E-text prepared by Jo Churcher, Scarborough, Ontario,
and revised by Joseph E. Loewenstein, M.D.
THE WARDEN
by
Anthony Trollope
CONTENTS
I. Hiram's Hospital
II. The Barchester Reformer
III. The Bishop of Barchester
IV. Hiram's Bedesmen
V. Dr Grantly Visits the Hospital
VI. The Warden's Tea Party
VII. _The Jupiter_
VIII. Plumstead Episcopi
IX. The Conference
X. Tribulation
XI. Iphigenia
XII. Mr Bold's Visit to Plumstead
XIII. The Warden's Decision
XIV. Mount Olympus
XV. Tom Towers, Dr Anticant, and Mr Sentiment
XVI. A Long Day in London
XVII. Sir Abraham Haphazard
XVIII. The Warden Is Very Obstinate
XIX. The Warden Resigns
XX. Farewell
XXI. Conclusion
Chapter I
HIRAM'S HOSPITAL
The Rev. Septimus Harding was, a few years since, a beneficed
clergyman residing in the cathedral town of ----; let us call it
Barchester. Were we to name Wells or Salisbury, Exeter, Hereford, or
Gloucester, it might be presumed that something personal was intended;
and as this tale will refer mainly to the cathedral dignitaries of the
town in question, we are anxious that no personality may be suspected.
Let us presume that Barchester is a quiet town in the West of England,
more remarkable for the beauty of its cathedral and the antiquity of
its monuments than for any commercial prosperity; that the west end
of Barchester is the cathedral close, and that the aristocracy of
Barchester are the bishop, dean, and canons, with their respective
wives and daughters.
Early in life Mr Harding found himself located at Barchester. A fine
voice and a taste for sacred music had decided the position in which
he was to exercise his calling, and for many years he performed the
easy but not highly paid duties of a minor canon. At the age of forty
a small living in the close vicinity of the town increased both his
work and his income, and at the age of fifty he became precentor of
the cathedral.
Mr Harding had married early in life, and was the father of two
daughters. The eldest, Susan, was born soon after his marriage; the
other, Eleanor, not till ten years later.
At the time at which we introduce him to our readers he was living as
precentor at Barchester with his youngest daughter, then twenty-four
years of age; having been many years a widower, and having married his
eldest daughter to a son of the bishop a very short time before his
installation to the office of precentor.
Scandal at Barchester affirmed that had it not been for the beauty of
his daughter, Mr Harding would have remained a minor canon; but here
probably Scandal lied, as she so often does; for even as a minor canon
no one had been more popular among his reverend brethren in the close
than Mr Harding; and Scandal, before she had reprobated Mr Harding for
being made precentor by his friend the bishop, had loudly blamed the
bishop for having so long omitted to do something for his friend Mr
Harding. Be this as it may, Susan Harding, some twelve years since,
had married the Rev. Dr Theophilus Grantly, son of the bishop,
archdeacon of Barchester, and rector of Plumstead Episcopi, and her
father became, a few months later, precentor of Barchester Cathedral,
that office being, as is not unusual, in the bishop's gift.
Now there are peculiar circumstances connected with the precentorship
which must be explained. In the year 1434 there died at Barchester
one John Hiram, who had made money in the town as a wool-stapler, and
in his will he left the house in which he died and certain meadows and
closes near the town, still called Hiram's Butts, and Hiram's Patch,
for the support of twelve superannuated wool-carders, all of whom
should have been born and bred and spent their days in Barchester; he
also appointed that an alms-house should be built for their abode,
with a fitting residence for a warden, which warden was also to
receive a certain sum annually out of the rents of the said butts and
patches. He, moreover, willed, having had a soul alive to harmony,
that the precentor of the cathedral should have the option of being
also warden of the almshouses, if the bishop in each case approved.
From that day to this the charity had gone on and prospered--at least,
the charity had gone on, and the estates had prospered. Wool-carding
in Barchester there was no longer any; so the bishop, dean, and
warden, who took it in turn to put in the old men, generally
appointed some hangers-on of their own; worn-out gardeners, decrepit
grave-diggers, or octogenarian sextons, who thankfully received a
comfortable lodging and one shilling and fourpence a day, such being
the stipend to which, under the will of John Hiram, they were declared
to be entitled. Formerly, indeed,--that is, till within some fifty
years of the present time,--they received but sixpence a day, and
their breakfast and dinner was found them at a common table by the
warden, such an arrangement being in stricter conformity with the
absolute wording of old Hiram's will: but this was thought to be
inconvenient, and to suit the tastes of neither warden nor bedesmen,
and the daily one shilling and fourpence was substituted with the
common consent of all parties, including the bishop and the
corporation of Barchester.
