The Old Nurse's Story

Gaskell uses the ghostly organ music in the hall to highlight the Gothic elements of the story, but also to suggest the possibility that the arts (including literature and storytelling) offer a path to moral improvement and emotional development.

When Miss Grace laments “in a strange kind of meaning way” that it will be “a terrible winter,” and Mrs. Stark attempts to distract everyone’s attention, the exchange suggests that her father’s lingering brutal presence continues to exert emotional control in the hall (15). The haunting music resounding on winter evenings, and the fear that it inspires in all the inhabitants, demonstrates how Lord Furnivall’s excessive patriarchal control still obliterates domestic happiness in the house.

Hester, as a somewhat homesick young woman in the ghostly manor, tries to accept the music as inspiringly pleasant and a source of enjoyment in her dismal new setting. As long as Hester can imagine any rational explanation for the music, she enjoys it, rather than letting fear overtake her. That initial response demonstrates her bravery and her intellectual capacities. She discerns different tones and styles in the music and finds it “rather pleasant to have that grand music rolling around the house” (14).