Meg of the Heather

Meg of the Heather by Evelyn R. Garratt

Meg of the Heather follows a teenage girl raised as a tramp's daughter, singing for coins with a gypsy troupe on the English roads, whose loyal companion Jem reveals that she is not truly related to the abusive couple who raised her and is therefore free to leave. Meg sets off alone toward London hoping to audition as an animal trainer for Bostock's menagerie, surviving by singing in villages and pubs, and after a hard tramp collapses from exhaustion at the gates of Friars Court, the estate of wealthy young orphan Sheila Dennison. Struck by Meg's beauty and voice, and fresh off a failed, impulsive attempt to host slum children for a "charitable" holiday, the restless, changeable Sheila decides on impulse to adopt Meg as a "sister" and transform her into a lady, over the quiet misgivings of her old governess-companion, Miss Gregson, and her more cautious cousin Peter Fortescue, both of whom warn that uprooting a "girl of the heather" from her natural freedom may prove cruel rather than kind. Over two years, Meg is dressed, tutored, and drilled out of her rough speech, growing devoted to Sheila while Miss Gregson quietly teaches her about God and Peter becomes a gentle, steadying friend. But Sheila's enthusiasm for her "hobby" curdles into irritation as the novelty fades; Meg, terrified of displeasing her benefactress, grows anxious and unnaturally self-conscious rather than truly refined. Meanwhile Jem, having lost his little brother Steve, tramps in search of Meg, eventually taking carpentry work at Elminster and helping build the platform for a garden-party concert at which Sheila plans to unveil Meg as a singer. Overwhelmed at the sight of Jem watching from the crowd, Meg flees the stage mid-song, humiliating Sheila, who—already primed by Miss Gregson's warnings about spoiling her—coldly tells Meg to plan on leaving within a month to support herself, unaware the flight was about Jem, not stage fright. Ashamed of her own cowardly rejection of Jem and crushed by Sheila's rejection, Meg secretly leaves Friars Court before dawn, taking nothing but plain clothes and her small savings, and travels to London. Rescued from a predatory "helper" at the station by a kind widow, Mrs. Webb, she lodges in a poor tenement, struggles to adapt to poverty and manual work after her genteel interlude, and eventually collapses from fever and near-starvation, ending up in the pauper Infirmary. There, dying instances of faith around her—an old woman's peaceful recitation of Scripture, the coarse despair of other patients—bring Meg to a spiritual crisis and conversion in the depths of her illness. Meanwhile, Sheila's guilt, spurred by Peter's sharp rebuke and Miss Gregson's threat to leave her service and go find Meg herself, sends both Peter and Jem separately in search of the missing girl, Peter funding Jem's journey to London to track her down, with the narrative closing as Meg begins to recover, comforted by Mrs. Webb's household and her small son Willie, awaiting reunion with those who love her.

By Evelyn R. Garratt · First published 1920 · Genre: Romance, Coming-of-Age, Social Realism · 23 chapters · 68,651 words

First lines

MEG lay face downwards on the heath. Her auburn hair gleamed gold among / the bracken, and her faded green dress mingled well with the pink and / green of her resting place.

She had chosen a comfortable couch on which to rest her tired limbs, / and of this she was fully conscious. She had been walking for hours / without food and her strength was nearly played out; but though tired / and hungry she was exulting in the fact that she was alone.

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Edwardian era · coming-of-age · class transformation · self-discovery · moorland setting · adopted child · female protagonist · friendship · loyalty · independence seeking · social climbing · romantic elements

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