. Father is quite put out about it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Is he going with you?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He was, but two of the shepherds from Holler Scree have just come for him. There is something wrong with the flocks."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Julius?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He does not know I am going; and if he did, I should tell him plainly he was not wanted either at Up-Hill, or on the way to it. Ducie thinks little of him, and grandfather Latrigg makes his face like a stone wall when Julius talks his finest."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "They don't understand Julius. How can they? Steve is their model, and Steve is not the least like Julius."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I should think not."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What do you mean?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Never mind. Good-by."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have had very bad news about the Holler Scree flock, Charlotte, and I must away there to see what can be done. Tell Barf Latrigg it is the sheep, and he will understand: he was always one to put the dumb creatures first. The kindest thing that is in your own heart say it to the dear old man for me; will you, Charlotte?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You can trust to me, father."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, I know I can; for that and more too. And there is more. I feel a bit about Stephen. Happen I was less than kind to him the other day. But I gave you good reasons, Charlotte; and I have such confidence in you, that I said to mother, 'You can send Charlotte. There is nothing underhand about her. She knows my will, and she'll do it.' Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, father: I'll be square on all four sides with you. But I told you there had been no love-making between me and Steve."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Steve was doing his best at it. Depend upon it he meant love-making; and I must say I thought you made out to understand him very well. Maybe I was mistaken. Every woman is a new book, and a book by herself; and it isn't likely I can understand them all."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Stephen is sure to speak to me about your being so queer to him. Had I not better tell the truth?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have a high opinion of that way. Truth may be blamed, but it can't be shamed. However, if he was not making love to you at the shearing, won't you find it a bit difficult to speak your mind? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He will understand."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ay, I thought so."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Father, we have never had any secrets, you and me. If I am not to encourage Stephen Latrigg, do you want me to marry Julius Sandal?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, I never! Such a question! What for?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Because, at the very first, I want to tell you that I could not do it--_no way_. I am quite ready to give up my will to your will, and my pleasure to your pleasure. That is my duty; but to marry cousin Julius is a different thing."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Don't get too far forward, Charlotte. Julius has not said a word to me about marrying you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But he is doing his best at it. Depend upon it he means marrying; and I must say I thought you made out to understand him very well. Maybe I was mistaken. Every man is a new book, and a book by himself; and it is not likely I can understand them all."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Now you are picking up my own words, and throwing them back at me. That isn't right. I don't know whatever to say for myself. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Say, 'dear Charlotte,' and 'good-by Charlotte,' and take an easy mind with you to Holler Scree, father. As far as I am concerned, I will never grieve you, and never deceive you,--no, not in the least little thing."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "When men as old as father fall, they stumble at their own grave; and I can't think what I'll do without father."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You have Steve."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Steve is going away. He would have left this morning, but for this fresh trouble. I see you are startled, Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I am that. I heard nothing of it. He moves in a great hurry."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He always moves that way, does Steve."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "How is grandfather?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He has had quite a backening since yesterday night. He has got 'the call,' Charlotte. I've had more than one sign of it. Just before he fell he went into the garden, and brought in with him a sprig of 'Death-come-quickly.' [The plant _Geranium Robertianum_.] 'Father,' I asked, 'whatever made you pull that?' Then he looked so queerly, and answered, 'I didn't pull it, Ducie: I found it on the wall.' He was quite curious, and sent me to ask this one and the other one if they had been in the garden. No one had been there; and, at the long end, he said, 'Make no more talk about it, Ducie. There's _them_ that go up and down the fellside that no one sees. _They_ lift the latch, and wait not for the open door, the king's command being urgent. I have had a message.' He fell an hour afterwards, Charlotte. He did not think he was much hurt at the time, but he got his death-throw. I know it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I should like to speak to him, Ducie. Tell him that Charlotte Sandal wants his blessing."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Come here, Charlotte, he said;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "O grandfather! is there any thing I can do for you?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Be a good girl. Be good, and do good. Stand true to Steve,--remember,--true to Steve."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He is saving his strength for the squire, said Ducie."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He has a deal to say to him."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Father hoped to be back this afternoon."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Though it be the darkening when he gets home, ask him to come at once, Charlotte. Father is waiting for him, and I don't think he will pass the turn of the night."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why, Barf is very near all the same as my own father, he said. And then, in a lower voice,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It whispers in the heart of every shepherd on these hills, she said;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I know, Sophia. I lifted the book yesterday: your mark was in it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, yes!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Though inland far we be, Our souls have sight of that immortal sea Which brought us hither.'"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Barf is gone, Alice,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But all is well, William."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No doubt of it. I met the rector on the hillside. 'How is Barf?' I asked; and he answered, 'Thank God, he has the mastery!' Then he went on without another word. Barf had lost his sight when I got there; but he knew my voice, and he asked me to lay my face against his face. 'I've done well to Sandal,--well to Sandal,' he muttered at intervals. 'You'll know it some day, William.' I can't think what he meant. I hope he hasn't left me any money. I could not take it, Alice."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Was that all?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "When Steve came in he said something like 'Charlotte,' and he looked hard at me; and then again, 'I've done well by Sandal.' But I was too late. Ducie said he had been very restless about me earlier in the afternoon: he was nearly outside life when I got there. We thought he would speak no more; but about three o'clock this morning he called quite clearly, '_Ducie, the abbot's cross_.' Then Ducie unlocked the oak chest that stands by the bed-side, and took from it an ivory crucifix. She put it in his left hand. With a smile he touched the Christ upon it; and so, clasping the abbot's cross, he died."