Barchester Towers

A >> Anthony Trollope >> Barchester Towers


"Oh, Mrs. Proudie, it's for fourteen children--for fourteen
children." Such was the burden that fell on her ear as she closed
the door behind her.




CHAPTER XXVI

Mrs. Proudie Wrestles and Gets a Fall


It was hardly an hour since Mrs. Proudie had left her husband's
apartment victorious, and yet so indomitable was her courage that
she now returned thither panting for another combat. She was greatly
angry with what she thought was his duplicity. He had so clearly
given her a promise on this matter of the hospital. He had been
already so absolutely vanquished on that point. Mrs. Proudie began
to feel that if every affair was to be thus discussed and battled
about twice and even thrice, the work of the diocese would be too
much even for her.

Without knocking at the door, she walked quickly into her husband's
room and found him seated at his office table, with Mr. Slope
opposite to him. Between his fingers was the very note which he had
written to the archbishop in her presence--and it was open! Yes, he
had absolutely violated the seal which had been made sacred by her
approval. They were sitting in deep conclave, and it was too clear
that the purport of the archbishop's invitation had been absolutely
canvassed again, after it had been already debated and decided on in
obedience to her behests! Mr. Slope rose from his chair and bowed
slightly. The two opposing spirits looked each other fully in the
face, and they knew that they were looking each at an enemy.

"What is this, Bishop, about Mr. Quiverful?" said she, coming to the
end of the table and standing there.

Mr. Slope did not allow the bishop to answer but replied himself.
"I have been out to Puddingdale this morning, ma'am, and have seen
Mr. Quiverful. Mr. Quiverful has abandoned his claim to the hospital
because he is now aware that Mr. Harding is desirous to fill his
old place. Under these circumstances I have strongly advised his
lordship to nominate Mr. Harding."

"Mr. Quiverful has not abandoned anything," said the lady, with a
very imperious voice. "His lordship's word has been pledged to him,
and it must be respected."

The bishop still remained silent. He was anxiously desirous of
making his old enemy bite the dust beneath his feet. His new ally
had told him that nothing was more easy for him than to do so. The
ally was there now at his elbow to help him, and yet his courage
failed him. It is so hard to conquer when the prestige of former
victories is all against one. It is so hard for the cock who has once
been beaten out of his yard to resume his courage and again take a
proud place upon a dunghill.

"Perhaps I ought not to interfere," said Mr. Slope, "but yet--"

"Certainly you ought not," said the infuriated dame.

"But yet," continued Mr. Slope, not regarding the interruption,
"I have thought it my imperative duty to recommend the bishop not to
slight Mr. Harding's claims."

"Mr. Harding should have known his own mind," said the lady.

"If Mr. Harding be not replaced at the hospital, his lordship will
have to encounter much ill-will, not only in the diocese, but in the
world at large. Besides, taking a higher ground, his lordship, as I
understand, feels it to be his duty to gratify, in this matter, so
very worthy a man and so good a clergyman as Mr. Harding."

"And what is to become of the Sabbath-day school and of the Sunday
services in the hospital?" said Mrs. Proudie, with something very
nearly approaching to a sneer on her face.

"I understand that Mr. Harding makes no objection to the Sabbath-day
school," said Mr. Slope. "And as to the hospital services, that
matter will be best discussed after his appointment. If he has any
permanent objection, then, I fear, the matter must rest."

"You have a very easy conscience in such matters, Mr. Slope," said
she.

"I should not have an easy conscience," he rejoined, "but a conscience
very far from being easy, if anything said or done by me should lead
the bishop to act unadvisedly in this matter. It is clear that in the
interview I had with Mr. Harding I misunderstood him--"

"And it is equally clear that you have misunderstood Mr. Quiverful,"
said she, now at the top of her wrath. "What business have you at all
with these interviews? Who desired you to go to Mr. Quiverful this
morning? Who commissioned you to manage this affair? Will you answer
me, sir? Who sent you to Mr. Quiverful this morning?"

