Bruton Bell; Housework Shmousework; Early Church Chronicles; and Barchester Towers

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Good afternoon. It's Thursday afternoon. I'm in a little town called Bruton in Somerset. And that's a lovely sound. It's a continental sound when I hear a bell ring like that. I think it's the bell that's part of the chapel of the school here. But I really like, as much as I love the peel of bells, there's something about the repeated bell that reminds me so much of being in France. I'm just going to stand still a minute. And I hope you're well. It's warming up, it's getting hotter, and I think we're gonna have our lovely sunny day a few days here in England. Hello. Hello, hello. It's uh Friday morning and it's so warm and lovely. Oh, it's beautiful. I'm walking in a little place called Shepton Montague, which had links with the family who owned the Montague house that I visited last week, and it's a place where I sometimes meet friends to have a cup of coffee because it's such a beautiful part of the country, and I'm by the church, and it's so pretty. Lots of lovely old stones, um, a little bit of hand dressing, and I'm leaning over the wall as we speak, and let's pay some respects to some names I can see there. So there's a recent one precious memories of a dear wife, mother, and grandmother, Pamela May Mitchell, 1941 to 2023. So that's a lovely long life, so that's 60, 83, 82 years, and loving husband, father, and grandfather, Douglas William Mitchell, 1938 to 2024, so that's 62, 86 years. Those are that's so nice that they had such a long time together. Then there's Peter James Coston, who died in 2021. And who else can I see? Adela, Geraldine Matthews, Adela or Adela, that's a nice name, isn't it? I can see ew trees, I can see tall daisies, I can see egg and bacon, little yellow flowers. Um what else I can see? A lovely big copper beach, huge. An oak tree. I can see the memorial, the war memorial. It's tucked away in a funny position actually. Let's go and see if I can read anything on it. Um there's no wind, but as soon as I walk, obviously, I probably create a bit of wind, and I haven't I don't want to use my microphone. Okay, so in memory of the men of this parish who fell in the Great War, killed and missing. W. G. Bagwell, G. Beach, A. Brine, W A King, G. Longman, and also in 1939 to 45, W. H. Bagwell, that's very sad, so that would have been his son, I imagine. Oh, D. Bagwell and KCC Mills. So the Bagwell family really hit there, and now it's so such a beautiful view looking at the church and with the hills behind. That I'm going to take a photograph. But before I do that, let me just let you enjoy the sound of this really beautiful summer's day. And she's looking around almost thinking, well, where's Doggo? But sometimes it's good to take her on her own. And there's a bird that's been making noises similar to a wren, similar to a chaffinch, but I don't think it's either. And my bird app isn't working, so I was hoping to record it so that you could let me know what it is. Let's see if it's making the noise. Also, can you hear the sheep? The lambs. I get sad when I think that the lambs don't really even get to their first birthday, I don't think. I don't think I don't think I like it really. And you're having a lovely time, aren't you, little pup? Jumping in the water, drinking the lovely fresh water. And I I've got my eyes peeled thinking, is there anything interesting in that water? It's so clear, you can see all these lovely old stones and rocks and things. So I'm looking, thinking, anything interesting? I can see an old twisted metal something that maybe looks like part of an old plough, maybe. I can see that on the other side of the river. And of course, the bird that I was talking about stopped making a noise. And I thought I'd go home and do we haven't read from the history of Christianity for a while, so I was going to read a little bit from that. I'm also really missing Thomas Hardy about 10 minutes ago. I thought I it's been a long time since I either visited his part of Dorset or read any of his poems or read any extracts from his books. Maybe I'll do that. Maybe I'll do an extract because sometimes that's all you need. Like one of the his scenes from under the Greenwood tree, or one of the descriptive pieces from Tess or something. So I might do that and maybe not fill it tonight. I'm now taking you down by the river where it makes such a pretty flowing sound.

SPEAKER_01 6:51

I'm gonna give you a few minutes to enjoy the sound and hear the sound with I've got to stop calling her puppy.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

I swear it's I mean she's only six months though, and uh the wind's picked up, of course, but there we go.

SPEAKER_01 7:08

See if you can picture yourself on a sunny evening in Dorset. Hopefully feeling at peace with the world.

SPEAKER_02 8:14

I'm wearing white trousers today, which is silly, really, but I I like wearing white trousers and uh oh, glasses have just flew meant the river. Oh dear. There we go.

SPEAKER_00 8:29

I just seen a friend, one of my friends called Claire, of course, and she was the friend that I went to school with when I was five, and I just love her so much, and it's difficult to put my finger on why. I think she's puzzled as to why I love her so much. I I love seeing her, I love getting in touch with her, I love having her in my life.

SPEAKER_01 8:52

She's just really frank and straight speaking, and she's a really good listener, and she asks questions and she's interested and she cares, but but she's different, very different from me, and and I bore you the things I say now because you got to know me perhaps so well. But I always think it's the things that are different from you that you appreciate in other people, and she's she's she's not gushing uh like I can be.

SPEAKER_02 9:25

She's just I don't know, more like a man, really, in the sense that she gives compliments but in a straight way rather than in a kind of typical female, warm, warm way, and she works hard, she's a great mum, and she laughs a lot.

SPEAKER_00 9:45

She doesn't I think she makes me laugh the most when she does impressions, so she'll she she'll just do an impression of a shopkeeper that she's had a you know a contra chant with, or do an impression of uh her mum who drinks too much and is difficult to cope with. And as I talk, actually, I can see two shining halves of uh an oyster that's it's a shell that's d you know, it's divided into two, and they're on their back sort of thing, and they're they're catching the sunlight as it comes through the river.

SPEAKER_02 10:22

And there's some light pebbles and darker pebbles, and the whole effect is a very dappled look in the river. And I've got so much to do, so much to do, so many, so much housework.

SPEAKER_00 10:35

But well, it's only housework, isn't it? Housework mousework.

SPEAKER_02 10:42

Right, come on then, poppy, let's go home.

