{"product_id":"2940013740556","title":"The Lost Girl","description":"Take a mining townlet like Woodhouse, with a population of ten thousand\u003cbr\u003epeople, and three generations behind it. This space of three generations\u003cbr\u003eargues a certain well-established society. The old \"County\" has fled from\u003cbr\u003ethe sight of so much disembowelled coal, to flourish on mineral rights in\u003cbr\u003eregions still idyllic. Remains one great and inaccessible magnate, the\u003cbr\u003elocal coal owner: three generations old, and clambering on the bottom\u003cbr\u003estep of the \"County,\" kicking off the mass below. Rule him out.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA well established society in Woodhouse, full of fine shades, ranging\u003cbr\u003efrom the dark of coal-dust to grit of stone-mason and sawdust of\u003cbr\u003etimber-merchant, through the lustre of lard and butter and meat, to the\u003cbr\u003eperfume of the chemist and the disinfectant of the doctor, on to the\u003cbr\u003eserene gold-tarnish of bank-managers, cashiers for the firm, clergymen\u003cbr\u003eand such-like, as far as the automobile refulgence of the general-manager\u003cbr\u003eof all the collieries. Here the _ne plus ultra_. The general manager\u003cbr\u003elives in the shrubberied seclusion of the so-called Manor. The genuine\u003cbr\u003eHall, abandoned by the \"County,\" has been taken over as offices by the\u003cbr\u003efirm.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHere we are then: a vast substratum of colliers; a thick sprinkling of\u003cbr\u003etradespeople intermingled with small employers of labour and diversified\u003cbr\u003eby elementary schoolmasters and nonconformist clergy; a higher layer of\u003cbr\u003ebank-managers, rich millers and well-to-do ironmasters, episcopal clergy\u003cbr\u003eand the managers of collieries, then the rich and sticky cherry of the\u003cbr\u003elocal coal-owner glistening over all.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSuch the complicated social system of a small industrial town in the\u003cbr\u003eMidlands of England, in this year of grace 1920. But let us go back a\u003cbr\u003elittle. Such it was in the last calm year of plenty, 1913.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA calm year of plenty. But one chronic and dreary malady: that of the odd\u003cbr\u003ewomen. Why, in the name of all prosperity, should every class but the\u003cbr\u003elowest in such a society hang overburdened with Dead Sea fruit of odd\u003cbr\u003ewomen, unmarried, unmarriageable women, called old maids? Why is it that\u003cbr\u003eevery tradesman, every school-master, every bank-manager, and every\u003cbr\u003eclergyman produces one, two, three or more old maids? Do the\u003cbr\u003emiddle-classes, particularly the lower middle-classes, give birth to more\u003cbr\u003egirls than boys? Or do the lower middle-class men assiduously climb up or\u003cbr\u003edown, in marriage, thus leaving their true partners stranded? Or are\u003cbr\u003emiddle-class women very squeamish in their choice of husbands?","brand":"William Stockert","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47070245617904,"sku":"2940013740556","price":2.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013740556_p0.jpg?v=1763589616","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013740556","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}