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I wonder at that, William. A better Church-of-England man was not in all the dales than Barf Latrigg."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ay; but you see, Alice, that cross is older than the Church of England. It was given to the first Latrigg of Up-Hill by the first abbot of Furness. Before the days of Wyckliffe and Latimer, every one of them, babe and hoary-head, died with it in their hands. There are things that go deeper down than creeds, Alice; and the cross with the Saviour on it is one of them. I would like to feel it myself, even when I was past seeing it. I would like to take the step between here and there with it in my hands."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Come, and see the empty soul-case, she said softly;"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have had a few hard hours, Alice, he said wearily;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I suppose Steve got all."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Pretty nearly. Barf's married daughters had their portions long ago, but he left each of them three hundred pounds as a good-will token. Ducie got a thousand pounds and her right in Up-Hill as long as she lived. All else was for Steve except--and this bothers me--a box of papers left in Ducie's charge. They are to be given to me at her discretion; and, if not given during her lifetime or my lifetime, the charge remains then between those that come after us. I don't like it, and I can't think what it means. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He left you nothing?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He left me his staff. He knew better than to leave me money. But I am bothered about that box of papers. What can they refer to? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I can make a guess, William. When your brother Tom left home, and went to India, he took money enough with him; but I'm afraid he got it queerly. At any rate, your father had some big sums to raise. You were at college at the time; and though there was some underhand talk, maybe you never heard it, for no one round Sandal-Side would pass on a word likely to trouble the old squire, or offend Mistress Charlotte. Now, perhaps it was at that time Barf Latrigg 'did well to Sandal.'"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I think you may be right, Alice. I remember that father was a bit mean with me the last year I was at Oxford. He would have reasons he did not tell me of. One should never judge a father. He is often forced to cut the loaf unevenly for the good of every one."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mother, he asked,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ratherly."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "When can you tell me?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "There must be a deal of sorrow before I can tell you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do you want to tell me?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "If I should dare to want it one minute, I should ask God's pardon the next. When I unlock that box, Steve, there is like to be trouble in Sandal. I think your grandfather would rather the key rusted away."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Does the squire know any thing about them?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not he."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If he asks, will you tell him?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not yet. I--hope never."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I wish they were in the fire."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Perhaps some day you may put them there. You will have the right when I am gone."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is a bit hard, but it might be harder; and right always gets the over-hand at the long end."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Good-morning, Mr. Latrigg, he said;"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He did not say it unkindly; but Steve somehow felt the difference between Mr. Latrigg and Squire Sandal as he had never felt it when the greeting had only been,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Good-morning, Steve. How do all at home do?"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I had an offer this morning from Squire Methley. He wants to rent the Skelwith 'walk' from me. What do you think of him, sir?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "As how?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "As a tenant. I suppose he has money. There are about a thousand sheep on it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He lives on the other side of the range, and I know him not; but our sheep have mingled on the mountain for thirty years. I count not after him, and he counts not after me; and Sandal spoke coldly, like a man defending his own order."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Are you going to rent your 'walks' so soon? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "As soon as I can advantageously."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I bethink me. At the last shearing you were all for spinning and weaving. The Coppice Woods were to make your bobbins; Silver Force was to feed your engines; the little herd lads and lassies to mind your spinning-frames. Well, well, Mr. Latrigg, such doings are not for me to join in! I shall be sorry to see these lovely valleys turned into weaving-shops; but you belong to a new generation, and the young know every thing,--or they think they do."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And you will soon join the new generation, squire. You were always tolerant and wide awake. I never knew your prejudices beyond reasoning with."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mr. Latrigg, leave my prejudices, as you call them, alone. To-day I am not in the humor either to defend them or repent of them."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The lad is upset with the money and land he has come into, and the whole place is too small for his greatness."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If I could only have let 'well' alone. If I had never written that letter."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A few more hands will bring home the harvest to-night, he said;"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "God love thy bonny face,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What idle-backs you are! Come, and bind a sheaf with me. And they rose with a merry laugh, and followed him down the field, working a little, and resting a little; and towards the close of the afternoon, listening to the singing of an old man who had brought his fiddle to the field in order to be ready to play at the squire's"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He was a thin, crooked, old man, very spare and ruddy."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Eighty-three years old, young sir,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Says t' auld man to t' auld oak-tree, Young and lusty was I when I kenned thee: I was young and lusty, I was fair and clear, Young and lusty was I, many a long year. But sair failed is I, sair failed now; Sair failed is I, since I kenned thou. Sair failed, honey, Sair failed now; Sair failed, honey, Since I kenned thou."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "God give you love and luck, young sir. I am eighty-three now, and sair failed; but I was once twenty-three, and young and lusty as you be. But life is at the fag end with me now. God save us all!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Picking of lilies the other day, Picking of lilies both fresh and gay, Picking of lilies, red, white, and blue, Little I thought what love could do."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Charlotte, I love you. I love you with all my heart."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You have no right to say such words to me, Julius. I have done all a woman could do to prevent, them. I have never given you any encouragement. A gentleman does not speak without it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I could not help speaking. I love you, Charlotte. Is there any wrong in loving you? If I had any hope of winning you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, no; there is no hope. I do not love you. I never shall love you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Unless you have some other lover, Charlotte, I shall dare to hope"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have a lover."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And I am frank with you because it is best. I trust you will respect my candor."