SPEAKER_00 10:46

And now back in the bosom of home. John Clare a ramble How sweet and dear to taste warm bosom and to health's flushed cheek, Mourne's flushing face peeps out her first fond smile, crimsoning the east in many tinted hue, the horizon round as edged with brooding mist, penciling its seeming circle round so uniform in tinge of faintly blue, how lovely then the streak which matchless nature skirting sweet, flushes the edge of the arching sky, and melting draws the hangings of the morn Oh who that lives is free to mark the charms of nature's earliest dress, far from the smoke and cheerless bustle of the city's strife To breathe the cool sweet air, mark the blue sky and all the nameless beauties limning mourn so beautifully touches, who, when free by drowsy slumbers, ere would be detained, snoring supinely o'er their idle dreams, would lie to lose a charm so charming now as in the early morn. Come now, we'll start, arise my dog, and shake thy curdled coat and bark thy friendly symptoms by my side, tracing the dewy plains we'll muse along. Behind us left our nooked track wild wound, From bush to bush, as rambling on we tread, peeping on dew gilt branch, moist grassy tuft and nature's every trifle ere so mean, her every trifle pleases much mine eye, so on we high to witness what she wears, how beautiful een seems this simple twig that steals it from the hedge, and wavering dipples down to taste the stream. I cannot think it, how the reason is that every trifle nature's bosom wears should seem so lovely and appear so sweet, and charm so much my soul, while heedless passenger seodles me by an animated post, and neer so much as turns his head to look, but stalks along as though his eyes were blinded, and as if the witching face of nature held but now a dark, unmeaning blank. O taste thou charm that so endears and nature makes so lovely, nameless enthusiastic ardour thine, that wildered witching raptor, quisitive, stooping bent, genius o'er each object, thine, that longing, pausing, wishing that cannot pass uncomprehended things without a sigh, for wisdom to unseal the hidden cause, that anchoring gaze is thine, that fainly would turn the blue blinders of the heavens aside, to see what gods are doing. And now William Hunt, chapter three The Church in Kent. Soon after Meletus and his companions arrived in England, perhaps at the end of six oh one, Augustine determined to ascertain whether the British Church would acknowledge the authority over it, with which Gregory had invested him, for he was anxious to obtain its help in his mission to the English. Through Ethelbert's influence a meeting was arranged on the borders of the lands of the West Saxons and the Hwickers, who I love that word, Hwickers, who had settled in the present Gloucestershire and Worcestershire. The meeting place was at an oak, long afterwards called Augustine's oak, probably a landmark and it may be an ancient tree which had received superstitious reverence alike from the earlier inhabitants of Britain and from the conquering race. Where it stood is not known, probably near the southern bank of the Severn. Oust, near Chepstow, has been suggested as the place of meeting, and though it was called after Emperor August Augustus, it may nevertheless have been the scene of Augustine's conference, and if so its name would have a twofold significance. I think that's the point we ended. To this oak came a party of British bishops and learned men from South Wales. They end it's quite nice to visit envisage it, isn't it? Imagine it, these people, you know, trekking and camping over the overnight and roughing it, I suppose they would have had to do. Or did they stop at wayside equivalent of sort of inns, you know, hovels, I don't know, huts make their way there. And was the oak surrounded by had people set up camp there, if you see what I mean? And from the oak did it must have been an oak, I g I guess, near the crossing of paths, tracks and it's probably now in the middle of a in our middle of a horrible roundabout, but let's not think of that. They entered the land from that which their countrymen had been driven to meet one who had came come to them as archbishop of the people whom they hated, demanding the submission of their church and their help in preaching the gospel to their fierce conquerors. Augustine asked them whether they would have Catholic concord with him and would join him in his work of evangelisation. His question referred to the points on which the church differed from Rome, the date of Easter and the rest. The British bishops declared that they would keep their own traditions and refused to listen to the prayers and reproaches which he and his companions addressed him. We've done all this, haven't we? And we've done the bit where they've asked they ask advice and hold on a minute. So do you remember they consulted a hermit named Dinut or Dinord, who basically said that if Augustine stood up to greet them, then they could respect his views, but he didn't rise, for he had come to assert his authority over them, and they, seeing that he remained seated, were offended and set themselves to contradict all he said. If Augustine cannot be acquitted of a lack of courtesy and Christian meekness in his reception of them, he certainly showed some liberality of mind in his demands, for he only asked three things of them. That they should keep Easter at its right date. Bear in mind this is written by someone who obviously has his own views, because these days it wouldn't be put like that, obviously, in a history book. But do you remember, I mean that's what partly why I I read these books. It's because I like I like I like biased accounts because as if you read enough biased accounts you get a good feel for I think it's like zeroing in, you know, that you do with guns, uh with with you know, rifles and so on. What else is it like? It's just taking yeah, maybe maybe maybe it's like map reading, taking lots of readings so that you can work out where something is. You can also do that with signals, can't you? It's it's the more the more sort of biased accounts you read, or or not biased, but just accounts that are subjective, then you can get a feel for different people's views and then sort of finally come to your own view. I hope it makes sense. Tell me what you think. I'm happy to whereas if you just read one objective account, then I don't know what is there to be gained from it, other than just re hearing about the facts. So they answered they would do none of these things and would not have him for Archbishop. Sorry, Easter was the first, baptised in the Roman manner, and should join in preaching the gospel to the English. He said all other differences he declared himself willing to bear without remonstrance, although I thought there was the huge issue of the Tontia, although I suppose that was later. So they said no, and a long time, nine, if not twelve years after his own death, his words were fulfilled, for Ethelfrith, the heathen king of Northumbria, overthrew the Britons in a fierce battle near Chester and slew nearly twelve hundred of the monks of Bangor, who had come to pray for the success of their fellow countrymen. The rejection of Augustine's demands was the beginning of an open schism that was accompanied by much angry and uncharitable feeling hence Barchester Towers. Not hence, but you know I want to read a bit more of that today. I really like it, I hope you like it too. Come on, focus, focus. The Scots agreed that the Britons in cleaving to the customs common to both Celtic churches, which were condemned by Rome, and on the side of the English church, Theodore, one of the greatest archbishops of Canterbury, pronounced that orders confirmed by the bishops of the British and Scottish churches were invalid, and that the churches consecrated by them had need of fresh rights. Even the large minded Bede speaks harshly of the Britons, and though he loved and revered the holy men of the Scottish Church, blames them for their obstinacy in adhering to their Celtic customs. For a long period the Britons, and especially those of the West, scarcely acknowledged the clergy of the English Church as Christians and would not eat with them. While feelings of this sort must be condemned, it is only fair to the advocates of the Roman usages in England to remember that the Celtic customs were a breach