Teaching was, of course, the first thing that suggested itself. If
Miss Matty could teach children anything, it would throw her among
the little elves in whom her soul delighted. I ran over her
accomplishments. Once upon a time I had heard her say she could
play "Ah! vous dirai-je, maman?" on the piano, but that was long,
long ago; that faint shadow of musical acquirement had died out
years before. She had also once been able to trace out patterns
very nicely for muslin embroidery, by dint of placing a piece of
silver paper over the design to be copied, and holding both against
the window-pane while she marked the scollop and eyelet-holes. But
that was her nearest approach to the accomplishment of drawing, and
I did not think it would go very far. Then again, as to the
branches of a solid English education--fancy work and the use of
the globes--such as the mistress of the Ladies' Seminary, to which
all the tradespeople in Cranford sent their daughters, professed to
teach. Miss Matty's eyes were failing her, and I doubted if she
could discover the number of threads in a worsted-work pattern, or
rightly appreciate the different shades required for Queen
Adelaide's face in the loyal wool-work now fashionable in Cranford.
As for the use of the globes, I had never been able to find it out
myself, so perhaps I was not a good judge of Miss Matty's
capability of instructing in this branch of education; but it
struck me that equators and tropics, and such mystical circles,
were very imaginary lines indeed to her, and that she looked upon
the signs of the Zodiac as so many remnants of the Black Art.
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