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sophia is coming. Please to forget that this conversation has ever been."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You are very cruel."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No. I am truly kind. Sophia, I am tired; let us go home."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The fairies have left us, he said."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "All of a sudden, the revel is over."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, how this spring of love resembleth The uncertain glory of an April day!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Hammering and clinking, chattering stony names Of shale and hornblende, rag and trap and tuff, Amygdaloid and trachyte."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Is not Stephen at home? she asked, as Ducie settled herself comfortably for their meal;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I thought Stephen was at home."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, he isn't. He went to Kendal three days ago about his fleeces. Whitney's carpet-works have made him a very good offer. Did not the squire speak of it?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well he knew all about it. He met Steve, and Steve told him. The squire has been a little queer with us lately, Charlotte. Do you know what the trouble is? I thought I would have you up to tea, and ask you; so when Sandal was up here this morning, I said, 'Let Charlotte come, and have a cup of tea with me, squire, I'd be glad.' And he said, 'When?' And I said, 'This afternoon. I am fair lonely without Steve.' And he said, 'I'm agreeable. She'll be glad enough to come.' And I said, 'Thank'ee, squire, I'll be glad enough to see her.' But what _is_ the matter, Charlotte? The squire has been in his airs with Steve ever so long."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Father thinks Steve loves me; and he says there is no love-line between our houses, and that, if there were, it is crossed with sorrow, and that neither the living nor the dead will have marriage between Steve and me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I thought that was the trouble. I did so. As for the living, he speaks for himself; as for the dead, it is your grandmother Sandal he thinks of. She was a hard, proud woman, Charlotte. Her two daughters rejoiced at their wedding-days, and two out of her three sons she drove away from their home. Your father was on the point of going, when his brother Launcie's death made him the heir. Then she gave him a bit more respect, and for pretty Alice Morecombe's sake he stayed by the old squire. Ten years your mother waited for William Sandal, Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, I know."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do you love Steve, Charlotte? I am Steve's mother, dear, and you may speak to me as if you were talking to your own heart. I would never tell Steve either this way or that way for any thing. Steve would not thank me if I did. He is one of them that wants to reach his happiness in his own way, and by his own hand. And I have good reasons for asking you such a question, or I would not ask it; you may be sure I have, that you may."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You need not tell me, dear, if you do not know; or if you do not want to tell me."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I do know, Ducie; and I do not mind telling you in the least. I love Stephen very dearly. I have loved him ever since--I don't know when."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And you have always had as good and as true as you have given. Steve is fondly heart-grown to you, Charlotte. But we will say no more; and what we have said is dropped into my heart like a stone dropped into deep water."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "How is Harry, and is he doing well?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Father is vexed and troubled about him, Ducie, she answered."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Whenever a letter comes from Harry, it puts every thing wrong in the house. Mother goes away and cries; and Sophia sulks because, she says, 'it is a shame any single one of the family should be allowed to make all the rest uncomfortable.'"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Harry should never have gone into the army. He hasn't any resisting power, hasn't Harry. And there is nothing but temptation in the army. Dear me, Charlotte! We may well pray not to be led into the way of temptation; for if we once get into it, we are no better off than a fly in a spider's web."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I hear Steve's footsteps. Sit still, Charlotte. He is opening the door. I knew it was he."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mother! mother!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Here I am, Steve."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That was very wrong, Steve. I told you at the harvest-home what father said, and what I had promised father. I'll break no squares with father, and you must not make me do so."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I could not help it, Charlotte, you looked so bewitching."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, dear! the old, old excuse, 'The woman tempted me,' etc."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Forgive me, dear Charlotte. I was going to tell you that I had been very fortunate in Kendal, and next week I am going to Bradford to learn all about spinning and weaving and machinery. But what is success without you? If I make every dream come to pass, and have not Charlotte, my heart will keep telling me, night and day, '_All for nothing, all for nothing_.'"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do not be so impatient. You are making trouble, and forespeaking disappointment. Before you have learned all about manufacturing, and built your mill, before you are really ready to begin your life's work, many a change may have taken place in Sandal-Side. When Julius comes at Christmas I think he will ask Sophia to marry him, and I think Sophia will accept his offer. That marriage would open the way for our marriage."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Only partly I fear. I can see that squire Sandal has taken a dislike, and your mother was a little high with me when I saw her last."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Partly your own fault, sir. Why did you give up the ways of your fathers? The idea of mills and trading in these dales is such a new one."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But a man must move with his own age, Charlotte. There is no prospect of another Stuart rebellion. I cannot do the queen's service, and get rewarded as old Christopher Sandal did. And I want to go to Parliament, and can't go without money. And I can't make money quick enough by keeping sheep and planting wheat. But manufacturing means money, land, influence, power."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Father does not see these things as you do, Steve. He sees the peaceful dales invaded by white-faced factory-hands, loud-voiced, quarrelling, disrespectful. All the old landmarks and traditions will disappear; also simple ways of living, calm religion, true friendships. Every good old sentiment will be gauged by money, will finally vanish before money, and what the busy world calls 'improvements.' It makes him fretful, jealous, and unhappy."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "That is just the trouble, Charlotte. When a man has not the spirit of his age, he has all its unhappiness. But my greatest fear is, that you will grow weary of waiting for _our hour_."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have told you that I shall not. There is an old proverb which says, 'Trust not the man who promises with an oath.' Is not my simple word, then, the best and the surest hope?"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Is dinner served, Noel?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It be over, Miss Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Come in."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Dear me, Sophia! what is the matter? It feels as if there were something wrong in the house."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I suppose there is something wrong. Father got a letter from Harry by the late post, and he left his dinner untouched; and mother is in her room crying, of course. I do think it is a shame that Harry is allowed to turn the house upside down whenever he feels like it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Perhaps he is in trouble."