of Catholic unity, that by adhering to them the Celtic churches separated themselves from the rest of Christendom, and that when the Church was standing face to face with paganism or had to consider the weakness of new converts, outward unity was of special importance. Hmm, I don't I don't agree. Moreover, the bitterness of the Which accompanied the schism may be traced, in part, at least, to a cause more exasperating than even differences in ritual and order. What that cause was will be evident if we examine the full significance of the Britons' refusal of Augustine's demands. While Bede's story of the consultation with the hermit represents a genuine tradition, Augustine's lack of courtesy would scarely scarcely have had much weight with the Britons had they not already determined on the course which they had adopted. Well spotted. Their rejection of Augustine certainly involved a renunciation of the authority of the Roman See, but that result was merely incidental. Nothing, so far as we know, was said about it, and the past history of the British Church, especially in connection with the date of Easter, shows no reason for Biggie believing that obedience to Rome would in itself have been distasteful to them. They were strongly attached to their traditions, and at first some among the Scots were not less bitter in their defence of them, but the long continued bitterness exhibited by the Britons of Wales and the West is not matched among the adherents to the Celtic Easter in Gaul or Galicia, among the Pitts, or the Scots of Ireland or the North. It was ooh it was race hatred that kept the Britons from preaching the gospel to the English. Hm and exaggerated their feelings with regard to ecclesiastical usages, which were in their eyes hallowed by a sentiment of nationality, specially keen and sensitive among a depressed and conquered people. Yeah, I think he's right. It is not perhaps going too far to say that the rejected Augustine at least, as much because he came to them as Archbishop of the English, and with the demand that they should help in the conversion of the English, as because he demanded that they should conform to the Roman usages in the computation of Easter and the ritual in baptism. In like manner we cannot doubt that even in the best of the English churchmen race hostility was strong, and that their dislike to the Britons was naturally increased by the fact that the British Church had chosen to stand aloof from the work of evangelisation. While Bede speaks harshly of the British Christians who fell in their nation's cause by the sword of the heathen Ethelfrith, he in another place blames an English king for invading Ireland on the grounds that the Scots, who were then still in schism, but had sent many holy men to labour in England, were most kind to the English nation. The refusal of the Britons to preach to the English was a drawback to the success of Augustine's mission. Other labourers were sorely needed, both then and later, to push forward the work, and other labours were before long supplied by the Scots, but from the British Church no help came, and it had no share either in the foundation or development of the English Church. Besides the general superiority of Ethelbert over all the English people south of the Humber, the kingdom of the East Saxons was more immediately under his control, for the East Saxon king Sabert or Sabrit, who, or Sabright, who was the son of Ethelbert's sister Ricula, reigned in complete dependence on him. Ethelbert used his power for the furtherance of the gospel, and in six oh four Augustine, shortly before his death, consecrated Melatus as bishop and sent him to preach to the East Saxons. They and their king accepted the faith, and Ethelbert built a church dedicated to Saint Paul in London, which was their chief city, and was much frequented by traders from foreign lands, that Melatus and his successors might have their see there. It may perhaps conveniently be noted here that when a bishop's see, or sedes, or official's seat or throne, cathedral, is placed in a church, it thereby becomes a cathedral church, or as is colloquial as it is colloquially called, a cathedral. In the same year, Augustine also consecrated Justice as bishop for the Kentish people settled in the western part of the kingdom, who were probably a distinct subdivision of the Jutes, and though equally with their eastern neighbours under the dominion of Ethelbert, may still have had a political existence of their own. The see of the West Kentish bishops was placed at Rochester, a walled town of Roman times, and there Ethelbert built a church for justice and his successors, which was dedicated to Saint Andrew. I often forget how old Rochester is, actually, I really must go to the cathedral there. It's a good reminder. The political dependence of the West Kentishman on the King reigning at Canterbury was long marked by the relation of the two churches to each other. The Bishopric of Rochester was dependent on the See of Canterbury, and until the middle of the twelfth century its bishops were appointed by the Archbishop. To both the churches of London and Rochester, as well as to the Church of Canterbury, Ethelbert gave lands and other gifts, partly in order to ensure the safety of the missionaries and of the property he had bestowed upon them, and to no small extent from a desire to copy the Roman civilization of which he heard from them, he determined to reduce the unwritten laws of his people to writing. And we'll hear about his laws, which I think were excellent. I mean who am I to say? But we've heard about them before, of course, in Bede, but we'll we'll hear about that next time. And today we celebrate the life of Romald of Ravenna, nine fifty to ten twenty seven, so seventy-seven years. Benedictine abbot, born of a noble Ravenna family, Romald became a monk at the nearby Cluniac monastery of Saint Apollinaire in Classe, after his father had killed a man and a jewel. After prolonged study of the Desert Fathers, that scout in the background chewing a cat hanger, of course she is, he aimed at restoring penance and solitude to contemporary monasticism and propagated the idea that monastic life, particularly in solitude, was the way of salvation for all. His most famous monasteries were Fonte Avellana, virtually refounded by his disciple Peter Damien and Camaldoni on a wooded mountainside in Tuscany, which developed into a separate congregation after his death. His particular contribution to the monastic order was to provide for the hermit life esteemed but rejected by Benedict within the framework of the Benedictine rule. The observance of Camaldoli greatly influenced Bruno and the Carthusian order. Rumald was very austere in character. His order has always been few in numbers, but it survives to this day. He died alone at Val di Castro on the twenty ninth of June. His incorrupt body was translated on the seventh of February, but his feast day is now the nineteenth of June. Juliana, early fourth century virgin and martyr don't like saying that. She probably suffered at Cumai or Naples. Gregory the Great requested relics of her from Fort Fortunatus, Bishop of Naples, for an oratory which a lady had built on her estate in Juliana's honour. The principal episode of her unreliable legend is a long verbal contest between her and the devil who tried to persuade her to obey the wish of wishes of her father and her suitor to get married. It's always that same issue, isn't it? Oh thus she is represented in art with a winged devil at her feet. Her cult in England goes back to the martyrology of Bede, and her feast is on the sixteenth of February. Ah, and I've read the wrong Juliana. I've done this before so many times. It's Juliana Fulconieri who died in thirteen forty one, foundress of the Servite nuns. Her father and mother oh here we go. Her father and mother were wealthy Florentines who built the church at Annunciata, and her uncle Alexis was one of the servite founders. She was born in 1270 and was so devoted to prayer and religion that her mother feared she'd never find a husband. She decided to renounce the world by consecrating to the religious life and became a servite tertiary in the family church. Juliana became superior of a servite community, for which she drew up regulations which were approved more than a century later by the papacy. As a