What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew

by Daniel Pool

An answer will oblige.

  Dancing.

  A reply within twenty-four hours was considered mandatory. In London, the town house would then be prepared by turning everything upside down. “In the houses of the aristocracy,” said The Ball-room Guide in 1868, “hours are often spent in polishing a floor with bees’wax and a brush where a ball is to be given.” Failing that, a “crumb cloth or linen diaper” might be stretched over the carpet. (In The Pickwick Papers the hero attends the Bath assembly with its “chalked floors.”) In a large house a suite of rooms opening one onto another on the “first” floor would be arranged with a refreshment room nearby so ladies would not get chilled passing down drafty staircases on their way for tea or lemonade between dances. Mrs. Weston, we are told in Emma, worried about putting the supper room at the other end of the hall from the ballroom, for she “was afraid of draughts for the young people in that passage.” Smaller houses had to jam the same things into a small room at the front of the house with a place for refreshments at the back, the ballroom itself being ideally squarish rather than long and narrow. There also had to be cloakrooms where men and women could park their wraps (or retire to, in the ladies’ case, so the maids could mend any damage to their dresses). And a supper room was necessary downstairs to which people could repair for the main meal. When old people were asked to be part of the festivities, there had to be a cardroom set aside for them in which to play whist, loo, vingt-et-un, or speculation while the young danced. At “one of the Miss Guests’ thoroughly condescending parties,” described in The Mill on the Floss, “the focus of brilliancy was the long drawing-room, where the dancing went forward, under the inspiration of the grand piano; the library into which it opened at one end had the more sober illumination of maturity, with caps and cards; and at the other end the pretty sitting-room with conservatory attached, was left as an occasional cool retreat.”

  Things generally got under way around 8 P.M. It was often the practice for the hostess and her daughter(s) to receive the guests as they came in the front door. Or after they’d gotten something to eat. Social courtesies out of the way, guests made their way to the ballroom, the men in formal black trousers, black jacket, and black waistcoat with white tie and shirt, and the ladies in white, wearing the jewelry that was considered de trop during the day. Floral decorations were popular in the 1850s and 1860s, but—at least until the 1890s—too much décolletage would be frowned on by the governess or married woman friend of the family who sat in as chaperone of each young lady who attended and endeavored to ensure that no breath of scandal could attach to her reputation. Both sexes wore gloves at all times.

  At the “top” of the room—usually the area farthest away from the door—was the orchestra, sometimes discreetly hidden behind ornamental shrubbery or placed just outside the room, but with an opening through which the music could be heard. At a large ball in the middle of the century one would wish to have a cornet, a piano, a violin, and a cello, the cornet sometimes being omitted for smaller affairs.

  Protocol for these events varied. In the early part of the century, when public balls and assemblies were not uncommon, an august personage known as the master of the ceremonies was often charged with maintaining proper decorum and at a minimum generally made the introductions between a strange man desiring to dance and the lady waiting patiently in her seat at the side of the floor. In Pickwick an unfamiliar member of the party decides to go after a widow at an assembly. “The stranger walked boldly up to, and returned with, the master of the ceremonies; a little introductory pantomime; and the stranger and Mrs. Budger took their places in a quadrille.” At the increasingly popular private balls that took the place of these events, the chaperone or perhaps a good friend or the lady of the house performed this office instead. Sometimes the ladies would have dance cards on one side of which the dances would be listed, with spaces on the other in which they or their partners would write in their names for the dances they preferred with the helpful little pencil that was attached to the card by a ribbon, a useful memory aid when there were many dances.

  When the dance began, the first dancers were the hostess or her daughter and the gentleman of highest rank present. This could apparently occasion some genteel teeth-grinding; in Emma the obnoxious Mrs. Elton, being a new bride, “must be asked to begin the ball.” Emma is quite displeased, we learn. “It was almost enough to make her think of marrying.” At the beginning of the century a ball would have begun with a minuet and been followed by various country-dances. By mid-century, however, the average dance would have started with a quadrille and then been followed by some fourteen waltzes, galops, and polkas, after which there would have come a time out for supper. There would then have been another ten or so dances, which meant that a fancy ball might not wind up until one in the morning.