There was a dead pause in the room. Mr. Slope had risen from his
chair, and was standing with his hand on the back of it, looking at
first very solemn and now very black. Mrs. Proudie was standing as
she had at first placed herself, at the end of the table, and as she
interrogated her foe she struck her hand upon it with almost more
than feminine vigour. The bishop was sitting in his easy chair
twiddling his thumbs, turning his eyes now to his wife, and now to
his chaplain, as each took up the cudgels. How comfortable it would
be if they could fight it out between them without the necessity of
any interference on his part; fight it out so that one should kill
the other utterly, as far as diocesan life was concerned, so that
he, the bishop, might know clearly by whom it behoved him to be led.
There would be the comfort of quiet in either case; but if the bishop
had a wish as to which might prove the victor, that wish was
certainly not antagonistic to Mr. Slope.

"Better the d---- you know than the d---- you don't know," is an old
saying, and perhaps a true one; but the bishop had not yet realized
the truth of it.

"Will you answer me, sir?" she repeated. "Who instructed you to call
on Mr. Quiverful this morning?" There was another pause. "Do you
intend to answer me, sir?"

"I think, Mrs. Proudie, that under all the circumstances it will be
better for me not to answer such a question," said Mr. Slope. Mr.
Slope had many tones in his voice, all duly under his command; among
them was a sanctified low tone and a sanctified loud tone--he now
used the former.

"Did anyone send you, sir?"

"Mrs. Proudie," said Mr. Slope, "I am quite aware how much I owe
to your kindness. I am aware also what is due by courtesy from a
gentleman to a lady. But there are higher considerations than either
of those, and I hope I shall be forgiven if I now allow myself to be
actuated solely by them. My duty in this matter is to his lordship,
and I can admit of no questioning but from him. He has approved of
what I have done, and you must excuse me if I say that, having that
approval and my own, I want none other."

What horrid words were these which greeted the ear of Mrs. Proudie?
The matter was indeed too clear. There was premeditated mutiny in
the camp. Not only had ill-conditioned minds become insubordinate by
the fruition of a little power, but sedition had been overtly taught
and preached. The bishop had not yet been twelve months in his chair,
and rebellion had already reared her hideous head within the palace.
Anarchy and misrule would quickly follow unless she took immediate
and strong measures to put down the conspiracy which she had
detected.

"Mr. Slope," she said with slow and dignified voice, differing much
from that which she had hitherto used, "Mr. Slope, I will trouble
you, if you please, to leave the apartment. I wish to speak to my
lord alone."

Mr. Slope also felt that everything depended on the present
interview. Should the bishop now be re-petticoated, his thraldom
would be complete and forever. The present moment was peculiarly
propitious for rebellion. The bishop had clearly committed himself
by breaking the seal of the answer to the archbishop; he had
therefore fear to influence him. Mr. Slope had told him that no
consideration ought to induce him to refuse the archbishop's
invitation; he had therefore hope to influence him. He had accepted
Mr. Quiverful's resignation and therefore dreaded having to renew
that matter with his wife. He had been screwed up to the pitch of
asserting a will of his own, and might possibly be carried on till by
an absolute success he should have been taught how possible it was
to succeed. Now was the moment for victory or rout. It was now that
Mr. Slope must make himself master of the diocese, or else resign his
place and begin his search for fortune again. He saw all this plainly.
After what had taken place any compromise between him and the lady
was impossible. Let him once leave the room at her bidding and leave
the bishop in her hands, and he might at once pack up his portmanteau
and bid adieu to episcopal honours, Mrs. Bold, and the Signora Neroni.

And yet it was not so easy to keep his ground when he was bidden by
a lady to go, or to continue to make a third in a party between a
husband and wife when the wife expressed a wish for a _tete-a-tete_
with her husband.

"Mr. Slope," she repeated, "I wish to be alone with my lord."

"His lordship has summoned me on most important diocesan business,"
said Mr. Slope, glancing with uneasy eye at Dr. Proudie. He felt
that he must trust something to the bishop, and yet that that trust
was so woefully ill-placed. "My leaving him at the present moment
is, I fear, impossible."

"Do you bandy words with me, you ungrateful man?" said she. "My
lord, will you do me the favour to beg Mr. Slope to leave the room?"

My lord scratched his head, but for the moment said nothing. This was
as much as Mr. Slope expected from him, and was on the whole, for him,
an active exercise of marital rights.

"My lord," said the lady, "is Mr. Slope to leave this room, or am I?"

Here Mrs. Proudie made a false step. She should not have alluded to
the possibility of retreat on her part. She should not have expressed
the idea that her order for Mr. Slope's expulsion could be treated
otherwise than by immediate obedience. In answer to such a question
the bishop naturally said in his own mind that, as it was necessary
that one should leave the room, perhaps it might be as well that Mrs.
Proudie did so. He did say so in his own mind, but externally he
again scratched his head and again twiddled his thumbs.

