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257
Cranford
·
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
71
There
was
a
great
gap
before
any
of
the
rector’s
letters
appeared.
And
then
his
wife
had
changed
her
mode
of
her
endorsement.
It
was
no
longer
from,
“My
dearest
John;”
it
was
from
“My
Honoured
Husband.”
The
letters
were
written
on
occasion
of
the
publication
of
the
same
sermon
which
was
represented
in
the
picture.
The
preaching
before
“My
Lord
Judge,”
and
the
“publishing
by
request,”
was
evidently
the
culminating
point—
the
event
of
his
life.
It
had
been
necessary
for
him
to
go
up
to
London
to
superintend
it
through
the
press.
Many
friends
had
to
be
called
upon
and
consulted
before
he
could
decide
on
any
printer
fit
for
so
onerous
a
task;
and
at
length
it
was
arranged
that
J.
and
J.
Rivingtons
were
to
have
the
honourable
responsibility.
The
worthy
rector
seemed
to
be
strung
up
by
the
occasion
to
a
high
literary
pitch,
for
he
could
hardly
write
a
letter
to
his
wife
without
cropping
out
into
Latin.
I
remember
the
end
of
one
of
his
letters
ran
thus:
“I
shall
ever
hold
the
virtuous
qualities
of
my
Molly
in
remembrance,
dum
memor
ipse
mei,
dum
spiritus
regit
artus,”
which,
considering
that
the
English
of
his
correspondent
was
sometimes
at
fault
in
grammar,
and
often
in
spelling,
might
be
taken
as
a
proof
of
how
much
he
“idealised
his
Molly;”
and,
as
Miss
Jenkyns
used
to
say,
“People
talk
a
great
deal
about
idealising
now-a-days,
whatever
that
may
mean.”
But
this
was
nothing
to
a
fit
of
writing
classical
poetry
which
soon
seized
him,
in
which
his
Molly
figured
away
as
“Maria.”
The
letter
containing
the
carmen
was
endorsed
by
her,
“Hebrew
verses
sent
me
by
my
honoured
husband.
I
thowt
to
have
had
a
letter
about
killing
the
pig,
but
must
wait.
Mem.,
to
send
the
poetry
to
Sir
Peter
Arley,
as
my
husband
desires.”
And
in
a
post-scriptum
note
in
his
handwriting
it
was
stated
that
the
Ode
had
appeared
in
the
Gentleman’s
Magazine,
December
1782.
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