MR. MAINWARING'S LITTLE DINNER.
The company at the rector's house consisted of the Senator, the
two Mortons, Mr. Surtees the curate, and old Doctor Nupper. Mrs.
Mainwaring was not well enough to appear, and the rector therefore
was able to indulge himself in what he called a bachelor party. As a
rule he disliked clergymen, but at the last had been driven to invite
his curate because he thought six a better number than five for
joviality. He began by asking questions as to the Trefoils which were
not very fortunate. Of course he had heard that Morton was to marry
Arabella Trefoil, and though he made no direct allusion to the fact,
as Reginald had done, he spoke in that bland eulogistic tone which
clearly showed his purpose. "They went with you to Lord Rufford's, I
was told."
"Yes;--they did."
"And now they have left the neighbourhood. A very clever young lady,
Miss Trefoil;--and so is her mother, a very clever woman." The
Senator, to whom a sort of appeal was made, nodded his assent. "Lord
Augustus, I believe, is a brother of the Duke of Mayfair?"
"Yes, he is," said Morton. "I am afraid we are going to have frost
again." Then Reginald Morton was sure that the marriage would never
take place.
"The Trefoils are a very distinguished family," continued the rector.
"I remember the present Duke's father when he was in the cabinet,
and knew this man almost intimately when we were at Christchurch
together. I don't think this Duke ever took a prominent part in
politics."
"I don't know that he ever did," said Morton.
"Dear, dear, how tipsy he was once driving back to Oxford with me in
a gig. But he has the reputation of being one of the best landlords
in the country now."
"I wonder what it is that gives a man the reputation of being a good
landlord. Is it foxes?" asked the Senator. The rector acknowledged
with a smile that foxes helped. "Or does it mean that he lets his
land below the value? If so, he certainly does more harm than good,
though he may like the popularity which he is rich enough to buy."
"It means that he does not exact more than his due," said the rector
indiscreetly.
"When I hear a man so highly praised for common honesty I am of
course led to suppose that dishonesty in his particular trade is
the common rule. The body of English landlords must be exorbitant
tyrants when one among them is so highly eulogised for taking no more
than his own." Luckily at that moment dinner was announced, and the
exceptional character of the Duke of Mayfair was allowed to drop.
Mr. Mainwaring's dinner was very good and his wines were
excellent,--a fact of which Mr. Mainwaring himself was much better
aware than any of his guests. There is a difficulty in the giving
of dinners of which Mr. Mainwaring and some other hosts have become
painfully aware. What service do you do to any one in pouring your
best claret down his throat, when he knows no difference between that
and a much more humble vintage,--your best claret which you feel so
sure you cannot replace? Why import canvas-back ducks for appetites
which would be quite as well satisfied with those out of the next
farm-yard? Your soup, which has been a care since yesterday, your
fish, got down with so great trouble from Bond Street on that very
day, your saddle of mutton, in selecting which you have affronted
every butcher in the neighbourhood, are all plainly thrown away! And
yet the hospitable hero who would fain treat his friends as he would
be treated himself can hardly arrange his dinners according to the
palates of his different guests; nor will he like, when strangers sit
at his board, to put nothing better on his table than that cheaper
wine with which needful economy induces him to solace himself when
alone. I,--I who write this,--have myself seen an honoured guest
deluge with the pump my, ah! so hardly earned, most scarce and most
peculiar vintage! There is a pang in such usage which some will not
understand, but which cut Mr. Mainwaring to the very soul. There was
not one among them there who appreciated the fact that the claret
on his dinner table was almost the best that its year had produced.
It was impossible not to say a word on such a subject at such a
moment;--though our rector was not a man who usually lauded his
own viands. "I think you will find that claret what you like, Mr.
Gotobed," he said. "It's a '57 Mouton, and judges say that it is
good."
"Very good indeed," said the Senator. "In the States we haven't got
into the way yet of using dinner clarets." It was as good as a play
to see the rector wince under the ignominious word. "Your great
statesman added much to your national comfort when he took the duty
off the lighter kinds of French wines."
The rector could not stand it. He hated light wines. He hated cheap
things in general. And he hated Gladstone in particular. "Nothing,"
said he, "that the statesman you speak of ever did could make such
wine as that any cheaper. I am sorry, sir, that you don't perceive
the difference."
"In the matter of wine," said the Senator, "I don't think that I have
happened to come across anything so good in this country as our old
Madeiras. But then, sir, we have been fortunate in our climate. The
English atmosphere is not one in which wine seems to reach its full
perfection." The rector heaved a deep sigh as he looked up to the
ceiling with his hands in his trowsers-pockets. He knew, or thought
that he knew, that no one could ever get a glass of good wine in the
United States. He knew, or thought that he knew, that the best wine
in the world was brought to England. He knew, or thought he knew,
that in no other country was wine so well understood, so diligently
sought for, and so truly enjoyed as in England. And he imagined that
it was less understood and less sought for and less enjoyed in the
States than in any other country. He did not as yet know the Senator
well enough to fight with him at his own table, and could only groan
and moan and look up at the ceiling. Doctor Nupper endeavoured to
take away the sting by smacking his lips, and Reginald Morton, who
did not in truth care a straw what he drank, was moved to pity and
declared the claret to be very fine. "I have nothing to say against
it," said the Senator, who was not in the least abashed.
