little miss austin

Watching the carriage leave, Alice was somewhat melancholy: she will be away from her family for 4 years, and Henry will soon move to London, so he will not visit her too many times in the future.She has written the plan and handed it over to Henry. From now on, as long as he runs the company step by step, the profit may decrease, but it is impossible to lose money.To occupy a unique blank market, there are many places that need to be managed up and down, and this expense is included in the cost; including the necessary expenses for Tom Lefroy to enter the House of Commons in the future, Alice also discussed with Henry, there is an absolute The "insiders" of the House of Commons are very necessary in the House of Commons. The resources of the Austin family are not bad. From the perspective of Mr. Hastings, it is a powerful support; coupled with the necessary financial support, Tom wants to enter the The House of Commons is only a matter of time.

Pastor George is about to go to Bath to recuperate. She hopes that her father can live longer and see his children have their own careers.Dad is a kind man, knowledgeable, but not too ambitious. He is content with his wife and children. He does not make enough money to support the family. He has no economic sense. He is at the level of ordinary people. Fortunately, there are always a few rich and generous people. Relatives, otherwise I would not be able to support 9 children.

My mother is also very kind-hearted. She has received a lady's education, and she must have fallen in love with Pastor George at the beginning.But after all, my mother is always at home, she is a typical housewife, and it is unrealistic to expect her to have a high level of awareness. Alice feels that she is already very good if she can do what she is now, and she should not have too high demands.

The elder brothers each have their own advantages and disadvantages, but they are also kind-hearted. This is the biggest advantage in essence. Just because of this, there are fewer possible disputes between brothers and sisters. The family atmosphere is very good. Alice likes this the most. a little.

As for the sisters, let Cathy go with her, the family will not be short of money in the future, and her expenses are limited, so she will definitely be able to support her; Jane, a happy little married woman, will have her own career in the future, even better.

She was thinking about when she could go to London to visit Henry and Jane, and she could go to Bath in winter for Christmas, and take a dip in the hot springs, which must be very pleasant in winter.

While she was still in a daze, the personal maid, Mei Li, touched her shoulder, indicating that it was time for her to go in.

Henry and Little Hastings set off very early, went out as soon as they got up, and would have breakfast when they stopped to rest on the road.Mr. Hastings went out for a walk, and it was not time for breakfast in Daylesford. Alice asked if there were any quail eggs today, and if there were, she would cook 2 or 30.

The maid came back after a while and said that there were quail eggs, which were already cooking and would be ready in a few minutes, and asked her what she wanted for breakfast.

"Sliced ​​lettuce and cabbage, sliced ​​tomato, peeled cucumber, lettuce, carrot and cut into small pieces, cooked potatoes and cut into small pieces, boiled corn kernels with butter, only the tender core of bitter chrysanthemum, only young leaves of parsley, a spoonful Stir-fry black sesame, a small spoonful of black pepper, a small jar of salad dressing, and a small jar of tomato sauce. After you’re done, put all the ingredients on a separate plate and serve them up. Prepare a pot of hot cocoa for hot drinks. A pot of hot coffee, a pot of fresh milk that has been heated and cooled, a small pot of cream, and a small pot of caster sugar."

The maid nodded while taking a notebook and pencil to write down.

"Mr. can't eat bacon or other meat in the morning. Prepare a few slices of toast for him. Don't overcook it. Fry two pieces of bacon and two slices of corned beef separately. Make two fried eggs, fried Be tender."

There are only two owners of the Daylesford house now, and the breakfast is not large, but there are many varieties.After Mr. Hastings came back, he washed his hands, took a plate, picked some vegetables, a few quail eggs, sprinkled with black sesame, black pepper, and mixed with salad dressing, it was a healthy and nutritious vegetable salad.He wanted to eat bacon, but Alice vetoed it, saying that he could not eat meat for breakfast. If he ate too much animal fat, it would accumulate in the blood vessels and cause hyperlipidemia, which would be bad for the blood vessels and heart. He could eat some fresh beef and fish for dinner.

Within a few days, Alice worked out a new recipe. The breakfast time at 9 o'clock remained the same, with vegetable salad, toast, bacon, and boiled eggs; The meal includes fruit salad, but the amount is small; at 8 o'clock in the afternoon, eat fruit pudding, roast squab or roast quail, fried cod steak, etc., and sometimes only eat pigeon soup or chicken soup.

Afternoon tea starts at 5:3 p.m., with Chinese black tea served with milk and sugar. There are also many types of refreshments, which come in turns, 4 or [-] kinds a day.