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He is always in trouble, for he is always busy making trouble. His very amusements mean trouble for all who have the misfortune to have any thing to do with him. Julius told me that no man in the 'Cameronians' had a worse name than Harry Sandal."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Julius! The idea of Julius talking badly about our Harry, and to you! I wonder you listened to him. It was a shabby thing to do; it was that."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Julius only repeated what he had heard, and he was very sorry to do so. He felt it to be conscientiously his duty."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Bah! God save me from such a conscience! If Julius had heard any thing good of Harry, he would have had no conscientious scruples about silence; not he! I dare say Julius would be glad if poor Harry was out of his way."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Charlotte Sandal, you shall not say such very unladylike, such unchristianlike, things in my room. It is quite easy to see _whose_ company you have been in."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have been with Ducie. Can you find me a sweeter or better soul?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Or a handsomer young man than her son?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I mean that also, certainly. Handsome, energetic, enterprising, kind, religious."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Spare me the balance of your adjectives. We all know that Steve is square on every side, and straight in every corner. Don't be so earnest; you fatigue me to-night. I am on the verge of a nervous headache, and I really think you had better leave me. She turned her chair towards the fire as she spoke, and hardly palliated this act of dismissal by the faint"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Gentleman's Magazine"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Can I come and speak to you, mother?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "To be sure you can, Charlotte. We are glad to see you. We are in trouble, my dear."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Is it Harry, father?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Trouble mostly comes that way. Yes, it is Harry. He is in a great strait, and wants five hundred pounds, Charlotte; five hundred pounds, dear, and he wants it at once. Only six weeks ago he wrote in the same way for a hundred and fifty pounds. He is robbing me, robbing his mother, robbing Sophia and you."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "William, I wouldn't give way to temper that road; calling your own son and my son a thief. It's not fair,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I must call things by their right names, Alice. I call a cat, a cat; and I call our Harry a thief; for I don't know that forcing money from a father is any better than forcing it from a stranger. It is only using a father's love as a pick-lock instead of an iron tool. That's all the difference, Alice; and I don't think the difference is one that helps Harry's case much. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Dear me! it is always money,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Your father knows very well that Harry must have the money, Charlotte. I think it is cruel of him to make every one ill before he gives what is sure to be given in the end. Sophia has a headache, I dare say, and I am sure I have."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But I cannot give him this money, Alice. I have not realized on my wool and wheat yet. I cannot coin money. I will not beg or borrow it. I will not mortgage an acre for it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And you will let your only son the heir of Sandal-Side, go to jail and disgrace for five hundred pounds. I never heard tell of such cruelty. Never, never, never!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You do not know what you are saying, Alice. Tell me how I am to find five hundred pounds. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "There must be ways. How can a woman tell?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Father, have I not got some money of my own?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You have the accrued interest on the thousand pounds your grandmother left you. Sophia has the same."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Is the interest sufficient?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You have drawn from it at intervals. I think there is about three hundred pounds to your credit."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sophia will have nearly as much. Call her, father. Surely between us we can arrange five hundred pounds. I shall be real glad to help Harry. Young men have so many temptations now, father. Harry is a good sort in the main. Just have a little patience with him. Eh, father?"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Did you send for me, father?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, I did. Come in and sit down. There is something to be done for Harry, and we want your help, Sophia. Eh? What?"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Harry wants five hundred pounds, Sophia."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I am astonished he does not want five thousand pounds. Father, I would not send him a sovereign of it. Julius told me about his carryings-on."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What has Julius to do with it? he cried."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Sandal-Side is not his property, and please God it never will be. Harry is one kind of a sinner, Julius is another kind of a sinner. God Almighty only knows which kind of sinner is the meaner and worse. The long and the short of it, is this: Harry must have five hundred pounds. Charlotte is willing to give the balance of her interest account, about three hundred pounds, towards it. Will you make up what is lacking, out of your interest money? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I do not know why I should be asked to do this, I am sure."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Only because I have no ready money at present. And because, however bad Harry is, he is your brother. And because he is heir of Sandal, and the honor of the name is worth saving. And because your mother will break her heart if shame comes to Harry. And there are some other reasons too; but if mother, brother, and honor don't seem worth while to you, why, then, Sophia, there is no use wasting words. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Let father have what is needed, Sophia. I will pay you back."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Very well, Charlotte; but I think it is most unjust, most iniquitous, as Julius says"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Now, then, don't quote Julius to me. What right had he to be discussing my family matters, or Sandal matters either, I wonder? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He is in the family."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Is he? Very well, then, I am still the head of the family. If he has any advice to offer, he can come to me with it. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Father, I am as sick as can be to-night."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Go thy ways then. Mother and I are both poorly too. Good-night, girls, both."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "with each other. But Sophia really had a nervous attack, and was shivery and sick with it. By the lighted candle in her hand, Charlotte saw that her very lips were white, and that heavy tears were silently rolling down her wan cheeks. They washed all of Charlotte's anger away; she forgot her resolution not to enter her sister's room again, and at its door she said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Let me stay with you till you can sleep, Sophia; or I will go, and ask Ann to make you a cup of strong coffee. You are suffering very much."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, I am suffering; and father knows how I do suffer with these headaches, and that any annoyance brings them on; and yet, if Harry cries out at Edinburgh, every one in Seat-Sandal must be put out of their own way to help him. And I do think it is a shame that our little fortunes are to be crumbled as a kind of spice into his big fortune. If Harry does not know the value of money I do."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I will pay you back every pound. I really do not care a bit about money. I have all the dress I want. You buy books and music, I do not. I have no use for my money except to make happiness with it; and, after all, that is the best interest I can possibly get."