A Vicarage Family: A Biography of Myself

by Noel Streatfeild

  ‘And that was pretty mean,’ sang Victoria, ‘for I like them even if you do not.’

  The children, all through their childhood, heard discussions as to whether people were very high, medium high or low church. As the daughters of a vicar of the Church of England they knew nobody who was not Church of England. Presumably at their school some girls were Roman Catholics and some were chapel, but if this were so they never knew about it. Everyone in their world was very high, medium high or low Church of England.

  The girls’ father and mother did not agree on the right way for a church service to be held. The subject was never discussed before the children but words were dropped and their sharp eyes and ears missed little. They knew their mother hated what she called ‘anything high’. ‘High’ included the red lamp to show where the reserved sacrament was kept, and ‘dressing up’, by which she meant vestments.

  Their father did not wear vestments because he had none, but on grand occasions, such as Easter, Christmas and the day of the patron saint, Peter, nothing was spared in the way of processions, or to beautify the altar. Once when the Bishop came to stay the house parlourmaid, when she came out of the dining room, had said to the cook: ‘He’d like incense but the Bishop thinks they aren’t ready. She’s looking as if they’d both gone over to Rome.’ Isobel, hanging over the stairs, had heard this statement. She had told Victoria and both had gone to Miss Herbert for enlightenment.

  ‘I know about frankincense like the wise men brought to baby Jesus,’ Isobel said as they walked to school, ‘but what is incense?’

  Miss Herbert was medium high herself though, because of her devotion to the vicar, struggling to like being higher.

  ‘It’s stuff that smells when it burns. Roman Catholics put it in little braziers and swing the smoke out over the congregation. Sometimes it is done in our churches too but only in very, very few.’

  ‘Would you like it if Daddy used it?’ Victoria asked.

  Miss Herbert, who had heard nothing of the talk in the dining room, was shocked.

  ‘Oh no, dear, and I’m sure he never would, it’s very un-English I think.’

  ‘Popish,’ Isobel suggested.

  Miss Herbert thought that was just what incense was, but knowing how ‘high’ the children’s father was, he just might not disapprove of the nasty stuff, so she had evaded a direct answer.

  ‘Something like that, but don’t let’s talk any more about incense on this bright clear morning. Breathe deeply, Isobel, this is just the day to fill your lungs.’

  During Sunday matins there were ‘high’ moments which the children waited for, knowing their mother disapproved of them; the choir bowing to the altar when they processed in, and before they processed out, and the part at the end of the Creed when their father, the curate and some members of the congregation crossed themselves. And they knew their mother disapproved when during the week their father would slip out in the early morning to take Holy Communion to the sick. He always went quietly hoping to meet no one because in his portable altar case was the reserved sacrament, and to speak would seem to him profane. When he came home their mother would watch him eat his breakfast in a grudging way, as if she were saying: ‘Those that run about before breakfast doing what you’ve been doing don’t deserve to be fed.’ Isobel, when she was at home because of asthma, used to watch her parents on these mornings with amusement, for she did not believe her father noticed how her mother felt or, if he did, that he cared, for in his philosophy a wife believed what her husband believed. The point was above argument.

  After morning church a visit was paid to distant cousins. There were two sets of these, old Cousin Violet who was in her nineties and had produced so many children she had long ago lost count of the number, was a cousin on their mother’s side. Cousin Fred and Cousin Pearl belonged to Father’s family. He came of Quaker stock, as had their father’s grandmother. She was Hannah, a daughter of Elizabeth Fry. There was not a room in the vicarage which had not something in it by which to remember Elizabeth Fry. Busts of her; engravings of her teaching prisoners; a small Bible signed by her; and, in the day nursery, a portrait of her nurse. But Cousin Fred was unique in that he took Elizabeth Fry out of being history and made her real.

  Once when he was a tiny boy, he had stayed in a house, he told the children, where each morning he was lifted on to a great four-poster bed to kiss a very old lady. The old lady had worn a stiff white muslin bonnet. Each day she said the same thing. ‘Hast thou said thy prayers, Fred?’ When the child answered ‘Yes’ he was given a reward. The old lady opened a tin and out of it took a piece of barley sugar hanging on a string. Every time Cousin Fred told the story he finished it the same way. ‘And that old lady was your great-great-grandmother, Elizabeth Fry.’

  The visits to the cousins were usually turn about except in the strawberry season when each Sunday Cousin Fred let the children loose under his strawberry nets. Cousin Violet, who dressed exactly as had Queen Victoria in a bonnet, with a cape covered in bugles and beads, though devoted to the children’s father, was low church. To counteract any Popish tang attached to words, she deliberately mispronounced them, for instance, God was always Gawd. She had a remarkable memory and delighted the children with stories of her girlhood. Their favourite was of the death of a relative at which she had been present, when, gripping her daughter’s hand, the dying mother had whispered as her last words: ‘Never wear pink. And never know the name of a card.’

  ‘Why shouldn’t she have worn pink?’ one of the children would always ask in order to hear Cousin Violet say:

  ‘No nice girl wore pink when I was young.’