She entertains guests about twice a week, some come from London, some are squires living nearby or nobles who are on vacation. Daylesford House used to have no hostess, and most of the guests were so-so. Now, Alice can count The first one is the acting hostess. Mr. Hastings asked all the housekeepers and housekeepers to report to Alice. If Alice couldn't solve or decide, she would ask him again.

There are more than 20 servants in Daylesford, and there are a lot of things to do every day, ranging from whether the bedding in the guest room needs to be changed and cleaned, to whether the guests need to stay overnight, and everything has to be taken care of, which is really tiring.Alice spent a month sorting out the family from top to bottom, and then reassigned the tasks that the housekeeper and the housekeeper should be responsible for. She was only responsible for looking at the expense account, giving money, and personnel rights.

Although Mrs. Baker taught her how to manage a home and even a manor, she has never had the opportunity to practice, and now she can put what she has learned into practice.She wasn't a real hostess in Daylesford, she just came to study for a few years and then left. The housekeeper and the housekeeper didn't have to mess with her, they were very cooperative.She also understands that "when the water is clear, there will be no fish", and she pretends not to see some small pocket-filling behaviors, such as paying more for purchases. This is a default unspoken rule. a typical.

The housekeepers also need to formulate a new vacation plan for their servants. Originally, the servants, except for the housekeeper, had two days off in a month, and the shifts were staggered. Now Alice arranges for them to rest 4 days a month, and they can rest separately. , They can also rest for 4 days at a time, they can go home to visit their parents or go out to play, it doesn't matter.For example, Jacob can go home once a month and stay at home for 3 full days.The servants all thought it was good, after all, who wouldn't want to work two days less and still get the same money.

There is only one thing, the things she told her must be done well. If there is something to explain but someone procrastinates and fails to do it well, then don't blame her for being rude.

Every morning is Alice's study time.After breakfast and a short rest, Mr. Hastings is about to start work. The work of dictating memoirs has been going on one after another, all typed out with a typewriter, and has been written to the second volume.

Alice intervened in the middle, and often asked about a certain event he mentioned, and Mr. Hastings would stop and tell her the cause, process and result of the event from beginning to end, and then asked her to read related books by herself. .

After the dictation ended, we took a break, the secretary left, and Mr. Hastings began to teach Alice.

His literary quality is also very high, because he has a broad vision and extensive experience, has his own unique insights into many things, and has a very high appreciation for literary works. He joined the East India Company at the age of 18 and was far away from his hometown, but his self-learning ability is too strong. He has continued to learn and improve for decades, and has good friends. He is indeed a generation.

Alice read the file of the Hastings case again.Earlier, she just skimmed through it briefly, and there was no time for her to read it from beginning to end.It took several months to read all kinds of dossiers in the past seven years.It is inevitable that a politician will have political opponents. Political opponents attack him from his character and personal morality to the military decisions he made. The charges can be said to be varied and all-encompassing. If you only read the indictment, you may think that Warren Black What a heinous top villain Stings is.

Some of the information about her aunt Freda Fia and cousin Eliza can be regarded as allowing her to really understand why the Austen family is connected with Mr. Hastings.

George Austin and Freda Fia Austin are siblings. Alice's grandfather, William Austin, married the widow Rebecca Hampson. Rebecca had a son, William Hampson, with her ex-husband, and brought them to Austin. Home; Rebecca remarried and gave birth to 4 children: son Hampson, who died young, daughter Felicia, son George, and second daughter Leonora.Rebecca died of illness after giving birth to her next daughter, and William Austin died of illness a few years later in 1737. At this time, Freda Fia was 7 years old, George was 6 years old, and Leonora was 4 years old.

Fortunately, there was a rich relative in Austin's family who took over the three siblings to raise him. He nurtured George carefully, paid him to study at Oxford University, and gave his two nieces a good education. But because the sisters had no money, 20-year-old Fei Lidafia had to travel across the Indian subcontinent to find a suitable husband, because there were many wealthy men who could not find a suitable white wife.

Not long after arriving in India, Felidafia married Tesso Hancock. Hancock had a very good relationship with his colleague Warren Hastings. Hastings also married a few years later. The family has always been in close contact.After Hastings' wife and youngest daughter died of illness one after another, he decided to send his son back to China, so Freda Fia arranged for George Hastings to return to England and send him to the home of his newly married younger brother, Reverend George, to be raised.But little George died of laryngitis after more than a year at Austin's house.