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Very well. Then, you can pay Harry's debts if it gives you pleasure. I suppose I am a little peculiar on this subject. Last Sunday, when the rector was preaching about the prodigal son, I could not help thinking that the sympathy for the bad young man was too much. I know, if I had been the elder brother, I should have felt precisely as he did. I don't think he ought to be blamed. And it would certainly have been more just and proper for the father to have given the feast and the gifts to the son who never at any time transgressed his commandments. You see, Charlotte, that parable is going on all over the world ever since; going on right here in Seat-Sandal; and I am on the elder brother's side. Harry has given me a headache to-night; and I dare say he is enjoying himself precisely as the Jerusalem prodigal did before the swine husks, when it was the riotous living."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Have a cup of coffee, Sophy. I'll go down for it. You are just as trembly and excited as you can be."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Very well; thank you, Charlotte. You always have such a bright, kind face. I am afraid I do not deserve such a good sister."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, you do deserve all I can help or pleasure you in. And then, when the coffee had been taken, and Sophia lay restless and wide-eyed upon her bed, Charlotte proposed to read to her from any book she desired; an offer involving no small degree of self-denial, for Sophia's books were very rarely interesting, or even intelligible, to her sister. But she lifted the nearest two, Barret's"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Maga, and"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The Veiled Prophet,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Neither of them, Charlotte. The 'Maga' makes me think, and I know you detest poetry. I got a letter to-night from Agnes Bulteel, and it appears to be about Professor Sedgwick. I was so annoyed at Harry I could not feel any interest in it then; but, if you don't object, I should like to hear you read it now."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Object? No, indeed. I think a great deal of the old professor. What gay times father and I have had on the Screes with him, and his hammer and leather bags! And, as Agnes writes a large, round hand, and does not fresco her letters, I can read about the professor easily."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "We've something else to do here than go raking over the fells on a fine day like this with nobody knows who."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Away with thee! It's a crown more than ever thou was worth at home."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is just the way Sedgwick goes on. He led father and me exactly such a chase one day last June."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I dare say he did. I remember you looked like it. Go on."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Geologist she means, Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Of course; but Agnes spells it 'jolly-jist.'"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Agnes ought to know better. She waited table frequently, and must have heard the word pronounced. Go on, Charlotte."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Are you sleepy Sophy?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, dear, no! Go on."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Joe take good care of thysen'; thou art over sharp to live very long in this world; fill thy bags, and make on with thee."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Don't you remember old Abraham, Sophy? He built the stone dyke at the lower fold."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, I do not remember, I think."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You are getting sleepy. Shall I stop?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, no; finish the letter."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sophia, you are sleepy now."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, a little. You can finish to-morrow."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Behold! The solemn spaces of the night are thronged By bands of tender dreams, that come and go Over the land and sea; they glide at will Through all the dim, strange realms of men asleep, And visit every soul."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Still to ourselves in every place consigned. Our own felicity we make or find."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Catch, then, oh, catch the transient hour! Improve each moment as it flies. Life's a short summer, man a flower; He dies, alas! how soon he dies!"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "even Sophia had admitted that"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I never thought Charlotte would have given me the go-by. All along she has taken my side, no matter what came up. Oh, my little lass!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Come, father, let you and me have a bit of pleasure by ourselves: there isn't much comfort in the house to-day."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You say right, Charlotte; you do so, my dear. Where shall we go? Eh? Where?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Wherever you like best. There is no snow to hamper us yet. Some of the servants are down from Up-Hill. Ducie has sent mother a great spice-loaf and a fine Christmas cheese."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ducie is a kind woman. I have known Ducie ever since I knew myself. Could we climb the fell-breast, Charlotte? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I think we could. Ducie will miss it, if you don't go and wish her 'a merry Christmas.' You never missed grandfather Latrigg. Old friends are best, father."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "They are that. Is Steve at home?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He isn't coming home this Christmas. I wasn't planning about Steve, father. Don't think such a thing as that of me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I don't, Charlotte. I don't think of Charlotte Sandal and of any thing underhand at the same time. I'm a bit troubled and out of sorts this morning, my dear."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You are sure that you want to go, my dear? Won't you be missed? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "They don't want me, father. I am in the way."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Has it come to that? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, it has come to that."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am very glad it isn't you. And I'm nettled at myself for ever showing him a road to slight you, Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "If there is any slight between Julius and me, father, I gave it; for he asked me to marry him, and I plainly told him no."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Hear--you--but. I _am_ glad. You refused him? Come, come, that's a bit of pleasure I would have given a matter of five pounds to have known a day or two since. It would have saved me a few good ratings. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why, father! Who has been rating you?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Myself, to be sure. You can't think what set-downs I have given William Sandal. Do you mind telling me about that refusal, Charlotte? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not a bit. It was in the harvest-field. He said he loved me, and I told him gentlemen did not talk that way to girls who had never given them the least encouragement; and I said I did not love him, and never, never could love him. I was very firm, father, perhaps a little bit cross; for I did not like the way he spoke. I don't think he admires me at all now."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I dare be bound he doesn't. 'Firm and a little bit cross.' It wouldn't be a nice five minutes for Julius. He sets a deal of store by himself; and then, as if he thought it was his duty not to show too much gratification, he added,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I hope you were very civil, Charlotte. A good asker should have a good nay-say. And you refused him? Well, I _am_ pleased. Mother never heard tell of it? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, no; I have told no one but you. At the long end you always get at my secrets, father."