But when the cloth was drawn,--for the rector clung so lovingly to
old habits that he delighted to see his mahogany beneath the wine
glasses,--a more serious subject of dispute arose suddenly, though
perhaps hardly more disagreeable. "The thing in England," said the
Senator, "which I find most difficult to understand, is the matter of
what you call Church patronage."
"If you'll pass half an hour with Mr. Surtees to-morrow morning,
he'll explain it all to you," said the rector, who did not like that
any subject connected with his profession should be mooted after
dinner.
"I should be delighted," said Mr. Surtees.
"Nothing would give me more pleasure," said the Senator; "but what
I mean is this;--the question is, of course, one of paramount
importance."
"No doubt it is," said the deluded rector.
"It is very necessary to get good doctors."
"Well, yes, rather;--considering that all men wish to live." That
observation, of course, came from Doctor Nupper.
"And care is taken in employing a lawyer,--though, after my
experience of yesterday, not always, I should say, so much care as is
needful. The man who wants such aid looks about him and gets the best
doctor he can for his money, or the best lawyer. But here in England
he must take the clergyman provided for him."
"It would be very much better for him if he did," said the rector.
"A clergyman at any rate is supposed to be appointed; and that
clergyman he must pay."
"Not at all," said the rector. "The clergy are paid by the wise
provision of former ages."
"We will let that pass for the present," said the Senator. "There he
is, however he may be paid. How does he get there?" Now it was the
fact that Mr. Mainwaring's living had been bought for him with his
wife's money,--a fact of which Mr. Gotobed was not aware, but which
he would hardly have regarded had he known it. "How does he get
there?"
"In the majority of cases the bishop puts him there," said Mr.
Surtees.
"And how is the bishop governed in his choice? As far as I can learn
the stipends are absurdly various, one man getting £100 a year for
working like a horse in a big town, and another £1000 for living an
idle life in a luxurious country house. But the bishop of course
gives the bigger plums to the best men. How is it then that the big
plums find their way so often to the sons and sons-in-law and nephews
of the bishops?"
"Because the bishop has looked after their education and principles,"
said the rector.
"And taught them how to choose their wives," said the Senator with
imperturbable gravity.
"I am not the son of a bishop, sir," exclaimed the rector.
"I wish you had been, sir, if it would have done you any good. A
general can't make his son a colonel at the age of twenty-five, or
an admiral his son a first lieutenant, or a judge his a Queen's
Counsellor,--nor can the head of an office promote his to be a chief
secretary. It is only a bishop can do this;--I suppose because a cure
of souls is so much less important than the charge of a ship or the
discipline of twenty or thirty clerks."
"The bishops don't do it," said the rector fiercely.
"Then the statistics which have been put into my hands belie them.
But how is it with those the bishops don't appoint? There seems to me
to be such a complication of absurdities as to defy explanation."
"I think I could explain them all," said Mr. Surtees mildly.
"If you can do so satisfactorily, I shall be very glad to hear it,"
continued the Senator, who seemed in truth to be glad to hear no one
but himself. "A lad of one-and-twenty learns his lessons so well
that he has to be rewarded at his college, and a part of his reward
consists in his having a parish entrusted to him when he is forty
years old, to which he can maintain his right whether he be in any
way trained for such work or no. Is that true?"
"His collegiate education is the best training he can have," said the
rector.
"I came across a young fellow the other day," continued the Senator,
"in a very nice house, with £700 a year, and learned that he had
inherited the living because he was his father's second son. Some
poor clergyman had been keeping it ready for him for the last fifteen
years and had to turn out as soon as this young spark could be made a
clergyman."
"It was his father's property," said the rector, "and the poor man
had had great kindness shown him for those fifteen years."
"Exactly;--his father's property! And this is what you call a cure of
souls! And another man had absolutely had his living bought for him
by his uncle,--just as he might have bought him a farm. He couldn't
have bought him the command of a regiment or a small judgeship. In
those matters you require capacity. It is only when you deal with the
Church that you throw to the winds all ideas of fitness. 'Sir,' or
'Madam,' or perhaps, 'my little dear,' you are bound to come to your
places in Church and hear me expound the Word of God because I have
paid a heavy sum of money for the privilege of teaching you, at the
moderate salary of £600 a year!'"
Mr. Surtees sat aghast, with his mouth open, and knew not how to say
a word. Doctor Nupper rubbed his red nose. Reginald Morton attempted
some suggestion about the wine which fell wretchedly flat. John
Morton ventured to tell his friend that he did not understand the
subject. "I shall be most happy to be instructed," said the Senator.
"Understand it!" said the rector, almost rising in his chair to
rebuke the insolence of his guest--"He understands nothing about
it, and yet he ventures to fall foul with unmeasured terms on an
establishment which has been brought to its present condition by the
fostering care of perhaps the most pious set of divines that ever
lived, and which has produced results with which those of no other
Church can compare!"
"Have I represented anything untruly?" asked the Senator.
"A great deal, sir."
"Only put me right, and no man will recall his words more readily. Is
it not the case that livings in the Church of England can be bought
and sold?"
"The matter is one, sir," said the rector, "which cannot be discussed
in this manner. There are two clergymen present to whom such language
is distasteful; as it is also I hope to the others who are all
members of the Church of England. Perhaps you will allow me to
request that the subject may be changed." After that conversation
flagged and the evening was by no means joyous. The rector certainly
regretted that his "'57" claret should have been expended on such a
man. "I don't think," said he when John Morton had taken the Senator
away, "that in my whole life before I ever met such a brute as that
American Senator."