After receiving the letter of his son's death, Warren Hastings only lamented the ruthlessness of the illness and his own misfortune, and did not blame George Austin for not taking good care of the child.Later, the daughter of Frieda Fia and Hancock was named Eliza, the same name as his youngest daughter who died young.This has become one of the reasons for political opponents to attack him, thinking that it is too ambiguous to name a friend's daughter after a dead daughter. Hancock was cuckolded without knowing it, stupid; Hastings hooked up with a friend's wife Adultery, shameless.

When Eliza grew up, Hastings gave a huge sum of money to his goddaughter. After Hancock's death, he often sponsored the living expenses of Friedaphia and her daughter. It's no wonder that even the people of the East India Company They thought they were lovers, until Frieda Fia brought Elisa back to England, and Hastings had a mistress, and this matter was gradually not mentioned, because his mistress was extremely jealous, and Frieda When Fia returned to India, she didn't see Hastings a few times.

A bizarre but plausible rumor was also recorded as to why my aunt had returned to India.It is said that after Hancock's death, Freda Fia tried to marry Eliza, who was only 14 years old at the time, to Hastings, because in India, child brides are not uncommon, and Eliza married rich black men. Stings, their mother and daughter will not worry about future living expenses.

Alice was stunned when she saw this document: Unexpectedly, Cousin Eliza almost became a maiden bride!However, this record proves from another aspect that Eliza is not Hastings' biological daughter, otherwise Felidafia would not have thought of letting her daughter marry Hastings.You can barely care about seniority, but blood relationship will definitely not mess around.

Classes in the morning and after lunch in the afternoon are Alice’s free time. Housework is done before breakfast, and she usually takes a nap in the afternoon. She gets up at 3 o’clock and changes her clothes and goes horseback riding for an hour. Mr. Hastings had afternoon tea, and then he was taught French and fencing by different tutors, and later he had someone teach her shooting before lunch; after dinner in the evening, he played the piano or played whist, every day The schedule is very tight.

The contact with Jacob was only during the riding time every afternoon.Jacob is probably an apprentice. The butler taught him how to be a good manservant. There are many kinds of manservants. Ordinary manservants and personal servants are not in the same class. A personal servant is the upper class of servants except the butler. , the final advancement is to become a housekeeper after further training.Ordinary male servants mostly do menial work. For example, Jacob has to brush horses in the stables now. The groom only needs to add fodder, check horseshoes, saddles and harnesses, etc. The most tiring and dirtiest manual work such as brushing horses and cleaning up horse manure is all done. It was done by the handyman.

Alice saw Jacob brushing horses one day, and asked him, "How long have you been learning to brush horses?"

Jacob replied honestly: "Two years." Before the age of 12, he was too young, weak, and not tall enough to reach the back of a horse. Only when he grew tall and strong could he do physical work well.

"What else have you learned? Did you continue to learn spelling?"

"Yes, Mr. Whittaker taught me to read, and I can read the newspaper by myself now." Mr. Whittaker is the butler.

"Can you ride a horse?"

Jacob carefully looked around, nodded, "Yes."

"Mr. Whitaker won't let you learn to ride?"

"He didn't say I wouldn't learn it, it's just—Kurt didn't want me to learn to ride a horse. Kurt's a groom."

"I will let Kurt teach you how to ride a horse, and you will ride with me in the future."

There are also several types of maids, personal maids, housemaids, sewing maids, and kitchen maids. Alice asked the sewing maid to sew some men's clothes for her to wear when she went out riding.

I also added a few new sets of clothes to Jacob. After all, I wanted to accompany her on horseback rides, and the clothes were too tattered to suit her.Jacob's position in Daylesford has changed subtly. Most of the time, he is still an ordinary servant, but he is the closest servant to Alice besides Meili.

Some people naturally dislike Jacob being favored by Alice, but speaking of it, Jacob is only a 14-year-old child. They have known each other and are similar in age. Alice is really close to him. As a normal thing, both the male and female housekeepers thought that when Alice left Daylesford, Jacob would probably be taken away.The master likes Miss Alice very much, and Jacob will leave in the future, so he can't really be regarded as a competitor, so Jacob has no one to punish him except for a few sarcasm.

The biggest advantage of Jacob following Alice in and out is that he can finally let go. The 14-year-old boy has just entered the puberty period, and his stomach is like a bottomless pit. Before, he was afraid to eat for fear of being rejected and unable to do much work, but he ate twice as much as others.Now Alice has spoken, don't starve him, you can eat as much as you want, Daylesford spends so much money on food every week, where is his portion missing?

It feels so good to finally be full!