superior, she showed zealous charity, immense thoughtfulness and consideration, and died at seventy. There we go. A few convent churches in England are dedicated to her feast nineteenth of June. And now to finish, we continue the chapter of Mr Arabin, Barchester Towers. Now don't switch off, it was a little bit boring shape no, I can't say boring, dense last time, 'cause we learned about his character and his moves towards Rome and then back to Protestantism. But now we're at the good bit. Such is an interior view of Mr Arabin at the time when he accepted the living at St. Ewold. Exteriorly he was not a remarkable person. He was above the middle height, well made and very active. His hair which had been jet black was now tinged with grey, but his face bore no signs of years. It would perhaps be wrong to say that he was handsome, but his face was nonetheless pleasant to look at. The cheekbones were rather too high for beauty, and the formation of his forehead too massive and too massive and heavy, but the eyes, nose and mouth were perfect. There was a continual play of lambent fire about his eyes which gave promise of either pathos or humour whenever he essayed to speak, and that promise was rarely broken. There was a gentle play about his mouth which declared that his wit never descended to sarcasm, and that there was no ill nature in his repartee. Mr Arabin was a popular man among women, but more so as a general than a special favourite. Living as a fellow at Oxford, marriage with him had been out of the question, and it may be doubted whether he had ever allowed his heart to be touched. Though belonging to a church in which celibacy is not the required lot of its ministers, he had come to regard himself as one of those clergymen to whom would be a to whom to be a bachelor is almost a necessity. He had never looked for parochial duty, and his career at Oxford was utterly incompatible with such domestic joys as a wife and nursery. He looked on women, therefore, in the same light that one sees them regarded by many Romish priests. He liked to have near him that which was pretty and amusing, but women generally were little more to him than children. He talked to them without putting out all his powers, and listened to them without any idea that what he should hear from them could either actuate his conduct or influence his opinion. Such was Mr Arabin, the new vicar of St. Ewald, who is going to stay with the Grantleys at Plumstead Episcopi Episcopy. Mr Arabin reached Plumstead the day before Mr Harding and Eleanor and the Grantly family were thus enabled to make his acquaintance and discuss his qualifications before the arrival of the other guests. Grislda was surprised to find that he looked so young, but she told Florinda, her younger sister, when they had retired for the night, that he did not look talk at all like a young man, and she decided with the authority that seventeen has over sixteen. All right, Scout, what a matter? Come on. Over here. That's quite funny because that was like my sister, she sort of spoke with the authority of an adult over a child, even though she was just two years older than me, that he was not at all nice, although his eyes were lovely. As usual, sixteen implicitly acceded to the dictum of seventeen in such a matter, and said that he certainly was not nice. Then they branched off on the relative merits of other clerical bachelors in the vicinity, and both determined without any feeling of jealousy between them that a certain Rev Augustus Green was by many degrees the most estimable of the lot. The gentleman in question had certainly much in his favour, as having a comfortable allowance from his father, he could devote the whole proceeds of his curacy to violet gloves and unexceptionable neckties. Having thus fixedly resolved that the newcomer had nothing about him to shake the preeminence of the exalted green, the two girls went to sleep in it in each other's arms, contented with themselves and the world. Ah, no well that's something I definitely didn't have with my sister. Sadly, I would have liked to have done it, but she wouldn't have. Mrs. Grantly at first sight came to much the same conclusion about her husband's favourite as her daughters had done, though in seeking to measure his relative value, she did not compare him to Mr Green. Indeed, she made no comparison by name between him and anyone else, but she remarked to her husband that one person's swans were very often another person's geese. I like that. Thereby clearly showing that Mr Arabin had not yet proved his qualifications in swanhood to her satisfaction. Well, Susan, said he, rather offended at hearing his friend spoken of so disrespectfully, if you take Mr Arabin for a goose, I cannot say I think very highly of your discrimination. A goose no, of course, he's not a goose. I've no doubt he's a very clever man, but you're so matter of fact, Archdeacon, when it suits your purpose, that one can't trust oneself to any façon de parley. I've no doubt Mr Arabin is a very valuable man at Oxford, and that he'll be a good vicar at St. Ewald. All I mean is that having passed one evening with him, I don't find him to be absolutely a paragon. In the first place, if I'm not mistaken, he's a little inclined to be conceited. Of all the men that I know intimately, said the Archdeacon, Arabin is, in my opinion, the most free from any taint of self conceit. His fault is that he's too diffident. Perhaps so, said the lady. Only I must own I did not find it out this evening. Nothing further was said about him. Dr. Grantly thought that his wife was abusing Mr Arabin merely because he had praised him, and Mrs. Grantly knew that it was useless arguing for or against any person, in favour of or in opposition to whom the archdeacon had already pronounced a strong opinion. In truth they were both right. Mr Arabin was a diffident man in social intercourse with those he did not intimately know. When placed in situations which it was his business to fill, and discussing matters with which it was his duty to be cons conversant, Mr Arabin was from habit brazen faced enough. When standing on a platform in Exeter Hall, no man would be less mazed than he by the eyes of the crowd before him. I've not seen that before, mazed, used just like that. It's nice to see I don't know, it's just nice to see the development of words, if you see what I mean. For such was the work which his profession had called on him to perform, but he shrank from a strong expression of opinion in general society, and his doing so not uncommonly made it appear that he considered the company not worth the trouble of his energy. He was averse to dictate when the place did not seem to him to justify dictation, and as the subjects on which people to wished to hear him speak were such as he was accustomed to treat with decision, he generally shunned the traps there were laid to allure him into discussion, and by doing so not unfrequently subjected himself to such charges as those brought against him by Mrs. Grantly. Mr Arabin, as he sat at his open window, enjoying the delicious moonlight and gazing at the grey towers on the church which stood almost within the rectory grounds, little dreamed that he was the subject of so many friendly or unfriendly criticisms, considering how much we are all given to discuss the character characters of others and discuss them not in the strictest spirit of charity, it is singular how little we are inclined to think that others can speak ill naturedly of us, and how angry and hurt we are when proof reaches us that they have done so. It's so true, isn't it? The idea that people are speaking about us is awful, but we we have to just put it to one side, don't we? It is hardly too much to say that we're all of us occasionally speaking of our dearest friends in a manner which those dearest friends would very little like to hear themselves mentioned, and that we nevertheless expect that our dearest friends shall invariably speak of us as though they were blind to all our faults, but keenly alive to every shade of our virtues, good observation. It did not occur to Mr Arabin that he was spoken of at all. It seemed to him when he compared himself with his host, that he was a person of so little consequence to anyway to any, that he was worth no one's thoughts or words. He was utterly alone in the world as regarded domestic