Tales from the Neighbourhood, Part One
By Frank
The life of a French Maid was not an easy one at the turn of the nineteenth century. I remember being in the service of the d’Aubergés, a rich and upper class family who lived in a secluded mansion in the British countryside. My master was Sir Mark d’Aubergé, but he was out of the house for most of the day, and so I was alone with my Mistress, Madame d’Aubergé, and the two daughters for most of time.
As I said, the d’Aubergés lived in a secluded place, however, they had a very prominent social life, and there wasn’t one ball where noblesse and other elites met, that they didn’t attend. It was for this reason that Madame d’Aubergé educated her daughters in etiquette and grace with the greatest care.
The most important thing for Madame was grace, the way the girls walked. To train their movement, Madame used a very clever, if uncomfortable device. A long wooden stick was attached to the girls’ backs, with a leather belt around their necks and one around their waists. This made sure that they both held their backs straight and their heads up. Their wrists were attached to a chain that went to the stick and was just long enough to give them the right amount of movement. At their ankles was a similar chain, heavily restricting their steps, for it was considered graceful to walk in small steps for a lady.
Thus bound had the girls to walk around for several hours a day, performing small host duties like serving tea. And although you may think of this as being cruel, there wasn’t a single day on which Madame didn’t spent at least 2 hours in those bounds herself, for it was as important to train her daughters’ elegance as to keep up hers.
But Madame could be more cruel. Whenever one of the girls did a mistake, like spilling some tea, a very special ritual took place. It didn’t matter who of the girls did the mistake, they were always both punished. Madame knew that the sisters loved each other very much, and it would hurt them more to see the other punished than being punished themselves. Anyway, the punishment for such mistakes was as follows. Madame went into the garden, with both girls following behind. There, they went and stood under a tree each.
Madame then tied their hands together with a leather ribbon and tied the other end to a high branch. This she pulled so tight that the girls’ feet were lifted from the ground by about 5 inches. Each foot was then separately tied to rings in the ground which had been put there for that very occasion. Then, Madame would pour sweet honey over the girls’ feet and leave them like that.
Now, this garden was very populated by all sorts of animals, but Madame’s favourites were her 2 black cats. Their names were “Plucky” and “Beatrice” and they loved honey. The poor girls thus exposed were like a five course meal to them. It never took long until the pussies had smelled the honey and picked up on the trail. This was where the real punishment began. They carefully licked away all the honey from both girls’ feet and this was terribly tickling. It always started with small giggling but always ended in almost hysterical laughter, with the girls’ tears in their eyes - pleading to be released.
As soon as the cats had done their jobs, the girls were saved. They ran into the house, rubbing their feet and giggling still. For although they were laughing, they had learned their lesson!
To be continued…