Mrs. Proudie was boiling over with wrath. Alas, alas! Could she but
have kept her temper as her enemy did, she would have conquered as
she had ever conquered. But divine anger got the better of her, as
it has done of other heroines, and she fell.

"My lord," said she, "am I to be vouchsafed an answer or am I not?"

At last he broke his deep silence and proclaimed himself a Slopeite.
"Why, my dear," said he, "Mr. Slope and I are very busy."

That was all. There was nothing more necessary. He had gone to the
battlefield, stood the dust and heat of the day, encountered the fury
of the foe, and won the victory. How easy is success to those who
will only be true to themselves!

Mr. Slope saw at once the full amount of his gain, and turned on the
vanquished lady a look of triumph which she never forgot and never
forgave. Here he was wrong. He should have looked humbly at her
and, with meek entreating eye, have deprecated her anger. He should
have said by his glance that he asked pardon for his success, and that
he hoped forgiveness for the stand which he had been forced to make
in the cause of duty. So might he perchance have somewhat mollified
that imperious bosom and prepared the way for future terms. But Mr.
Slope meant to rule without terms. Ah, forgetful, inexperienced
man! Can you cause that little trembling victim to be divorced from
the woman that possesses him? Can you provide that they shall be
separated at bed and board? Is he not flesh of her flesh and bone of
her bone, and must he not so continue? It is very well now for you
to stand your ground and triumph as she is driven ignominiously from
the room, but can you be present when those curtains are drawn, when
that awful helmet of proof has been tied beneath the chin, when the
small remnants of the bishop's prowess shall be cowed by the tassel
above his head? Can you then intrude yourself when the wife wishes
"to speak to my lord alone?"

But for the moment Mr. Slope's triumph was complete, for Mrs. Proudie
without further parley left the room and did not forget to shut the
door after her. Then followed a close conference between the new
allies, in which was said much which it astonished Mr. Slope to
say and the bishop to hear. And yet the one said it and the other
heard it without ill-will. There was no mincing of matters now. The
chaplain plainly told the bishop that the world gave him credit for
being under the governance of his wife; that his credit and character
in the diocese were suffering; that he would surely get himself in
hot water if he allowed Mrs. Proudie to interfere in matters which
were not suitable for a woman's powers; and in fact that he would
become contemptible if he did not throw off the yoke under which he
groaned. The bishop at first hummed and hawed and affected to deny
the truth of what was said. But his denial was not stout and quickly
broke down. He soon admitted by silence his state of vassalage and
pledged himself, with Mr. Slope's assistance, to change his courses.
Mr. Slope also did not make out a bad case for himself. He explained
how it grieved him to run counter to a lady who had always been his
patroness, who had befriended him in so many ways, who had, in fact,
recommended him to the bishop's notice; but, as he stated, his duty
was now imperative; he held a situation of peculiar confidence, and
was immediately and especially attached to the bishop's person. In
such a situation his conscience required that he should regard solely
the bishop's interests, and therefore he had ventured to speak out.

The bishop took this for what it was worth, and Mr. Slope only
intended that he should do so. It gilded the pill which Mr. Slope
had to administer, and which the bishop thought would be less bitter
than that other pill which he had so long been taking.

"My lord," had his immediate reward, like a good child. He was
instructed to write and at once did write another note to the
archbishop accepting his grace's invitation. This note Mr. Slope,
more prudent than the lady, himself took away and posted with his own
hands. Thus he made sure that this act of self-jurisdiction should
be as nearly as possible a _fait accompli_. He begged, and coaxed,
and threatened the bishop with a view of making him also write at
once to Mr. Harding, but the bishop, though temporally emancipated
from his wife, was not yet enthralled to Mr. Slope. He said, and
probably said truly, that such an offer must be made in some official
form; that he was not yet prepared to sign the form; and that he
should prefer seeing Mr. Harding before he did so. Mr. Slope might,
however, beg Mr. Harding to call upon him. Not disappointed with his
achievement Mr. Slope went his way. He first posted the precious
note which he had in his pocket, and then pursued other enterprises
in which we must follow him in other chapters.

