I have mentioned several times the pertness of Mrs. Betty to me; and now, having a little time upon my hands, I will give you a short dialogue that passed just now between us. It may, perhaps, be a little relief to you from the dull subjects with which I am perpetually teasing you.
As she attended me at dinner, she took notice, That Nature is satisfied with a very little nourishment: and thus she complimentally proved it—For, Miss, said she, you eat nothing; yet never looked more charmingly in your life.
As to the former part of your speech, Betty, said I, you observe well; and I have often thought, when I have seen how healthy the children of the labouring poor look, and are, with empty stomachs, and hardly a good meal in a week, that God Almighty is very kind to his creatures, in this respect, as well as in all others in making much not necessary to the support of life; when three parts in four of His creatures, if it were, would not know how to obtain it. It puts me in mind of two proverbial sentences which are full of admirable meaning.
What, pray, Miss, are they? I love to hear you talk, when you are so sedate as you seem now to be.
The one is to the purpose we are speaking of: Poverty is the mother of health. And let me tell you, Betty, if I had a better appetite, and were to encourage it, with so little rest, and so much distress and persecution, I don’t think I should be able to preserve my reason.
There’s no inconvenience but has its convenience, said Betty, giving me proverb for proverb. But what is the other, Madam?
That the pleasures of the mighty are not obtained by the tears of the poor. It is but reasonable, therefore, methinks, that the plenty of the one should be followed by distempers; and that the indigence of the other should be attended with that health, which makes all its other discomforts light on the comparison. And hence a third proverb, Betty, since you are an admirer of proverbs: Better a hare-foot than none at all; that is to say, than not to be able to walk.
She was mightily taken with what I said: See, returned she, what a fine thing scholarship is!—I, said she, had always, from a girl, a taste for reading, though it were but in Mother Goose, and concerning the fairies [and then she took genteelly a pinch of snuff]: could but my parents have let go as fast as I pulled, I should have been a very happy creature.
Very likely, you would have made great improvements, Betty: but as it is, I cannot say, but since I had the favour of your attendance in this intimate manner, I have heard smarter things from you, than I have heard at table from some of my brother’s fellow-collegians.
Your servant, dear Miss; dropping me one of her best courtesies: so fine a judge as you are!—It is enough to make one very proud. Then with another pinch—I cannot indeed but say, bridling upon it, that I have heard famous scholars often and often say very silly things: things I should be ashamed myself to say; but I thought they did it out of humility, and in condescension to those who had not their learning.
That she might not be too proud, I told her, I would observe, that the liveliness or quickness she so happily discovered in herself, was not so much an honour to her, as what she owed to her sex; which, as I had observed in many instances, had great advantages over the other, in all the powers that related to imagination. And hence, Mrs. Betty, you’ll take notice, as I have of late had opportunity to do, that your own talent at repartee and smartness, when it has something to work upon, displays itself to more advantage, than could well be expected from one whose friends, to speak in your own phrase, could not let go so fast as you pulled.
The wench gave me a proof of the truth of my observation, in a manner still more alert than I had expected: If, said she, our sex had so much advantage in smartness, it is the less to be wondered at, that you, Miss, who have had such an education, should outdo all the men and women too, that come near you.
Bless me, Betty, said I, what a proof do you give me of your wit and your courage at the same time! This is outdoing yourself. It would make young ladies less proud, and more apprehensive, were they generally attended by such smart servants, and their mouths permitted to be unlocked upon them as yours has been lately upon me.—But, take away, Mrs. Betty.
Why, Miss, you have eat nothing at all—I hope you are not displeased with your dinner for any thing I have said.
No, Mrs. Betty, I am pretty well used to your freedoms now, you know.—I am not displeased in the main, to observe, that, were the succession of modern fine ladies to be extinct, it might be supplied from those whom they place in the next rank to themselves, their chamber-maids and confidants. Your young mistress has contributed a great deal to this quickness of yours. She always preferred your company to mine. As you pulled, she let go; and so, Mrs. Betty, you have gained by her conversation what I have lost.
Why, Miss, if you come to that, nobody says better things than Miss Harlowe. I could tell you one, if I pleased, upon my observing to her, that you lived of late upon the air, and had no stomach to any thing; yet looked as charmingly as ever.
I dare say, it was a very good-natured one, Mrs. Betty! Do you then please that I shall hear it?
Only this, Miss, That your stomachfulness had swallowed up your stomach; and, That obstinacy was meat, drink, and clothes to you.
Ay, Mrs. Betty; and did she say this?—I hope she laughed when she said it, as she does at all her good things, as she calls them. It was very smart, and very witty. I wish my mind were so much at ease, as to aim at being witty too. But if you admire such sententious sayings, I’ll help you to another; and that is, Encouragement and approbation make people show talents they were never suspected to have; and this will do both for mistress and maid. And another I’ll furnish you with, the contrary of the former, that will do only for me: That persecution and discouragement depress ingenuous minds, and blunt the edge of lively imaginations. And hence may my sister’s brilliancy and my stupidity be both accounted for. Ingenuous, you must know, Mrs. Betty, and ingenious, are two things; and I would not arrogate the latter to myself.