  In every way Cousin Violet belonged to the past. When the previous Christmas, for the first time, all the children were taken to a pantomime by Cousin Fred and Cousin Pearl, Cousin Violet had said:

  ‘I should never care to go inside a theatre. How terrible if you died there.’

  This Sunday it was Cousin Fred and Cousin Pearl’s turn. As was usual when it was fine they were walking round their garden when the family arrived but this Sunday they were not alone, two very old people were with them. Cousin Fred introduced the children one by one to the old lady, who nodded and smiled. Then, raising her voice, she in turn introduced them to the old man. She started with Isobel, leading her forward, one hand on her shoulder.

  ‘Isobel, thee dost not know thy cousin John Henry.’

  Walking home to lunch the children were full of questions.

  ‘Why do they talk like that?’ Isobel asked her mother.

  ‘Because they are Quakers; Quakers don’t talk like that now as a rule but those two are very old and haven’t changed.’

  Victoria giggled.

  ‘I felt I ought to curtsey or something.’

  ‘It was a good thing you didn’t,’ said her mother. ‘They don’t approve of anything of that sort. An ancestor of yours through Elizabeth Fry lived in Oxford, and for a time Charles II was there too. As a joke, to tease the Quakers, King Charles would sweep off his hat. One day your Quaker ancestor stopped the king just as he was lifting his hat from his head. “Charles,” he said, “I did not doff my hat to thee, so thee needs not doff thy hat to me.”’

  ‘Did anything happen to him?’ the girls wanted to know.

  Their mother shook her head.

  ‘I don’t think so. I think probably the king admired him for standing up for his convictions.’

  As soon as they were back in the vicarage the girls wanted to open their envelope from Joyce Sedman, but their mother said no.

  ‘You’ve only just got time to wash and tidy for lunch, the gong will go in a few minutes. We’ll open it after lunch.’

  ‘How mean!’ said Victoria as they were washing their hands. ‘I shouldn’t have thought any mother could be as mean as that.’

  ‘Any more of that talk, Vicky,’ said Miss Herbert, who had come up to collect the girls, ‘and you’ll have no pudding.’

  There was a second when going without pudding
almost won, then Isobel tugged at Victoria’s arm.

  ‘Come on down,’ she whispered. ‘It’s not worth it. Going without pudding won’t open the envelope any quicker.’

  In those days, however much a family like the Strangeways might believe in the catechism – ‘Remember that thou keep holy the Sabbath day. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all that thou hast to do; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. In it thou shalt do no manner of work, thou and thy son and thy daughter, thy man-servant and thy maidservant, thy cattle and the stranger that is within thy gates …’ – it did not prevent the cook cooking a hot Sunday lunch and the house parlourmaid serving it. The reason, which belonged to the period was that, though it was never actually admitted to, churchgoing was a class affair. Matins was for the gentry, evensong for the working classes.

  In a big household where there were perhaps twenty or more indoor servants, a large part of the staff in uniform attended matins and then congregated outside the church to take off their hats or curtsey to the family for whom they worked when they left the church. But such households did not exist in the vicar’s parish, so keeping holy the Sabbath day started for the servants in the vicarage after they had served afternoon tea and laid cold supper in the dining room.

  Lunch on Sundays was always the same: a roast joint, usually beef, in which case it was served with Yorkshire pudding, followed by apple tart and custard. Afterwards, because it was Sunday, the one sweet of the Lenten week was eaten, chosen by each in turn according to age, from one of the many boxes given to the family last Christmas. Chocolates, except on special occasions, were only eaten once a day, so sometimes the Christmas boxes lasted until midsummer. During Lent six chocolates were put away each week to be given to a blind child in the parish on Easter Day.

  After lunch the envelope was opened. Inside was an invitation card, which said that Joyce was giving a party from four o’clock to eight o’clock and she hoped Isobel, Victoria and Louise would be able to come. There would be competitions and a conjurer. It was this last which drew excited murmurs from the girls.

  There were many parties, especially round Christmas, but they were usually only games and dancing; a conjurer was a rare treat at a time when for children such as the Strangeways there was no entertainment save an occasional magic lantern, except those they made themselves. Other children had things called phonographs on which a black tube spun round and tunes came out, such as A Whistler and his Dog, but not the Strangeways, such things not only cost too much but were looked at in dismay by their father, who had no love for any invention he had not known as a child in his own home. True, he accepted gas and was to accept electricity but all his life he sighed for lamps.

  ‘Don’t get too excited about the conjurer,’ their mother warned. ‘The party is on the Saturday before Holy Week so I doubt if Daddy will let you go.’

  ‘It’s going to be awkward for him saying “no” as Mr Sedman’s a churchwarden,’ Victoria suggested.

  Her mother wanted to snap but refrained.

  ‘I’ve yet to hear your father say “yes” to something he did not approve of.’

  Louise looked anxious.

  ‘I do hope he lets us go. It’s been a very long Lent this year.’