ties and those inner familiar relations which are hardly possible between others than husbands and wives, parents and children, or brothers and sisters. He had often discussed with himself the necessity of such bonds for a man's happiness in this world, and had generally satisfied himself with the answer that happiness in this world is not a necessity, herein he deceived himself, or rather tried to do so. He, like others, yearned for the enjoyment of whatever he saw enjoyable, and though he attempted, with the modern stoicism of so many Christians, to make himself believe that joy and sorrow were matters here which should be held as perfectly indifferent, these things were not indifferent to him. He was tired of his Oxford rooms and his college life. He regarded the wife and children of his friends uh of his friend with something like envy. He all but coveted the pleasant drawing room with its pretty windows opening on to lawns and flower beds, the apparel of the comfortable house, and above all the air of home which encompassed it all. It will be said that no time can have been so fitted for such desires on his part as this, when he had just possessed himself of a country parish, of a living among fields and gardens, of a house which a wife would grace. It is true there was a difference between the opulence of Plumstead and the modest economy of St. Ewald, but surely Mr Arabin was not a man to sigh after wealth. Of all men his friends would have unanimously declared he was the last to do so, but how little our friends know us. In his period of stoical rejection of this world's happiness, he had cast from him as utter dross all anxiety as to fortune. He had, as it were, proclaimed himself to be indifferent to promotion, and those who chiefly admired his talents and would mainly have exerted themselves to secure to them their deserved reward had taken him at his word, and now if the truth must be out, he felt himself to be himself disappointed, disappointed not by them but by himself, the daydream of his youth was over, and at the age of forty he felt that he was not fit to work in the spirit of an apostle. He had mistaken himself and learned his mistake when it was past remedy. He had professed himself indifferent to miters and diaconal residences to rich livings and pleasant glebes, and now he had to own to himself that he was sighing for things of other men, on whom in his pride he had ventured to look down. Not for wealth in its vulgar sense had he ever sighed, not for the enjoyment of rich things had he ever longed, but for the allotted share of worldly bliss which a wife and children and happy home could give him for that usual amount of comfort which he had ventured to reject as unnecessary for him, he did now feel that he would have been wiser to have searched. He knew that his talents, his position and his friends would have won for him promotion had he put himself in the way of winning it. Instead of doing so he had allowed himself to be persuaded to accept a living which would give him an income of some three hundred pounds a year should he, by marrowing marrying marrowing marrying throw up his fellowship. Such at the age of forty was the worldly result of labour which the world had chosen to regard as successful. The world also thought that Mr Arabin was, in his own estimation, sufficiently paid alas alas the world was mistaken, and Mr Arabin was beginning to ascertain that such was the case. And here may I beg the reader not to be hard in his judgment upon this man. Is not the state at which he has arrived the natural result of efforts to reach that which is not the condition of humanity? Is not modern Stoicism built though it is on Christianity as great an outrage on human nature as was the Stoicism of the ancients? The philosophy of Zeno was built on true laws, but on true laws misunderstood and therefore misapplied it is the same with our Stoics here who would teach us that wealth and worldly comfort and happiness on earth are not worth the search, alas for a doctrine which can find no believing pupils and no true teachers. The case of Mr Arabin was the more singular as he belonged to a brand of the Church of England well inclined to regard its temporalities with avowed favour and had habitually lived with men who were accustomed to much worldly comfort. But such was his idiosyncrasy that these very facts had produced within him in early life a state of mind that was not natural to him. He was content to be a high churchman if he could be so on principles of his own and could strike out a course showing a marked difference from those with whom he consorted. He was ready to be a partisan as long as he was allowed to have a course of action and of thought unlike that of his party. His party had indulged him and he began to feel that his party was right and himself wrong just when a conviction was too late to be of service to him. This is brilliant writing he discovered when such discovery was no longer serviceable that it would have been worth his while to have worked for the usual pay assigned to work in this world and have earned a wife and children with a carriage for them to sit in, to have earned a pleasant dining room in which friends could drink his wine and the power of walking up the high street of his country town with the knowledge that all its tradesmen would have gladly welcomed him within their doors. Other men arrived at those convictions in their start of life and so worked up to them. To him they had come when they were too late to be of use. It has been said that Mr Arabin was a man of pleasantry and it may be thought that such a state of mind as that described would be antagonistic to humour, but surely such is not the case. Wit is the outward mental casing of the man and has no more to do with the inner mind of thought and feelings than have the rich brocaded garments of the priest at the altar with the asceticism of the anchorite below them, whose skin is tormented with sack cloth, and whose body is half laid with rods? Nay will not such a one often rejoice more than any other in the rich show of his outward apparel? Will it not be food for his pride to feel that he groans inwardly while he shines outwardly so it is with mental efforts which men make those which they show forth daily to the world are often the opposites of their inner workings of the spirit. In the archdeacon's drawing room Mr Arabin had sparkled with his usual unaffected brilliancy, but when he retired to his bedroom he sat there sad at his open window, repining within himself that he also had no wife, no bayons, no soft sword of lawn duly mown for him to lie on, no herb of attendant curates, no borrowings from the banker's clerks, no rich rectory That apostleship that he had thought of had evaded his grasp and he was now only the vicar of St. Ewald's with a taste for a mitre truly he had fallen between two stools Chapter twenty one Saint Ewald's Parsonage When Mr Harding and Mrs Bold reached the rectory on the following morning, the Archdeacon and his friend were at St. Ewald's they had gone over that the new vicar might expect inspect his church and be introduced to the squire and were not expected back before dinner. Mr Harding rambled out by himself and strolled as was his wont at Plumstead, about the lawn and round the church, and as he did so the two sisters naturally fell into conversations about Barchester. There was not much sisterly confidence between them. Mrs Grantly was ten years older than Eleanor and had been married while Eleanor was yet a child. They had never therefore poured into each other's ears their hopes and loves, and now that was what that one was a wife and the other a widow, it was not probable that they would begin to do so. They lived too much asunder to be able to fall into that kind of intercourse which makes confidence between sisters almost a necessity and moreover that which is so easy at eighteen is often very different at twenty eight. Mrs. Grantly knew this and did not therefore expect confidence from her sister, and yet she longed to ask her whether in real truth Mr Slope was agreeable to her. It was by no means difficult to turn the conversation to Mr Slope that gentleman had become so famous at Barchester, had so much to do with all clergymen connected with the city and especially concerned in the affairs of Mr Harding that