Southern Rose [Gone with the Wind]

Josephine and Ellen had a great chat.

If you want to know how a person's family is and how much he earns annually, you don't have to know how much money he has in his bank account, but look at other things: how many black slaves there are, how the black slaves live and eat, how many sets of clothes the children make every year , What jewelry does the hostess have.

Ellen took some jewelry with her when she got married, and they were all registered, and she also brought some jewelry for the ball.Jewelry is essential, and it is the most intuitive measure of "how much your husband loves you" for women.

Everyone loves shiny jewelry, a typical "conspicuous consumption" product.

Ellen brought a set of red garnet jewelry, some unsuitable pearls and turquoise jewelry. Garnet is a semi-precious stone, and pearls and turquoise are not rare ores, which fit Ellen’s personality and identity: low-key planting The owner's wife, a low-key lady from a big southern family.

This kind of temperament is the most common "lady cultivation" in the south. Mrs. Solange Robillard raised three daughters according to the standards of the southern high society, but in fact, Ellen has always been a rebellious girl at heart: she fell in love with the family The prodigal son in the movie, after being heartbroken, he resolutely "married" a middle-aged Irish man, and since then he has taken care of his husband and raised his children with peace of mind, and has never regretted it. It can be seen that Ellen's personality is actually soft and strong, and Scarlett has completely inherited her mother's personality in this.

From this point of view, Ellen will dote on Scarlett not only because she is the eldest daughter, but also because the eldest daughter is the child who is most like her.

The ball at the Robillard family has always been popular, and the scale is not too big. The most elite family members in Savannah were invited to the ball.

It was also Scarlett O'Hara's first social dance.

John Robillard made a grand appearance with his niece on his arm, formally introduced to relatives and friends, and also indicated that the girl had entered the marriage market.

A social ball is like a large-scale blind date. Both men and women have such a "first time", but people usually pay more attention to girls' first time.

Scarlett couldn't be happier.A famous lady doesn't like makeup, at most she just puts on a layer of light red lipstick, and she doesn't like to wear rouge. Her cheeks are bright red with excitement, and her magnolia-like white skin makes her lips red and teeth white, beautiful and gratifying.

She wore a pair of small drop-shaped ruby ​​earrings on her ears, and a drop-shaped ruby ​​pendant on her chest. The gemstone was bright red, shining brightly on her snow-white skin.A tiny diamond and ruby ​​tiara adorned her dark tan hair just right.

She couldn't believe that Josephine was so generous and willing to lend her such beautiful jewelry.

She thought that she would be the most beautiful girl at the ball, and everyone's eyes were on her. Her new dance dress was layered, with a lot of ribbons and lace; Her curves; her skin is the snow-white that everyone praises, and everyone should like her.

But just 10 minutes into the ball, she understood that the most popular woman at the ball was still Josephine.

Those well-mannered young gentlemen are still swarming to invite Josephine. Josephine never stops. She dances every dance with different people. If any man can dance the second dance with her Dance, will be proud to show off to others.

ah!It's not fair!

Scarlett glared at Josephine angrily.

Her new dress is very beautiful, but Josephine's dress is not only beautiful, but also very luxurious, it is full of pearls, precious stones, and a crystal chandelier hangs from the ceiling. The light of the pearl then flickered.

Envious and jealous, she didn't understand why Josephine could ignore the "rules" that the ladies said.How could a widow pursue happiness so freely?Doesn't she love her husband?People say widows grieve because they've lost someone they love, but Josephine doesn't seem to grieve that much.

She doesn't understand.

Maybe, as the Black Sister said, "rules" are used to restrain others, and the girls of the Robillard family don't need to be restrained.

She also danced, and they were all school-age boys from relatives and friends, boys aged 17 and 8, but they were always a bit stupid, and she couldn't tell what was wrong, in short, they were all boring.

The ball was perfect and served its purpose of introducing Scarlett O'Hara to the upper class of Savannah.The real meaning of a girl's first social dance is to show the public that "this girl is ready to be a wife", and relatives and friends begin to formally find a suitable husband for her at this time.Prom is the best public place to get to know each other. Young men and women are looking for the other half that can form a family here, and those who can talk will go to the next step: picnic party, afternoon tea party and so on.

This is a conditional "free love". The scope of love does not exceed the same class. More than 100 black slaves' hobbies of planting, drinking, playing cards, and hunting have successfully entered the "high society" of Clayton County. In addition, the grandfather is Robillard. Therefore, the O'Hara family The girl is also of first-rate birth and would be a suitable bride.