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "We've had a goodish few together,--fishing secrets, and such like; but I must tell mother this one, eh? She _will_ go on about it. In the harvest-field, was it? I understand now why he walked himself off a day or two before the set day. And he is all for Sophia now, is he? Well, I shouldn't wonder if Sophia will 'best' him a little on every side. You _have_ given me a turn, Charlotte. I didn't think of a son-in-law yet,--not just yet. Dear me! How life does go on! Ever since the sheep-shearing it has been running away with me. Life is a road on which there is no turning round, Charlotte. Oh, if there only were! If you could just run back to where you made the wrong turning! If you could only undo things that you have done! Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Not even God can make what has been, not to have been. When a thing is done, if it is only the taking of a walk, the walk is taken to all eternity."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "they stood on the brow of the hill which they had been climbing, and the squire said it again very solemnly."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Eternity! How dreadful to spend it in repentance which can undo nothing! That is the most awful conception of the word 'eternity.' Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It is mizzling already, Charlotte; the snow will turn into rain, and we shall have a downpour. Had we not better go home?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "For all will be at sixes and sevens at home, he commented,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And very likely, as it is Christmas Eve, you may be asked to give Sophia away. So a nice dinner, and a quiet smoke, and an hour's nap will help you through to-night. And the thought in each heart, beyond this one, was"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Perhaps Harry will be at home."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "My wife! Mine in lives long forgotten."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "O Julius!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Always mine; missed in some existences, recovered in others, but bringing into every life with you my mark of ownership. See here."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Look into them both, Sophia, and see how closely our line of fortune is alike. That is something, but behold."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Is it not also in Charlotte's palm? In others?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, indeed. Among all the women on earth, only yours has this facsimile of my own. It is the soul mark upon the body. Every educated Hindoo can trace it; and all will tell you, that, if two individuals have it precisely alike, they are twin souls, and nothing can prevent their union."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Did they explain it to you, Julius?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "An Oriental never explains. They apprehend what is too subtle for words. They know best just what they have never been told. Sophia, this hand of yours fits mine. It is the key to it; the interpreter of my fate. Give me my own, darling."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is Harry, said Sophia."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I must go to him, Julius."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am first. Wait a moment. You must promise me once more: 'My life is your life, my love is your love, my will is your will, my interest is your interest; I am your second self.' Will you say this Sophia, as I say it?"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "They have gone to Up-Hill, of course. Father always goes the day before Christmas; and Charlotte, no doubt, expected to find Steve at home. I must tell Julius about Charlotte and Steve. Julius will not approve of a young man like Steve in our family, and it ought not to be. I am sure father and mother think so."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But dinner will be ready in half an hour, and you have to dress yet, Charlotte. How do I look?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You look charming. How bright your eyes are, Sophia! I never saw you look so well. How much Julius will admire you to-night!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "As to that, Julius always admires me. He says he used to dream about me, even before he saw me."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, you know that is nonsense! He couldn't do that. I dare say he dreams about you now, though. I should think he would like to."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You will have to hurry, Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I can dress in ten minutes if I want to."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I will leave you now. She hesitated a moment at the door, but she could not bring herself to speak of her engagement. She saw that Charlotte was in one of her"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, I hope if Harry is of so much importance in your eyes, you will dress decently to meet him. The rector is coming to dinner also."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I shall wear my blue gown. If I imitate you, I cannot be much out of the way. Heigh-ho! Heigh-ho! I hope Harry will have a pleasant visit. We must do our best, Sophia, to make him happy."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "O Charlotte, if you have nothing to talk about but Harry, Harry, Harry, I am going! I am very fond of Harry, but I don't pretend to be blind to Harry's faults. Remember how many disagreeable hours he has given us lately. And I must say that I think he was very ungrateful about the hundred and eighty pounds I gave him. He never wrote me a line of thanks."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You did not give it to Harry, you loaned it to me. Be just Sophia. I have paid you fifteen pounds of it back already, and I shall not buy a single new dress until it is all returned. You will not lose a shilling, Sophia."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "How Quixotic you can be! However, it is no use exciting ourselves to-night. One likes to keep the peace at Yule-tide, and so I will bow down to your idol as much as I can conscientiously."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "She might have told me."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is not Sophia's fault, she muttered;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Julius is to blame for it. I think he really hates me now. He has said to her, 'There is no need to tell Charlotte, specially; it will make her of too much importance. I don't approve of Charlotte in many ways.' Oh, I know you, sir!"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You good sister. You saved me, Charlotte, with that five hundred pounds."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I would have given it had it been my all, it been fifty times as much, Harry."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "This Indian fellow, this Sandal of the Brahminical caste, what is he like, Charley?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He does not admire me, Harry; so how can I admire him?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then there must be something wrong with him in the fundamentals; a natural-born inability to admire what is lovely and good."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You mustn't say such a thing as that, Harry. I am sure that Sophia is engaged to him."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Does father like him?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not much; but Julius is a Sandal, after all, and"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "After me, the next heir. Exactly. It shall not be my fault, Charley, if he does not stand a little farther off soon. I can get married too."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "O Harry, if you only would! It is your duty; and there is little Emily Beverley. She is so beautiful and good, and she adores you, Harry."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Dear little Emmy. I used to love Emmy a long time ago."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It would make father so happy, and mother and me too. And the Beverleys are related to mother,--and isn't mother sweet. Father was saying"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Father, I have not done right lately. I am very sorry."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Say no more, Harry, my lad. There shall be no back reckoning between you and me. You have been mixed up with a sight of follies, but you can over-get all that. You take after me in looks. Up-sitting and down-sitting, you are my son. You come of a good kind; you have a kind heart and plenty of dint;[Dint, energy.] now, then, make a fresh start, Harry. Oh, my dear, dear son!"