it would have been odd if Mr Harding's daughters had not talked about him. Mrs Grantly was soon abusing him which she did with her whole heart, and Mrs Bold was nearly as eager to defend him. She positively disliked the man, would have been delighted to have learned that he had taken himself off so she'd never see him again, had indeed almost a fear of him, and yet she constantly found herself taking his part. The abuse of other people and abuse of a nature that she felt to be unjust imposed this necessity on her, and at last made Mr Slope's defence an habitual course of argument with her. For Mr Slope the conversation turned to the Stanhope's, and Mrs Grantly was listening with some interest to Eleanor's account of the family when it dropped out that Mr Slope had made one of the party What? said the lady of the rectory was Mr Slope there too Eleanor merely replied that such had been the case. Why, Eleanor he must be very fond of you, I think he seems to follow you everywhere. Even this did not open Eleanor's eyes. She merely laughed and said that she imagined Mr Slope found other attractions at Dr Stanhope's, and so they parted. Mrs Grantly felt quite convinced that the odious match would take place, and Mrs Bold as convinced that the unfortunate chaplain, disagreeable as he must be allowed to be, was more sinned against than sinning. The Archdeacon, of course, heard before dinner that Eleanor had remained the day before in Barchester, with the view of meeting Mr Slope and that she had so met him. He remembered how she had positively stated that there were to be no guests at the Stanhopes and he did not hesitate to accuse her of deceit. Moreover the fact or rather presumed fact of her being deceitful on such a matter spoke but too plainly in evidence against her as to her imputed crime of receiving Mr Slope as a lover. It feels like me with my situation last year with my sister which is that once she thought that I'd said something that wasn't right about nurses and doctors and which was a nurse and which was a doctor then once she was convinced that I had lied then suddenly she saw lies everywhere thick as grass, black as night Take time to judge be slow to judge and suffer fools gladly I am afraid that anything we can do will be too late, said the archdeacon. I own I am fairly surprised I never liked your sister's taste with regard to men, but still I do not give her credit for Ugh And soon too, said Mrs Grantly, who thought more perhaps of her sister's indecorum indecorum indecorum in having a lover before she had put off her weeds than her bad taste in having such a lover as Mr Slope Well my dear I shall be sorry to be harsh or to do anything that can hurt your father, but positively neither that man nor his wife shall come within my doors. Mrs Grantly sighed and then attempted to console herself and her lord by remarking that after all the thing was not accomplished yet. Now that Eleanor was at Plumstead much might be done to wean her from her fatal passion poor Eleanor The evening passed off without anything I have to say I've got a golden labrador here with a pink, dark pink nose, very dark eyes and she's licking her lips and looking at me forlornly but earlier today she pulled off the side of the counter in the kitchen a complete packet of digestive biscuits I'm okay I'd had maybe five of them not all in one go. Nearly but not quite anyway I'd had about five of them and I came in and the packet was on the floor and she was licking the packet. Dogs always make the terrible thiefs because they leave they're not very good at covering up after them are you? And I'm stroking her now and she's wondering why she had so small a supper and she just wants more treats but if we're not careful she's going to be chubby and we can't have that 'cause she's only a puppy and that would be terrible. In fact when her husband comes back tomorrow I'm gonna ask him if he thinks the puppy looks a bit chubby. Ha right, shall I promise not to interrupt again? We're on fifty seven minutes. Let me make a promise that I'm not gonna interrupt again and I just hope you don't mind All right so the evening passed off without anything to make it remarkable what do you think Scout? Oops Mr Arabin discussed the parish of Snuald with the archdeacon and Mrs Grantly and Mr Harding who knew the parsonages personages of the parish joined in. Eleanor also knew them but she said little Mr Arabin did not apparently take much notice of her and she was not in a humour to receive at that time with any special grace any special favourite of her brother in law. Her first idea on reaching her bedroom was that a much pleasanter family party might be met at Dr Stanhope's than at the rectory. She began to think that she was getting tired of clergymen and their respectable humdrum, wearisome mode of living and that after all people in the outer world who had lived in Italy, London or elsewhere need not necessarily be regarded as atrocious and abominable. The Stanhopes, she had thought, were a giddy, thoughtless, extravagant set of people, but she had seen nothing wrong about them, and had, on the other hand, found that they thoroughly knew how to make their house agreeable. It was a thousand pities, she thought, that the archdeacon should not have a little of the same savoir fare. Mr Arabin, as we have said, did not apparently take much notice of her, and yet he did not go to bed without feeling that he had been in company with a very pretty woman, and as is the case with most bachelors and some married men, regarded the prospect of his month's visit at Plumstead in a much pleasanter light when he learnt that a very pretty woman was to share it with him. Scout's actually it's like she's reading the book she's a min she's right near the microphone. She's looking at the book and she's concentrating on it, aren't you? I just wish you could snuffle or something to let people know you're there. Ah, you want to bite it, don't you? It's all fairy and interesting. Say hello, have a little whimper shall I poke you with a pin so you do a little yelp Before they all retired it was settled that the whole party should drive over the following day to inspect the parsonage at St. Ewald. The three clergymen were to discuss dilapidations and the two ladies were to lend their assistance in suggesting such changes as might be necessary for a bachelor's abode. Accordingly soon after breakfast the carriage was at the door there was only room for four inside and the archdeacon got upon the box. Eleanor found herself opposite Mr Arabin and was therefore in a manner forced into conversation with him. They were soon on comfortable terms together, and had she thought about it she would have thought that in spite of his black cloth Mr Arabin would not have been a bad addition to the Stanhope family party I've now got a great galumpha on my lap. Now that the archdeacon was away they could all trifle Mr Harding began telling them in the most innocent manner imaginable an old legend about Mr Arabin's new parish there was, he says, in days of yore, an illustrious priestess of St. Yorde, famed throughout the whole country for curing all manner of diseases. She had a well as all priestesses ever have had, which well was which well was that's interesting just thinking about wells, then it makes me wonder about the origin of the sort of witch and the cauldron what do you think? Because imagine okay so we imagine holy ladies and we've read enough the life of saints in this podcast to know that they were all virgins alas and they were all well often they wanted to be unmarried and they were martyred and so on but also crucially they were they lived near wells or springs and I wonder wells if you think about it hauling up a bucket and then if you were to haul up a bucket that was metal you'd put it over a fire and hence your cauldron so there's got to be a link with all that do you think we should do a little bit of finding out so okay so there was a priestess curing all manner of diseases she had a well and share and shared in the minds of many of the people the sanctity which belonged to the consecrated ground of the parish church. Mr Arabin declared that he should look on such tenets on the part of his parishioners as anything but orthodox, and Mrs Grantly replied that she so entirely disagreed with him as to think that no parish was in a proper