After the ball, Ellen stayed for another two weeks, took her three daughters to several afternoon teas, went to a few theater performances, and returned to Tara in the last week of November.

Josephine also had some invitations during this period, and Mrs. Emile took her daughter to visit relatives and friends.The lives of the wives are relatively boring, and there are no beauty salons, hairdressers, nail shops, etc. to kill their too much leisure time. The wives living in the city are very keen on small afternoon tea parties, reading clubs, etc. reunion.

Josephine can be said to have attracted the attention of all young unmarried men in Savannah. If she wanted to, she could attend three different parties every morning, noon and night, so she was really too busy to have any spare time.

The choice of party is of course very important. It is impossible for the Miss Robillard to see her whoever wants to see her.Savannah is not that big, with a population of only 3 to 4, and the so-called "upper class" families add up to only a few hundred people.

Based on the concept of "it doesn't matter if you don't learn knowledge, just get a diploma", most of the children of the wealthy gentry in the south will go to college, but a considerable number of them only focus on eating, drinking and having fun. Because of the difference between the state and the southern state, he swears that he wants to show the Yankees a good look.

The arrogance of young people is sometimes cutely stupid.

She carefully selected three young masters: Louis of the Mayville family, 24 years old, just returned from a European tour; Francis of the Beauval family, 25 years old; Leonardo of the Darcy family of Charleston, 31 years old, A young widower who has just experienced a widow.

These three families are similar to the Robillard family. They established themselves in Savannah and Charleston around the end of the last century, and have grown to the third generation. They are still "upstarts" in this city because "wealth does not last three generations." The "Seaside Aristocrats" family was destroyed by the Revolutionary War, and this generation of Seaside Aristocrats will be destroyed by the Civil War.

These were the last good times, the last leisurely years before the war.

The Mayville family had three sons. The eldest died of illness within a few years of marriage, leaving behind a daughter, Elizabeth; the second son, Louis, became the heir.Louie is extremely tall, 192cm tall, tall and thin, with good looks, not handsome.

There are two sons and four daughters in the Beauval family. The two sons are the oldest and the youngest children, and Francis is the youngest son.

As for Leonardo Darcy, his parents passed away in middle age, his uncle brought him up, sent him to Harvard University to study, and came back to inherit the family property after graduation. His uncle had nothing bad to say and left the Darcy family property as it was. Hand it over to your nephew, there's nothing wrong with it.However, this person was very unfortunate. He married a 17-year-old little wife. The wife died when she gave birth for the first time, and the wife and children were not kept.

Mrs. Emile doesn't like Mr. Darcy, thinking that he is "unlucky", full of bad luck, and destined to be lonely all his life.

"Mother, it's not objective for you to say that. As far as I know, Mr. Darcy's uncle is alive and well, and no one in his family died prematurely."

"But his uncle was just as unfortunate. He gave birth to seven daughters, but none of them were boys." Emile was still an aristocrat, thinking that a male heir was needed.

"He has a daughter, and the daughter can inherit his property in the future." Josephine thinks that because the United States does not have the issue of land inheritance, it is very progressive that both men and women can inherit their parents' inheritance.American families continue to have children because there is no good contraceptive method, but the need for a male heir is not very urgent, and it is not a big deal to "not have" a son.

"Ah, I'm surprised here. Darcy can marry one of his cousins. His uncle should be happy to see his daughter marry his nephew."

"Maybe he just sees his cousins ​​as sisters."

"Maybe, anyway, we need to pay attention to it for a while. I really hope that you can stay at home for a few more years, but then people will say that you have too high vision and cannot choose a suitable husband. We did not participate in your meeting in Paris. I have never seen you in a wedding dress," Mrs. Emile expressed her dissatisfaction tactfully, "I will definitely choose a husband for you this time, you have to stay in Savannah, stay by my side .”

Josephine smiled, "Yes, Mother."

"And that Talent, he writes to you every week, did you reply?"

"I'm back."

"While he's a Yankee, which won't please your father, he seems to me likeable, handsome--perhaps too handsome, and he's been nice to Victor. , I think he should be very willing to be Victor's stepfather. What do you think of him?"

"I don't know. He's handsome and rich, but he's too busy for a real gentleman to be busy making money."

Real gentlemen don't need to be very busy. Their time should be spent on dances, picnics, hunting and other things. Oh, the necessary skills of gentlemen include how to court women.

Emile refused to comment on this, "You write to ask him when he will come to Savannah again, and then you send an invitation to invite him to be a guest at home."

Josephine wondered if her mother was casting a wide net.