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "and the repression and constraint were soon evident through all the conventional efforts to be"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It was the squire who finally hit upon the circumstance which tided over the evening, and sent every one to bed in a ripple of laughter. For, when the piano was closed, he opened his eyes, and said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sophia, your mother tells me she has had a very nice Christmas present from the little maid you took such a liking to,--little Agnes Bulteel. It is a carriage hap made of sheepskins white as the snow, and from some new breed of sheep surely; for the wool is longer and silkier than ever I saw."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Agnes Bulteel! cried Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "O Sophia! where are her last letters? I am sure father would like to hear about Joe and the jolly-jist."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Joe Bulteel is no fool, said the squire warmly."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is the way around here to laugh a bit at Joe; but Joe aims to do right, and he is a very spirity lad. What are you and Sophia laughing at? Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Get the letters, Sophia. Julius and Harry will enjoy them I know. Harry must remember Joe Bulteel."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Certainly. Joe has carried my line and creel many a day. Trout couldn't fool Joe. He was the one to find plovers' eggs, and to spot a blaeberry patch. Joe has some senses ordinary people do not have, I think. I should like to hear about Joe and the _what_?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The jolly-jist,--Professor Sedgwick really. Joe has been on the fells with the professor."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I called at Skeàl-Hill on my road home. Mother was knitting at her side of the hearth. She hadn't opened her mouth since father came home; nay, she hadn't so much as looked at him after the one hard glower that she gave him at first; but when he said he'd been at Skeàl-Hill, she gave a grunt, and said, as if she spoke to nobody but herself,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ay, a blind body might see that. --"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I was speaking to Joe, said father."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Joe, said he again,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I was at Skeàl-Hill, --mother gave another grunt then,--"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Come this way, Joe. Well, our Joe followed him till he stopped before a room door; and he gave a little knock, and then opened it, and says he,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Joe, sir. Joe wasn't going to stand that; and he said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Joe, sir, made him madder than ever; but when the old jolly-jist--that he thought would be so fain to see him, if it was only for the sake of their sprogue on the fells together--when he wondered"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Let us have the rest now, Sophia. I'd have given a gold guinea to have heard Joe's 'burst.'"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Show my face? said Joe;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "said Joe,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I come of a stock that never would be frightened to show their face to a king, let alone an old noodles that calls himself a jolly-jist. And I defy the face of clay, said Joe,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "said Joe again,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "My song! but this is a bonnie welcome to give a fellow that has come so far to see you such a hot morning."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Joe is like all these shepherd lads, said the squire,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You need not laugh, nephew. It is as I say. The Bulteels are as good stock as the Sandals; a fine old family, and, like the Sandals, at home here when the Conqueror came. Joe would do the right thing I'll be bound. Let us hear if he didn't, Sophia."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Have you any thing against me? If you have, speak it out like a man; and don't sit there twiddling your thumbs, and calling folks out of their names in this road."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Trick, said Joe."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "said Joe. The jolly-jist took off his spectacles, and glowered at Joe without them. Then he put them on again, and glowered at Joe with them; and then he laughed, and asked Joe, if he thought there could be no difference in stones."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why! answered Joe,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, Joe said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "As Joe said this, it came into his head that it was better to flatter a fool than to fight him; and after all, that there might be something in the old man liking stones of his own breaking better than those of other folks' breaking. We all think the most of what we have had a hand in ourselves, don't we Miss Sandal? It's nothing but natural. And as soon as this run, through Joe's head, he found himself getting middling sorry for the old man; and he said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What will you give me to get you your own bits of stones back again?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "as he called them, were safe."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ay, said Joe,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "With that the jolly-jist jumped up, and said Joe must have something to eat and drink. Then Joe thought to himself,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Come, come, we are getting back to our own menseful way again."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do it again, Joe, if you can. But after that he said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Here, Joe, is five shillings for restoring my speciments, and here is another five shillings for showing me a speciment of human nature that I did not believe in until this day."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That is good, cried the squire, clapping his knee emphatically."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It was like the professor, and it was like Joe Bulteel. The story does them both credit. I am glad I heard it. Alice, fill our glasses again."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Friends and serving hands, a merry Christmas to you!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "She was made for him,--a special providence in his behalf."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Like to like,--and yet love may be dear bought."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "In time comes she whom Fate sends."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is such semblance of good fellowship, such a wearisome pretence of good wishes that mean nothing, he said one day."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What value is there in such talk?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, answered the squire,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Such wishes mean nothing."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Nay, now, there is no need to think that kind words are false words. There is a deal of good sometimes in a mouthful of words. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And yet, sir, as the queen of the crocodiles remarked, 'Words mend none of the eggs that are broken.'"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I know nothing about the queen of the crocodiles. But if you don't believe in words, Julius, it is quite allowable at Christmas time to put your good words into any substantial form you like. Nobody will doubt a good wish that is father to a handsome gift; so, if you don't believe in good words, you have a very reliable substitute in good deeds. I saw how you looked when I said 'A merry Christmas' to old Simon Gills, and you had to say the words after me. Very well; send old Simon a new plaid or a pound of tobacco, and he'll believe in your wish, and you'll believe in yourself. Eh? What?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Your father and brother have been examining timber, and looking at the out-houses this morning, and I understand they were discussing the building of a conservatory for Charlotte; but I was left out of the conversation entirely. Is it fair, Sophia? You and I are the next heirs, and just as likely to inherit as Harry. More so, I may say, for a soldier's life is already sold, and Harry is reckless and dissipated as well. I think I ought to have been consulted. I should not be in favor of thinning the timber. I dare say it is done to pay Harry's bills; and thus, you see, it may really be we who are made to suffer. I don't think your father likes our marriage, dear one."