  There was also a prescribed etiquette for the commencement of each individual dance. Early in the century, at least, the gentleman would bow and the lady curtsy to her partner. A customary conclusion to dancing evolved, too. The gentleman was expected to promenade at least halfway around the room at the conclusion of each dance with his partner on his right arm. At the conclusion of the quadrilles at the birthday party given by the Veneerings for their daughter in Our Mutual Friend, the dancers, “two and two, took a walk among the furniture,” and we are told “the procession of sixteen . . . slowly circled about, like a revolving funeral.” The gentleman then inquired if his partner desired refreshments, and if she said yes, he escorted her to the refreshments room, where they partook of wine, lemonade, ices, biscuits, tea, or coffee. In Jane Austen’s time, there was soup spiked with negus at many balls. Fanny Price weaves her way up to bed after the great dance in Mansfield Park, “feverish with hopes and fears, soup and negus.” If a gentleman were dancing with someone when the break for supper came, he took her down to supper and stood by while she ate but did not himself partake (he was to do that only later, alone), although he might permit himself a glass of wine while she dug into the turkey and ham. And there was always supper. Mrs. Weston suggests in Emma “having no regular supper; merely sandwiches, etc., set out in the little room,” but “a private dance without sitting down to supper was pronounced an infamous fraud upon the rights of men and women.”

  The dances were not without their downside notwithstanding all their glitter and gaiety. Quite apart from any damage to hearts or reputations, wax dripped from the overhead candelabra and chandeliers onto the dancers with some regularity. The wilder dances involved mad sorties across the floor (one etiquette book found it necessary to warn cavalry officers not to wear spurs in the ballroom) and with the bracelets that some ladies wore, in at least one instance someone slammed into another girl cutting her arm and sending blood spurting all over.

  The Country House Visit

  One of the most important social rituals of nineteenth-century England was the house party at a large country estate. In embryonic form, it appears in Jane Austen’s novels when the affectionate friends or relatives come for long stays in the country. Mr. Rochester throws open the doors of Thornfield Hall for a visit by his perhaps intended, Blanche Ingram, and in Trollope, guests come to pass the days or weeks at a great house and connive, flirt, and transact business as the plot of the novel goes forward.

  Can You Forgive Her? paints a vivid portrait of this era at midpoint in its description of a long party arranged by Lady Glencora Palliser and her husband, Plantagenet, during which Alice Vavasor comes to stay at Matching Priory for a few weeks. Plantagenet, “a legislator who served his country with the utmost assiduity,” has invited a party leader, the duke of St. Bungay, to stay and “when it was known among outside politicians that the Duke of St. Bungay was staying at Matching Priory, outside politicians became more sure than ever that Mr. Palliser would be the new Chancellor of the Exchequer.” In addition, Lady Glencora has asked her friend Alice Vavasor to join the group in order to have some company, while the dreadful Mr. Bott and Jeffrey Palliser are there to take part in whatever
shooting and hunting there is to be had—and, in the intervals, it seems, to pursue more or less equivocal flirtations with Alice. Sport, romance, political intrigue, and socializing—these were all characteristic elements of the country house visit.

  Transportation at the beginning of the century was very poor, which is one reason visits were often so long. It was so much trouble to travel that it made no sense to turn around and head home after only a couple of days. Later, the railroads made it possible for people to pop up for a weekend to someone’s country place and then be back in London by Monday. Even so, there remained the long excursions to the hinterlands, like the August or September visit to go grouse shooting at someone’s castle in Scotland, and the long visit of the sort Alice makes to Lady Glencora.

  The hostess with frequent visitors often sent them in advance a printed notice of the train schedule and an indication of the station at which to get off, together with instructions as to whether the traveler should expect to be met at the station or should hire a carriage. A visitor could bring a lady’s maid or valet, but the Habits of Good Society pointed out that “children and horses . . . should never be taken without special mention.” The thoughtful guest made an effort to arrive on time, usually in the late afternoon, recognizing that tardiness would interfere with the work of the servants as they prepared for dinner—the grand event of the day—or hold up the service of dinner for others while the new arrival “dressed for dinner.” The hostess would offer the new guest tea while his luggage was taken up, then show him to his room, telling him the dinner hour and indicating the bell for the maid. He might be apprised of the “rules of the house”—if any—such as those prohibiting smoking or reading in bed, or setting limits on the amount to be bet at a game.