He also grows very fast. At the end of June, he was not as tall as little Hastings, but by the end of the year and early December, he had grown about an inch.About the height of little Hastings.

He goes home to visit his parents once a month. His father is a carpenter, and he is the eldest son of the family. He has a younger brother and younger sister born on average every two years. There are now 6 children in the family—seven should have been, and one died— His mother is pregnant again.

Alice followed Jacob to his house once, and was amazed that there were two adults and six children in such a small house, and there were still children to be born.

Jacob had to go out to work to earn money when he was 10 years old. In Daylesford, he not only had food to eat, but also new clothes. He could give all his salary to his parents to support his younger siblings.The younger brothers and sisters all look a little disheveled. The home often eats potatoes, boiled rotten, put some meat, and cook a big pot. If you are full, you will be full, but you always eat potatoes, which are really tasteless.

Alice had no idea either.She can give money to his family, but she can't give it all the time, right?His family keeps giving birth like this, and depending on the situation, there can be another 6 more. Such a big family, it's scary to think about it.Even a big landowner like Edward's brother would occasionally complain about having too many children.But in this era, there is no reliable contraceptive method. If you want not to have children, you can only sleep separately.Most women can accept it, after all, raising children is a very tiring thing, but men——

Alice came to visit her cousin Anna, who also went to Bath to recuperate in the summer. After leaving Bath, she inspected her fields and properties, and returned to Oxfordshire at the end of October.

I haven't seen her for a few years, but Cousin Anna is still dressed in black, and still looks indifferent to anything.

I was a little surprised that Alice was now a little lady, with a good bearing and a good posture, and she was a little happy in her heart. She asked the maid to wash and slice the seasonal fruits brought back from London, and brought them up.

Nothing more than apples and oranges, greenhouse strawberries, and pineapples imported from Spain.It is said that someone opened up a pineapple plantation in Spain, and the Spanish royal family purchased this expensive fruit from there. Someone imported a small amount of pineapple to London.

She had never eaten pineapples before, and Alice wrote her a letter about pineapples before, but this time she knew that someone was selling them, so she quickly ordered the servants to grab a few and brought them back.

When Anna went out this time, she met all the relatives of the Austin family.She said that Maxwell Gardens was quite nice, and if it hadn’t been rented out by Reverend George, she would have wanted to rent it too. Later, she rented a small villa near Maxwell Gardens, and often went to soak in the hot springs with Mrs. Austin and Cathy.Mrs. Austin was very proud to mention that Henry's business in London was doing well, and Alice was studying in Daylesford, and she hoped to find a young son from an aristocratic family as her husband in the future.

Alice wanted to touch her forehead when she heard her mother bragging.

Anna thinks that Mrs. Austin is right. There are so many aristocratic children in England who have no status and no money. Only the eldest son can inherit the title and most of the property. Therefore, as long as Alice has a fair amount of property, she can find a young son from a noble family. There is nothing wrong with being a husband.If the eldest son who will inherit the family business in the future has no heirs, maybe the younger son will also have the opportunity to inherit the title and family property!Then Alice would be "Mrs."

In fact, no matter who they are, they are all obsessed with "my ancestors are richer". If it can improve the social class, my mother will definitely want Alice to find a young son from a noble family as much as possible.There were earls and barons in the ancestors of the Li family. Although her mother Cassandra's natal family was an early branch of the Li family and did not inherit the title, they were very close to the Li family who had the title. If the youngest daughter could become the wife of a knight, that would be It could not be better!

Anna also said that Major Bridges also stayed in Bath for a month, during which time he attended several balls and invited Cathy to dance each time.Anna herself has no intention of remarrying, but she thinks that it may be too hasty for Cathy to decide to be single at such a young age. What does it matter if she just gets to know her?Major Bridges can also be said to be their relatives, so let's treat them as relatives and have a normal relationship.

Cathy was forced to agree to Major Bridges' invitation, but she would not tell her mother or Cousin Anna, let alone Alice, what she was thinking in her heart, she must only tell Jane.

Alice has a good impression of Major Bridges: it seems that he has made a special trip to Bath, so he must have a good impression of Cathy.Speaking of which, both of them have lost their lovers, so there should be resonance.Because I have lost it, I will consider new relationships more carefully.

The author has something to say:

*It turns out that Lawrence Fox and Matthew Goode are good friends. They played "Spanish Love Song" together.Fox got married and Goody was the best man, wouldn't he be friends with Teacher Xiaoben too?Fox's ex-wife is Billie Piper, Rose in "Doctor Who", they got married and David Tennant also went.