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But he gave his consent, beloved."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I was very dissatisfied with his way of doing it. He might as well have said, 'If it has to be, it has to be; and there is no use fretting about it.' I may be wrong, but that is the impression his consent left on my mind. And he was quite unreasonable when I alluded to money matters. I would not have believed that your father was capable of being so disagreeably haughty. Of course, I expected him to say something about our rights, failing Harry's, and he treated them as if they did not exist. Even when I introduced them in the most delicate way, he was what I call downright rude. 'Julius,' he said, 'I will not discuss any future that pre-supposes Harry's death.'"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Father's sun rises and sets in Harry, and it was like him to speak that way; he meant nothing against us. Father would always do right. What I feel most is the refusal to give us our own apartments in Seat-Sandal. We do not want to live here all the time, but we ought to be able to feel that we have a certain home here."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, indeed. It is very important in my eyes to keep a footing in the house. Possession is a kind of right. But never mind, Sophia. I have always had an impression that this was my home. The first moment I crossed the threshold I felt it. All its rooms were familiar to me. People do not have such presentiments for nothing."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "and several times as far as Kendal together."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Am I one of the family, or am I not?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Julius and Sophia do not want them, mother, she said,"
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have always been so proud of Sophia, always given up to her in every thing. When grandmother showed me the sapphire necklace, and said she was going to leave it to me because she loved me best, I begged her not to slight Sophia in such a way as that,--Sophia being the elder, you know, Harry. I cried about it until she was almost angry with me. Julius offered his hand to me first; and though I claim no merit for giving up what I do not want, yet, all the same, if I had wanted him I should have refused, because I saw that Sophia had set her heart upon him. I should indeed, Harry."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I believe you would, Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And somehow Julius manages to give me the feeling that I am only in Seat-Sandal on his tolerance. Many a time a day I have to tell myself that father is still alive, and that I have a right in my own home. I do not know how he manages to make me feel so."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "In the same way that he conveys to me the impression that I shall never be squire of Sandal-Side. He has doomed me to death in his own mind; and I believe if I had to live with him, I should feel constrained to go and shoot myself."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I would come home, and get married, Harry. There will be room enough and welcome enough for your wife in Seat-Sandal, especially if she be Emily."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "She will not be Emily; for I love some one else far away better,--millions of times better than I love Emily."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am so glad, Harry. Have you told father?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not yet. I do not think he will be glad, Charlotte."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But why?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "There are many reasons."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Such as?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "She is poor."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh! that is bad, Harry; because I know that we are not rich. But she is not your inferior? I mean she is not uneducated or unladylike?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "She is highly educated, and in all England there is not a more perfect lady."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then I can see no reason to think father will not be pleased. I am sure, Harry, that I shall love your wife. Oh, yes! I shall love her very dearly."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And so he asked you first, eh, Charley?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "And you would not have him? What for Charley?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I did not like Julius, and I did like some one else."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh! Oh! Who is the some one else?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Guess, Harry. He is very like you, very: fair and tall, with clear, candid, happy blue eyes; and brown hair curling close over his head. In the folds and in the fields he is a master. His heart is gentle to all, and full of love for me. He has spirit, dint, [Dint, energy.] ambition, enterprise; and can work twenty hours out of the twenty-four to carry out his own plans. He is a right good fellow, Harry."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A North-country man?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Certainly. Do you think I would marry a stranger?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Cumberland born?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Who else?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then it is Steve Latrigg, eh? Well, Charley, you might go farther, and fare worse. I don't think he is worthy of you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, but I do!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Very few men are worthy of you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Only Steve. I want you to like Steve. Harry."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Certainly. Seat-Sandal folks and Up-Hill folks are always thick friends. And Steve and I were boy chums. He is a fine fellow, and no mistake. I am glad he is to be my brother. I asked mother about him; and she said he was in Yorkshire, learning how to spin and weave wool--a queer thing, Charley."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not at all. He may just as well spin his own fleeces as sell them to Yorkshiremen to spin. Then they talked awhile of Stephen's plans, and Harry appeared to be much impressed with them."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is a pity father does not join him, Charley, he said."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Every one is doing something of the kind now. Land and sheep do not make money fast enough for the wants of our present life. The income of the estate is no larger than it was in grandfather's time; but the expenses are much greater, although we do not keep up the same extravagant style. I need money, too, need it very much; but I see plainly that father has none to spare. Julius will press him very close."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What has Julius to do with father's money?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Father must, in honor, pay Sophia's portion. Unfortunately, when the fellow was here last, father told him that he had put away from the estate one hundred pounds a year for each of his girls. Under this promise, Sophia's right with interest will be near three thousand pounds, exclusive of her share in the money grandmother left you. I am sorry to say that I have had something to do with making it hard for father to meet these obligations. And Julius wants the money paid at the marriage. Father, too, feels very much as I feel, and would rather throw it into the sea than give it to him; only _noblesse oblige_."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why, Harry! she cried,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And she loves me."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It is the countenance of an angel."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And she loves me. I am not worthy to touch the hem of her garment, Charley, but she loves me."
}
] |
16258
|
Unknown Title
|
Unknown Author
|
[
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mine is the first marriage in the family, Sophia said,"
}
] |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.