state that had not its priestess as well as its priest. The duties are never well done, said she, unless they are so divided. I suppose, papa, said Eleanor, that in the olden times the priestess bore all the sway herself. Mr Arabin perhaps thinks that such might be too much the case now if a sacred lady were admitted within the parish. I think at any rate, said he, that it is safer to run no such risk no priestly pride has ever exceeded that of sacredal females a very lowly curate I might perhaps essay to rule, but a curatess would be sure to get the better of me. There are certain examples of such accidents happening, said Mrs Grantly they do say that there is a priestess at Barchester who is very imperious in all things touching the altar perhaps the fear of such a fate as that is that is before your eyes. When they were joined by the archdeacon on the gravel before the vicarage they descended again to grave dullness not that Archdeacon Grantly was a dull man, but his frolic humours were of a cumbrous kind, and his wit, when he was witty, did not generally extend itself to his auditory. On the present occasion he was soon making speeches about wounded roofs and walls, which he declared to be in want of some surgeon's art. There was not a partition that he did not tap, nor a block of chimneys that he did not narrowly examine all water pipes, flues, cisterns and sewers underwent an investigation, and he even descended in the care of his friend, so far as bef as bore sundry boards in the floors with a bradall so spelt B R A D A W L a Bradall Mr Arabin accompanied him through the rooms trying to look wise in such domestic matters and the other three also followed. Mrs Grantly showed that she had not herself been priestess of a parish twenty years for nothing, and examined the bells and window panes in a very knowing way. You will at any rate have a very beautiful prospect out of your window if this is to be your private sanctum, said Eleanor. She was standing at the lattice of a little room upstairs, from which the view certainly was very lovely. It was from the back of the vicarage and there was nothing to interrupt the eye between the house and the glorious grey pile of the cathedral. The intermediate ground however was beautifully studded with timber. In the immediate foreground ran the little river which afterwards skirted the city, and just to the right of the cathedral the pointed gables and chimneys of Hiram's hospital peeped out of the elms which encompass it. Yes, said he, joining her, I shall have a beautifully complete view of my adversaries I shall sit down before the hostile town and fire away at them in a very pleasant distance. I shall just be able to lodge a shot in the hospital should the enemy ever get possession of it, and as for the palace I have it within full range. I never saw anything like you clergyman, said Eleanor you're always thinking of fighting each other. Either that, said he, or else supporting each other the pity is that we cannot do the one without the other but are we not here to fight? Is not ours a church militant? What is all our work but fighting and hard fighting if it be well done Son, but not with each other. That's as maybe, the same complaint which you make of me for battling with another clergyman of our own church, the Mohammedan would make against me for battling with the error of a priest of Rome, yet surely you would not be inclined to say that I should be wrong to do battle with such as him. A pagan too, with his multiplicity of gods, would think it equally odd that the Christian and the Mohammedan should disagree. Ah, but you wage your wars about trifles so bitterly. Wars about trifles, said he, are always bitter, especially among neighbours. When the differences are great and the parties comparative strangers, men quarrel with courtesy, so true. What combatants are ever so eager as two brothers? Say true. But do not such contentions bring scandal on the church? More scandal would fall on the church if there were no such contentions. We have but one way to avoid them, that of acknowledging a common head of our church, whose word on all points of doctrine shall be authoritative. Such a termination of our difficulties is alluring enough. It has charms which are irresistible to many, and all but irresistible, I own, to me. You speak now of the Church of Rome, said Eleanor. No, said he, not necessarily the Church of Rome, but of a church with a head. Had it pleased God to vouchsafe to us such a church, our path would have been easy, but easy paths have not been thought good for us. He paused and stood silent for a while, thinking of the time when he had so nearly sacrificed all he had, his powers of mind, his free agency, the fresh running waters of his mind's fountain, his very inner self for an easy path in which no fighting would be needed. And then he continued. What you say is partly true. Our contentions do bring on us some scandal. The outer world, though it constantly reviles us for our human infirmities, and throws in our teeth the fact that being clergymen we are still no more than men, demands of us that we should do our work with godlike perfection. There is nothing godlike above about us. We differ from each other with the acerbity common to man. We triumph over each other with human frailty, we allow differences on subjects of divine origin to produce among us antipathies and enities which are anything but divine. This is all true, but what would you have in place of it? There is no infallible head for a church on earth. This dream of believing man has been tried, and we see in Italy and in Spain what has become of it. Grant that there are and have been no bickerings within the pale of the Pope's church. Such an assumption would be utterly untrue, but let us grant it, and then let us say which church has incurred the heaviest scandals. There was a quiet earnestness about Mr Arabin, as he half acknowledged and half defended himself from the charge brought against him, which surprised Eleanor. She had been used all her life to listen to clerical discussion, but the points at issue between the disputants had so seldom been of more than temporal significance as to have left on her mind no feeling of reverence for any of the subjects. There had always been a hard worldly leaven of the love, either of income or of power in the strains that she had heard. There had been no panting for the truth, no aspirations after religious purity. It had always been taken for granted by those around her that they were indubitably right, that there was no ground for doubt, that the hard uphill work of ascertaining what the duty of a clergyman should be had already been accomplished in full, and that what remained for an active militant parson to do was to hold his own against all comers. Her father, it is true, was an exception to this, but then he was so essentially anti militant in all things that she clasped him in her own mind apart from all others. She had never argued the matter within herself or considered whether this common tone was or was not faulty, but she was sick of it without knowing that she was so, and now she found to her surprise, and not without a certain pleasurable excitement, that this newcomer among them spoke in a manner very different from that to which she was accustomed. It is so easy to condemn, said he, continuing the thread of his thoughts, I know no life that must be so delicious as that of a writer for newspapers or a leading member of the opposition, to thunder forth accusations against men in power, show up the worst side of everything that is produced. To pick holes in every coat, to be so that's where that phrase comes from, to pick holes in every coat, so to look at a coat and to find holes everywhere in it, to be indignant, sarcastic, jocose, moral or supercilious, to damn with faint praise or crush with open calumny. What can be so easy as this when the critic has to be responsible for nothing? You condemn what I do, but put yourself in my position and do the reverse, and then see if I cannot condemn you. Oh, Mr Arabin, I do not condemn you. Pardon me, you do, Mrs. Bold, you as one of the world, you are now the opposition member, you are now composing your leading article, and well and bitterly you do it. Let dogs delight to bark and bite, you fitly begin with an elegant quotation. But if we