Mrs. Proudie, having received such satisfaction as was to be derived
from slamming her husband's door, did not at once betake herself to
Mrs. Quiverful. Indeed, for the first few moments after her repulse
she felt that she could not again see that lady. She would have to
own that she had been beaten, to confess that the diadem had passed
from her brow, and the sceptre from her hand! No, she would send a
message to her with a promise of a letter on the next day or the day
after. Thus resolving, she betook herself to her bedroom, but here
she again changed her mind. The air of that sacred enclosure somewhat
restored her courage and gave her more heart. As Achilles warmed at
the sight of his armour, as Don Quixote's heart grew strong when he
grasped his lance, so did Mrs. Proudie look forward to fresh laurels,
as her eye fell on her husband's pillow. She would not despair.
Having so resolved, she descended with dignified mien and refreshed
countenance to Mrs. Quiverful.

This scene in the bishop's study took longer in the acting than in
the telling. We have not, perhaps, had the whole of the conversation.
At any rate Mrs. Quiverful was beginning to be very impatient, and
was thinking that Farmer Subsoil would be tired of waiting for her,
when Mrs. Proudie returned. Oh, who can tell the palpitations of
that maternal heart, as the suppliant looked into the face of the
great lady to see written there either a promise of house, income,
comfort and future competence, or else the doom of continued and
ever-increasing poverty! Poor mother! Poor wife! There was little
there to comfort you!

"Mrs. Quiverful," thus spoke the lady with considerable austerity, and
without sitting down herself, "I find that your husband has behaved
in this matter in a very weak and foolish manner."

Mrs. Quiverful immediately rose upon her feet, thinking it
disrespectful to remain sitting while the wife of the bishop stood.
But she was desired to sit down again, and made to do so, so that
Mrs. Proudie might stand and preach over her. It is generally
considered an offensive thing for a gentleman to keep his seat while
another is kept standing before him, and we presume the same law
holds with regard to ladies. It often is so felt, but we are inclined
to say that it never produces half the discomfort or half the feeling
of implied inferiority that is shown by a great man who desires his
visitor to be seated while he himself speaks from his legs. Such a
solecism in good breeding, when construed into English, means this:
"The accepted rules of courtesy in the world require that I should
offer you a seat; if I did not do so, you would bring a charge
against me in the world of being arrogant and ill-mannered; I will
obey the world, but, nevertheless, I will not put myself on an
equality with you. You may sit down, but I won't sit with you. Sit,
therefore, at my bidding, and I'll stand and talk at you!"

This was just what Mrs. Proudie meant to say, and Mrs. Quiverful,
though she was too anxious and too flurried thus to translate the
full meaning of the manoeuvre, did not fail to feel its effect. She
was cowed and uncomfortable, and a second time essayed to rise from
her chair.

"Pray be seated, Mrs. Quiverful, pray keep your seat. Your husband,
I say, has been most weak and most foolish. It is impossible, Mrs.
Quiverful, to help people who will not help themselves. I much fear
that I can now do nothing for you in this matter."

"Oh, Mrs. Proudie, don't say so," said the poor woman, again jumping
up.

"_Pray_ be seated, Mrs. Quiverful. I must fear that I can do
nothing further for you in this matter. Your husband has, in a most
unaccountable manner, taken upon himself to resign that which I was
empowered to offer him. As a matter of course, the bishop expects
that his clergy shall know their own minds. What he may ultimately
do--what we may finally decide on doing--I cannot now say. Knowing
the extent of your family--"

"Fourteen children, Mrs. Proudie, fourteen of them! And barely
bread--barely bread? It's hard for the children of a clergyman, it's
hard for one who has always done his duty respectably!" Not a word
fell from her about herself, but the tears came streaming down her
big, coarse cheeks, on which the dust of the August road had left its
traces.

Mrs. Proudie has not been portrayed in these pages as an agreeable or
an amiable lady. There has been no intention to impress the reader
much in her favour. It is ordained that all novels should have a male
and a female angel and a male and a female devil. If it be considered
that this rule is obeyed in these pages, the latter character must
be supposed to have fallen to the lot of Mrs. Proudie. But she was
not all devil. There was a heart inside that stiff-ribbed bodice,
though not, perhaps, of large dimensions, and certainly not easily
accessible. Mrs. Quiverful, however, did gain access, and Mrs.
Proudie proved herself a woman. Whether it was the fourteen children
with their probable bare bread and their possible bare backs, or the
respectability of the father's work, or the mingled dust and tears on
the mother's face, we will not pretend to say. But Mrs. Proudie was
touched.