  The subsequent daily routine was largely invariant. The day officially began with breakfast, an informal affair to which, Trollope tells us in Can You Forgive Her?, the ladies did not descend until ten thirty. In contrast to the elaborate dinner which took place at day’s end, breakfast was relatively relaxed. There was no protocol—people came and went as they wished, sat where they pleased, helping themselves to food from the sideboard in the sunny and pleasant breakfast parlor or breakfast room where there would have been set out a hearty mixture of ham, eggs, pheasant, and other substantial fare necessary to fuel the guests for their day’s activities out in the field. Indeed, although the ladies came down late, “some of the gentlemen would breakfast earlier, especially on hunting mornings, and on some occasions the ladies, when they came together, would find themselves altogether deserted by their husbands and brothers.”

  After breakfast the men headed out for the woods, fields, or stream, according to whether they planned to shoot, hunt, or fish. This could be problematic for “town” men like Mr. Bott, Trollope tells us. “Twice he went out shooting, but as on the first day he shot the keeper, and on the second very nearly shot the Duke, he gave that up. Hunting he declined, though much pressed to make an essay in that art by Jeffrey Palliser.” One reason the ladies didn’t hurry to get up is that there was so little for them to do. Most days after breakfast they typically went for a walk, strolled around the gardens, or wrote interminable letters on the mansion’s stationery, to the periodic replenishment of which some servant would have been assigned. Sometimes, expeditions by horse and carriage to points of interest in the neighborhood might be arranged. At lunch the ladies would generally eat by themselves while the men picnicked somewhere out in the field. In the afternoon there might be a drive and a walk and then—beginning in the early 1870s—everyone would have gone upstairs to change into her tea gown and then present herself for five o’clock tea in the drawing room.

  The great formal event of the day was dinner. A dressing bell was sounded about half an hour before dinner. Both ladies and gentlemen alike dressed formally for the great occasion, but it is worth noting in this connection what a production it had gotten to be by the end of the century for women to pack for a country weekend. You needed a breakfast outfit, something fancier for lunch, followed by the tea gown, and then the heavy artillery for dinner that night. And if you were just away for the weekend, you tried not to wear the same outfit twice, which meant that for a simple three days in the country you could go through about fifteen different outfits.

  When the dinner bell sounded, everyone assembled in the drawing room, from which they eventually proceeded in to dine as they would at an ordinary dinner party. After dinner and the obligatory separation of the sexes had occurred—followed by their reunion for coffee or tea in the drawing room—there might be billiards, as in Can You Forgive Her?, light talk, round card games, and whist, or, perhaps, as in Jane Eyre, a bizarre game of charades. The British habit of dressing up and acting out tableaux (it is in Vanity Fair, too) evidently died hard, for the Etiquette of Good Society in 1893 was still recommending charades for those long wintry nights in the country.

  At a certain hour, a servant appeared with a tray bearing water, wine, and biscuits—the hostess might then discreetly suggest that it was time to turn in. The ladies then took their candles and retired, the gentlemen waiting a short interval before following them, or, sometimes, adjourning for a brief spell in the smoking room.

  And so to bed—sometimes in ways not always called for in the official schedule of room assignments. The neutral ground of a great estate, after all, was one of the few mattress-filled places a woman could go in the days before “ladies” could visit restaurants and hotels. Assignations, therefore, were apparently not unknown, although negotiating one’s way around a large mansion at night in order to carry them out was sometimes eventful. Lord Charles Beresford in the 1880s flung himself gleefully into a darkened room one night and jumped into bed, with a shout of “Cock-a-doodle-do”—only to find, when the lamps were lit, that the bishop of Chester was on one side of him and the bishop’s wife on the other.