  On Sunday afternoon the children were taken by Miss Herbert to the children’s service, so asking their father had to wait until after tea. They did not mind the children’s service which was, though they did not know it, a model of what a service for children should be. There were plenty of popular hymns. A reading from the Bible. A short talk on a theme suitable for children, another hymn and then, what all the children waited for – a story. How the vicar managed to find a new, absorbing story Sunday after Sunday amazed the adults, but the truth was he was a splendid storyteller and could produce a first-class story without much material. When years later Victoria wrote books for children and was asked whether her talent was inherited she always said ‘yes’, thinking back to those Sunday afternoons.

  Sunday tea for the girls was in the schoolroom supervised by Miss Herbert. Because it was Sunday the fast was lifted and there was both jam and a home-made cake. Usually on the Sundays in Lent the girls lingered over tea, enjoying the food they would not taste again for a week, but today they were anxious to get downstairs to learn whether or not they would be allowed to go to Joyce’s party.

  In the drawing room the children’s mother had broken the news of the invitation to their father. He looked at her with a worried face.

  ‘How awkward, and how peculiar of Sedman to give a party in Lent. In the ordinary way I would have told the children to refuse, but as we are leaving it seems unkind.’

  The children’s mother helped herself to a sandwich.

  ‘I expect he would be hurt. He’s going to miss you.’

  ‘And I him, dear man; yes, I think perhaps the girls must go, but because I say yes this time they must not think it could happen again.’

  The girls had not thought it could happen once! Before they came down Isobel had implored Victoria not to argue if the invitation had to be refused.

  ‘It won’t do any good and will only end in a row.’

  ‘If Daddy says no I shall cry,’ said Louise. ‘I do so want to see the conjurer.’

  Isobel looked at Victoria.

  ‘That might be an idea, Daddy hates her to cry.’

  Victoria stumped off to wash her hands, which had to be done before they went to the drawing room.

  ‘I’d much rather have a good argument, but if dear little Louise wants to cry, let her.’

  So it came as an anticlimax when, as the girls came into the drawing room, Isobel holding the invitation, their father said:

  ‘I have decided that as we are leaving the parish it would be unkind if you refused the party, so you may accept.’

  The girls fell on him.

  ‘Oh, thank you, Daddy,’ said Isobel as she kissed him.

  Louise hung round his neck.

  ‘Did you know there was going to be a conjurer?’

  Victoria rubbed her cheek against his.

  ‘I can’t pretend I like Joyce much but I’m glad we can go to her party, it’s her birthday so there’s sure to be a terrific cake.’

  That made her father think.

  ‘But listen, darlings, although you may go it does not mean that you forget it is Lent. Just stick to bread and butter for tea and, of course, no dressing up.’

  Horrified, the girls moved away from him. Eating only bread and butter at a party was bad, but no dressing up was much worse.

  ‘But it’s a party, Daddy.’ Isobel held out the invitation. ‘Look, a proper invitation card, everybody will wear party frocks.’

  ‘You couldn’t mean we’re to wear our school skirts and jerseys,’ said Victoria. ‘If we do I’d rather not go.’

  Louise’s eyes were full of tears.

  ‘I haven’t worn my muslin with the pink sash since Christmas.’

  Their father looked at their mother for help.

  ‘Couldn’t they wear what they’ve got on? They look very nice to me.’

  The three girls gave a protesting howl.

  ‘Daddy!’

  ‘Nice!’ said Louise. ‘This smock is so old it’s falling to pieces.’

  Victoria stuck her chin in the air.

  ‘If I have to go to a party in a frock where the sleeves are a different colour to the dress I’m not going.’

  ‘Mummy, make Daddy see we can’t go in our Sundays,’ Isobel pleaded. ‘Nobody, absolutely nobody, could say I look nice in this!’

  Her mother looked and thought that perhaps Isobel was right.

  ‘They could wear their velvets,’ she suggested.

  Victoria almost stamped her foot.

  ‘But they’re nearly as awful – at least mine and Louise’s are.’

  Their father felt sad. In his home there had never been scenes like this about clothes. Were his children thinking too much of worldly things? He quoted quietly: �
�“Consider the lilies of the field …”’

  That maddened Victoria.

  ‘Oh, Daddy! What’s that got to do with us? Nobody could say that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed better than us in our Sundays or our velvets.’

  Their father did not mean to be unkind but he was a truly unworldly man and could not believe, provided they were suitably dressed, that it mattered what his daughters wore. And also he was convinced that they should have better things to think about than frocks. He got up.

  ‘I must go to my study. Now Mummy and I don’t want to hear any more about what you will wear at the party. You will accept the invitation, Isobel, and you will go in the frocks you have on now.’

  Sunday evenings always finished the same way. Until Louise went to bed their mother played hymns and they stood round the piano singing. When the boys were home, each of whom had a good ear for music, they would often sing Glory to Thee my God this night in canon. But when they were away the girls sang in unison, Victoria’s voice soaring like a bird, Isobel and Louise following her, often out of tune. After Louise had gone to bed their mother read to the other two. Not the book they read in the week but what was called a Sunday book. Just now it was Meg, a Chattel, about a slave girl in America who was sold away from her family. While their mother read, to keep them from fidgeting, Isobel drew and Victoria cleaned a brass tray. Usually the girls liked the reading end of Sunday, but today they were glad when Miss Herbert called them to have their supper.