She did not show it as other women might have done. She did not give
Mrs. Quiverful eau-de-Cologne, or order her a glass of wine. She did
not take her to her toilet table and offer her the use of brushes
and combs, towels and water. She did not say soft little speeches
and coax her kindly back to equanimity. Mrs. Quiverful, despite her
rough appearance, would have been as amenable to such little tender
cares as any lady in the land. But none such were forthcoming.
Instead of this, Mrs. Proudie slapped one hand upon the other and
declared--not with an oath, for, as a lady and a Sabbatarian and a
she-bishop, she could not swear, but with an adjuration--that she
"wouldn't have it done."

The meaning of this was that she wouldn't have Mr. Quiverful's
promised appointment cozened away by the treachery of Mr. Slope and
the weakness of her husband. This meaning she very soon explained to
Mrs. Quiverful.

"Why was your husband such a fool," said she, now dismounted from her
high horse and sitting confidentially down close to her visitor, "as
to take the bait which that man threw to him? If he had not been so
utterly foolish, nothing could have prevented your going to the
hospital."

Poor Mrs. Quiverful was ready enough with her own tongue in accusing
her husband to his face of being soft, and perhaps did not always
speak of him to her children quite so respectfully as she might have
done. But she did not at all like to hear him abused by others, and
began to vindicate him and to explain that of course he had taken Mr.
Slope to be an emissary from Mrs. Proudie herself; that Mr. Slope
was thought to be peculiarly her friend; and that, therefore, Mr.
Quiverful would have been failing in respect to her had he assumed to
doubt what Mr. Slope had said.

Thus mollified, Mrs. Proudie again declared that she "would not have
it done," and at last sent Mrs. Quiverful home with an assurance
that, to the furthest stretch of her power and influence in the
palace, the appointment of Mr. Quiverful should be insisted on. As
she repeated the word "insisted," she thought of the bishop in his
night-cap and, with compressed lips, slightly shook her head. Oh, my
aspiring pastors, divines to whose ears _nolo episcopari_ are the
sweetest of words, which of you would be a bishop on such terms as
these?

Mrs. Quiverful got home in the farmer's cart, not indeed with a light
heart, but satisfied that she had done right in making her visit.




CHAPTER XXVII

A Love Scene


Mr. Slope, as we have said, left the palace with a feeling of
considerable triumph. Not that he thought that his difficulties were
all over--he did not so deceive himself--but he felt that he had
played his first move well, as well as the pieces on the board would
allow, and that he had nothing with which to reproach himself. He
first of all posted the letter to the archbishop and, having made
that sure, proceeded to push the advantage which he had gained. Had
Mrs. Bold been at home, he would have called on her, but he knew that
she was at Plumstead, so he wrote the following note. It was the
beginning of what, he trusted, might be a long and tender series of
epistles.


MY DEAR MRS. BOLD,

You will understand perfectly that I cannot at present
correspond with your father. I heartily wish that I could,
and hope the day may be not long distant when mists shall
have been cleared away, and we may know each other. But
I cannot preclude myself from the pleasure of sending
you these few lines to say that Mr. Q. has to-day, in
my presence, resigned any title that he ever had to the
wardenship of the hospital, and that the bishop has
assured me that it is his intention to offer it to your
esteemed father.

Will you, with my respectful compliments, ask him, who I
believe is now a fellow-visitor with you, to call on the
bishop either on Wednesday or Thursday, between ten and
one. _This is by the bishop's desire_. If you will so far
oblige me as to let me have a line naming either day, and
the hour which will suit Mr. Harding, I will take care
that the servants shall have orders to show him in without
delay. Perhaps I should say no more--but still I wish you
could make your father understand that no subject will be
mooted between his lordship and him which will refer at
all to the method in which he may choose to perform his
duty. I for one am persuaded that no clergyman could
perform it more satisfactorily than he did, or than he
will do again.

On a former occasion I was indiscreet and much too
impatient, considering your father's age and my own. I
hope he will not now refuse my apology. I still hope also
that with your aid and sweet pious labours we may live to
attach such a Sabbath-school to the old endowment as may,
by God's grace and furtherance, be a blessing to the poor
of this city.

You will see at once that this letter is confidential. The
subject, of course, makes it so. But, equally, of course,
it is for your parent's eye as well as for your own,
should you think proper to show it to him.