are to have a church at all in heaven's name, let the pastors who preside over it keep their hands from each other's throats. Lawyers can live without befouling each other's names, doctors do not fight jewels. Why is it that clergymen alone should indulge themselves in such unrestrained liberty of abuse against each other? And so you go on reviling us for our ungodly quarrels, our sectarian propensities, and scandalous differences. It will, however, give you no trouble to write another article next week, in which we are, or some of us, shall be twitted with an unseemly apathy in matters of our vocation. It will not fall on you to reconcile the discrepancy. Your readers will never ask you how the poor parson is to be urgent in season and out of season, and yet never come in contact with men who think widely different from him. You, when you condemn this foreign treaty or that official arrangement, will have to incur no blame for the graver faults of any different measure. It is so easy to condemn, and so pleasant too, for eulogy charms no listeners, as detraction does. Eleanor only half followed him in his railery, but she caught his meaning. I know I ought to apologise for presuming to criticise you, she said, but I was thinking with sorrow of the ill will that has lately come among us at Barchester, and I spoke more freely than I should have done. Peace on earth and good will among men are, like heaven, promises for the future, said he, following rather his own thoughts than hers. When that prophecy is accomplished, there will no longer be any need for clergymen. Here they were interrupted by the archdeacon, whose voice was heard from the cellar, shouting to the vicar Arabin, Arabin and then turning to his wife, who was apparently at his elbow, where's he gone to? This cellar is perfectly abominable. It would be murder to put a bottle of wine into it till it's been roofed, wooled and floored. How on earth old Goodenough ever got on with it, I cannot guess. But then Goodenough never had a glass of wine that any man could drink. Ah, but was the wine good enough? his wife asked. Sorry, that's me. What is it, Archdeacon? said the vicar, running downstairs and leaving Eleanor above to her meditations. This cellar must be roofed, walled and floored, repeated the archdeacon. Now, mind what I say, and don't let the architect persuade you that it will do. Half of these fellows know nothing about wine. This place, as it is now, would be damp and cold in winter, and hot and muggy in summer. I wouldn't give a straw for the best wine that was ever vented after it had lain here a couple of years. Mr Arabin assented and promised that the cellar should be reconstructed, according to the archdeacon's receipt. And Arag Arabin, look here, was such an attempt at a kitchen grate ever seen? The grate is really very bad, said Mrs. Grantly. I am sure the priestess won't approve of it when she is brought home to the scene of her future duties. Really, Mr Arabin, no priestess accompan accustomed to such an excellent well as that above could put up with such a grate as this. If there must be a priestess at St. Ewald's at all, Mrs. Grantly, I think we will leave her to her well, and not cool her down, cool down her divine wrath on any of the imperfections rising from our human poverty. However, I own I am amenable to the attractions of a well cooked dinner, and the great shall certainly be changed. By this time the archdeacon had again ascended and was now in the dining room. Arabin, said he, speaking in his usual loud, clear voice, and with that tone of dictation which was so common to him, you must positively alter this dining room, that is, remodel it altogether. Look here it is just sixteen feet by fifteen. Did anybody ever hear of a dining room of such proportions? And the archdeacon stepped the room long ways and crossways with ponderous steps, as though a certain amount of ecclesiastical dignity could be imparted, even to such an occupation as that by the manner of doing it. Barely sixteen, you may call it a square. It would do very well for a round table, suggested the ex warden. Now there was something peculiarly unorthodox in the archdeacon's estimation in the idea of a round table. He had always been accustomed to a goodly board of decent length, comfortably elongating itself according to the number of the guests, nearly black with perpetual rubbing and as bright as a mirror. Now round dinner tables are generally of oak, or else of such new construction as not to have acquired the peculiar hue which was so pleasing to him. He connected them with what he called the nasty new fangled method of leaving a cloth on the table, as though to warn people that they were not to sit long. In his eyes there was something democratic and parvenue in a round table. He imagined that dissenters and calico printers chiefly used them, and perhaps a few literary lions, more conspicuous for their wit than their gentility. He was a little flurried at the idea of such an article being introduced into the diocese by a protege of his own and at the instigation of his father in law. A round dinner table, said he, with some heat, is the most abominable article of furniture that ever was invented. I hope that Arabin has more taste than to allow such a thing in his house. Poor Mr Harding felt himself completely snubbed, and of course said nothing further, but Mr Arabin, who had yielded submissively in the small matters of the cellar and kitchen grate, found himself obliged to oppose reforms which might be of a nature too expensive for his pocket. But it seems to me, Archdeacon, that I can't very well lengthen the room without pulling down the wall, and if I pull down the wool, I must build it up again, and then if I throw out a bow on this side, I must do the same on the other. Then if I do it for the ground floor, I must carry it up to the top floor. That will be putting a new front to the house and will cost, I suppose, a couple of hundred pounds. The ecclesiastical commissioners will hardly assist me when they hear that my grievance consists in having a dining room only sixteen feet long. The archdeacon proceeded to explain that nothing would be easier than adding six feet to the front of the dining room without touching any other of the house. Such irregularities of construction in small country houses were, he said, rather graceful than otherwise, and he offered to pay for the whole thing. Out of his own pocket, if it cost more than forty pounds. Mr Arabin, however, was firm, and although the archdeacon fussed and fumed about it, would not give way. Forty pounds, he said, was a matter of serious moment to him, and his friends, if under such circumstances they would be good natured enough to come to him at all, must put up with the misery of a square room. He was willing to compromise matters by disclaiming any intention of having a round table. But, said Mrs. Grantly, what if the priestess insists on having both the rooms enlarged? The priestess, in that case, must do it for herself, Mrs. Grantly. I have no doubt she may be well able to do so, replied the lady, to do that and many more wonderful things. I am quite sure that the priestess of St. Ewald, when she does come, won't be empty handed. Mr Arabin, however, did not appear well inclined to enter into speculative expenses on such a chance as this, and therefore any material alterations in the house, the cost of which could not be fairly made to lie at the door, either of the ecclesiastical commissioners or of the estate of the late incumbent, were tabooed. With this essential exception, the archdeacon ordered, suggested, and carried all points before him in a manner very much to his own satisfaction. A close observer, had there been one there, might have seen that his wife had been quite as useful in the matter as himself. No one knew better than Mrs. Grantly the pertinences necessary to a comfortable house. She did not, however, think it necessary to lay claim to any of the glory which her lord and master was so ready to appropriate as his own. Having gone through their work effectually and systematically, the party returned to Plumstead, well satisfied with their expedition. And the next chapter is chapter 22 The Thorns of Uloth Ulothorn. Should we call it Ula Thorn? Hmm. I'll take some advice, and with that, a very, very good Friday evening. Good night.