When Salemina and I go into a cafe for
tea we ask the young woman if they serve Lipton's, and if they say
yes, we take coffee. This is self-punishment indeed (in London!),
yet we feel that it may have a moral effect; perhaps not
commensurate with the physical effect of the coffee upon us, but
these delicate matters can never be adjusted with absolute
exactitude.
Sometimes when we are to travel on a Pears' Soap 'bus we buy
beforehand a bit of pure white Castile, cut from a shrinking,
reserved, exclusive bar with no name upon it, and present it to some
poor woman when we arrive at our journey's end. We do not suppose
that so insignificant a protest does much good, but at least it
preserves one's individuality and self-respect.
Chapter IX. A Table of Kindred and Affinity.
On one of our excursions Hilda Mellifica accompanied us, and we
alighted to see the place where the Smithfield martyrs were
executed, and to visit some of the very old churches in that
vicinity. We found hanging in the vestibule of one of them
something quite familiar to Hilda, but very strange to our American
eyes: 'A Table of Kindred and Affinity, wherein whosoever are
related are forbidden in Scripture and our Laws to Marry Together.'
Salemina was very quiet that afternoon, and we accused her
afterwards of being depressed because she had discovered that, added
to the battalions of men in England who had not thus far urged her
to marry them, there were thirty persons whom she could not legally
espouse even if they did ask her!
I cannot explain it, but it really seemed in some way that our
chances of a 'sweet, safe corner of the household fire' had
materially decreased when we had read the table.
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