Lord, Miss, said the foolish girl, you know a great deal for your years.—You are a very learned young lady!—What pity—
None of your pitties, Mrs. Betty, I know what you’d say. But tell me, if you can, Is it resolved that I shall be carried to my uncle Antony’s on Thursday?
I was willing to reward myself for the patience she had made me exercise, by getting at what intelligence I could from her.
Why, Miss, seating herself at a little distance (excuse my sitting down) with the snuff-box tapped very smartly, the lid opened, and a pinch taken with a dainty finger and thumb, the other three fingers distendedly bent, and with a fine flourish—I cannot but say, that it is my opinion, you will certainly go on Thursday; and this noless foless, as I have heard my young lady say in FRENCH.
Whether I am willing or not willing, you mean, I suppose, Mrs. Betty?
You have it, Miss.
Well but, Betty, I have no mind to be turned out of doors so suddenly. Do you think I could not be permitted to tarry one week longer?
How can I tell, Miss?
O Mrs. Betty, you can tell a great deal, if you please. But here I am forbid writing to any one of my family; none of it now will come near me; nor will any of it permit me to see them: How shall I do to make known my request, to stay here a week or fortnight longer?
Why, Miss, I fancy, if you were to shew a compliable temper, your friends would shew a compliable one too. But would you expect favours, and grant none?
Smartly put, Betty! But who knows what may be the result of my being carried to my uncle Antony’s?
Who knows, Miss!—Why any body will guess what may be the result.
As how, Betty?
As how! repeated the pert wench, Why, Miss, you will stand in your own light, as you have hitherto done: and your parents, as such good parents ought, will be obeyed.
If, Mrs. Betty, I had not been used to your oughts, and to have my duty laid down to me by your oraculous wisdom I should be apt to stare at the liberty of you speech.
You seem angry, Miss. I hope I take no unbecoming liberty.
If thou really thinkest thou dost not, thy ignorance is more to be pitied, than thy pertness resented. I wish thou wouldst leave me to myself.
When young ladies fall out with their own duty, it is not much to be wondered at, that they are angry at any body who do theirs.
That’s a very pretty saying, Mrs. Betty!—I see plainly what thy duty is in thy notion, and am obliged to those who taught it thee.
Super polyphonic! What to do with the different cultural discourses at play here? What about Betty's feelings about education? I think this is a fascinating spot where these two women are working with/within/toward narratives that carry a lot of force in the larger culture, in Betty's case to sort of narrate the inevitability of Clarissa's marriage to Solmes, and in Clarissa's case to make claims for authority and independence.
I enjoy seeing Clarissa's steady critique of college education appearing again: "I have heard smarter things from you, than I have heard at table from some of my brother's fellow-collegians." Perhaps these subtle critiques of liberal education enable Clarissa to set herself apart from her brother (and other men who control her). In an earlier letter to her brother (letter 29.1), she writes, "Let me take the liberty further to observe, that the principal end of a young gentleman's education at the university is to learn him to reason justly, and to subdue the violence of his passions. I hope, brother, that you will not give room for anybody who knows us both to conclude that the toilette has learned the one more of the latter doctrine, than the university has taught the other." Here education tames passions and promotes logical reasoning. Clarissa has these qualities without her brother's education. Clarissa is extremely polite, so I can't be sure how critical she actually is here. But she's also incredibly witty and deploys insults beautifully.
I am going to try to comment on this section by using Dussinger. As I understand him, _Clarissa_ illustrates the tension between “categorical, atemporal assertions about world” and the character’s limited, momentary account of immediate situation. Thinking about this in narrative terms, these “assertions” are conventional identities (part of what Bruner calls Folk Psychology) and “limited, momentary” accounts are the flux of lived life. Everyone (even those of us who live in the 21st century) shifts between culturally constructed conventional asumptions (fill in your favorite generalization here) and the specific particularities of day-to-day life. In this scene, we see Clarissa bouncing back and forth between conventional ideas of lower class women and her knowledge of Betty Barnes. (Dusinger says that Master/Mistress/Servant relations are one of Richardson’s major topics in _Sentiments_ , which seems reasonable in a time when classes are shifting and becoming more permeable). This Clarissa is Dussinger’s first, the proud exemplar of her sex. This is perhaps the easiest identity for Clarissa to perform here, as BB is clearly her subordinate. The trading of proverbs is the exchange of categorial, atemporal assertions about the world. But interestingly, WITHIN these exchanges, both Clarissa and Betty are able to use the aphroisms as what Bakhtin would call dialogism. Bakhtin argues that conventional, authoritative discourse is often parodied or used to further a different kind of argument by those out of power. In this way, Clarissa (and Betty) are able to gain a kind of agency by speaking within conventional language, but “quoting” that language to different intents. And as Dussinger notes, before things get out of hand (i.e., Betty becomes too adept in her own parodic use of proverbs), Clarissa cuts things short, and draws on her class-related power to shut things down.