  It should not be imagined that country house visits were any easier on the people who planned them than on the guests. (Lady Glencora openly pronounces her detestation of entertaining dreadful bores like the duchess of St. Bungay, though she stalwartly acknowledges the necessity of doing so if her husband is to further his political career.) The preparations required were certainly considerable. Rooms had to be found for everyone, a perplexing problem when there were thirty guests and only twenty chambers. When he invites his guests, Mr. Rochester sends directions to his housekeeper, Mrs. Fairfax: “for all the best bedrooms to be prepared; and the library and the drawing-rooms are to be cleaned out; and I am to get more kitchen hands from the George Inn, at Millcote, and from wherever else I can.” The place is very clean as it is, Jane Eyre thinks, but nonetheless, “carpets were laid down, bed-hangings festooned, radiant white counterpanes spread, toilet tables arranged, furniture rubbed, flowers piled in vases; . . . The hall, too, was scoured; and the great carved clock, as well as the steps and bannisters of the staircase, were polished to the brightness of glass.”

  All this entertaining was not cheap, since to keep a house running in this fashion required not only lavish expenditures on food and entertainment for the guests but also maintaining servants to look after them. Plus room and board had to be provided for the valets and ladies’ maids who often accompanied guests. The mistress of “Taplow” found upon reviewing her records for 1899 that to run the house for a year—guests came virtually each week—cost about £2,118.

  The payoffs, however, could be numerous. Relaxation and gossip, of course, were always to be had, but, in addition, weddings might be engineered (or affairs facilitated), political and social intrigue carried forward or the friendships adjunct to such intrigue nurtured in a convivial and appealing setting. “Mr. Palliser remained three days at Monkshade, and cemented his political alliance with Sir Cosmo much in the same way as he had done before with the Duke of St. Bungay. There was little or nothing said about politics, and certainly not a word that could be taken as any definite party understanding between the men; but they sat down at din
ner together at the same table, drank a glass of wine or two out of the same decanters, and dropped a chance word now and again about the next session of Parliament. I do not know that anything more had been expected either by Mr. Palliser or by Sir Cosmo; but it seemed to be understood when Mr. Palliser went away that Sir Cosmo was of opinion that that young scion of a ducal house ought to become the future Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Whig Government.”

  MONEY

  Being Wealthy

  What did it mean to be wealthy in the days before tax shelters, credit cards, junk bonds, and golden parachutes? No stocks and bonds, no money market funds—what did you put your money into?

  First and foremost, it went into land. Land was socially prestigious and it also produced rent from tenant farmers that was probably the major source of income for most of the landed gentry and nobility during much of the 1800s. Good land, however, was not likely to be easily attainable. Much of it was tied up through entail in family estates, and it was an extremely complicated and expensive procedure to purchase it. A contemporary observer toward the end of the century said the legal fees involved were enormous and also pointed out that by then the 2 percent return on land made it a bad investment unless you didn’t need a big income. In families, land always went to the men, while the women got things like government securities. Thus, in The Warden, the wealthy physician “Dr. Bold died, leaving his Barchester property to his son, and a certain sum in the Three per cents, to his daughter Mary.”

  Except for railway shares, no one would have had stocks or bonds from private companies until the second half of the century, for the excellent reason that even the smallest shareholders were 100 percent liable to the extent of all their goods and land for any debt incurred by the business of which they were part owners. Consequently, business transacted on the Stock Exchange, as a contemporary observer noted in 1832, “relates entirely to the purchase and sale of stock in the public funds, Exchequer bills, India bonds and similar securities.” Gold and silver were popular forms of wealth, partly in the form of coins, of course, but also in the form of the “plate” (or silverware) which in great houses was locked up in a safe guarded by the butler at night and which accounts for the practice of those, who, like the well-off individuals in Oliver Twist, made a point when leaving London of “sending the plate, which had so excited Fagin’s cupidity, to the banker’s.” Dickens wrote that in the 1830s. By 1867, things had evidently changed. “Everybody has these plated things now,” says Mr. Musselboro in response to a neighbor’s query about the lack of “real silver forks” at dinner in The Last Chronicle of Barset. “What’s the use of a lot of capital lying dead?”