Such was the condition of Hiram's twelve old men when Mr Harding was
appointed warden; but if they may be considered as well-to-do in the
world according to their condition, the happy warden was much more so.
The patches and butts which, in John Hiram's time, produced hay or fed
cows, were now covered with rows of houses; the value of the property
had gradually increased from year to year and century to century, and
was now presumed by those who knew anything about it, to bring in
a very nice income; and by some who knew nothing about it, to have
increased to an almost fabulous extent.
The property was farmed by a gentleman in Barchester, who also acted
as the bishop's steward,--a man whose father and grandfather had been
stewards to the bishops of Barchester, and farmers of John Hiram's
estate. The Chadwicks had earned a good name in Barchester; they
had lived respected by bishops, deans, canons, and precentors; they
had been buried in the precincts of the cathedral; they had never
been known as griping, hard men, but had always lived comfortably,
maintained a good house, and held a high position in Barchester
society. The present Mr Chadwick was a worthy scion of a worthy
stock, and the tenants living on the butts and patches, as well as
those on the wide episcopal domains of the see, were well pleased to
have to do with so worthy and liberal a steward.
For many, many years,--records hardly tell how many, probably from
the time when Hiram's wishes had been first fully carried out,--the
proceeds of the estate had been paid by the steward or farmer to the
warden, and by him divided among the bedesmen; after which division
he paid himself such sums as became his due. Times had been when the
poor warden got nothing but his bare house, for the patches had been
subject to floods, and the land of Barchester butts was said to be
unproductive; and in these hard times the warden was hardly able to
make out the daily dole for his twelve dependents. But by degrees
things mended; the patches were drained, and cottages began to
rise upon the butts, and the wardens, with fairness enough, repaid
themselves for the evil days gone by. In bad times the poor men had
had their due, and therefore in good times they could expect no more.
In this manner the income of the warden had increased; the picturesque
house attached to the hospital had been enlarged and adorned, and
the office had become one of the most coveted of the snug clerical
sinecures attached to our church. It was now wholly in the bishop's
gift, and though the dean and chapter, in former days, made a stand
on the subject, they had thought it more conducive to their honour
to have a rich precentor appointed by the bishop, than a poor one
appointed by themselves. The stipend of the precentor of Barchester
was eighty pounds a year. The income arising from the wardenship of
the hospital was eight hundred, besides the value of the house.
Murmurs, very slight murmurs, had been heard in Barchester,--few
indeed, and far between,--that the proceeds of John Hiram's property
had not been fairly divided: but they can hardly be said to have been
of such a nature as to have caused uneasiness to anyone: still the
thing had been whispered, and Mr Harding had heard it. Such was his
character in Barchester, so universal was his popularity, that the
very fact of his appointment would have quieted louder whispers
than those which had been heard; but Mr Harding was an open-handed,
just-minded man, and feeling that there might be truth in what had
been said, he had, on his instalment, declared his intention of adding
twopence a day to each man's pittance, making a sum of sixty-two
pounds eleven shillings and fourpence, which he was to pay out of
his own pocket. In doing so, however, he distinctly and repeatedly
observed to the men, that though he promised for himself, he could not
promise for his successors, and that the extra twopence could only
be looked on as a gift from himself, and not from the trust. The
bedesmen, however, were most of them older than Mr Harding, and were
quite satisfied with the security on which their extra income was
based.
This munificence on the part of Mr Harding had not been unopposed.
Mr Chadwick had mildly but seriously dissuaded him from it; and his
strong-minded son-in-law, the archdeacon, the man of whom alone Mr
Harding stood in awe, had urgently, nay, vehemently, opposed so
impolitic a concession: but the warden had made known his intention
to the hospital before the archdeacon had been able to interfere,
and the deed was done.
Hiram's Hospital, as the retreat is called, is a picturesque building
enough, and shows the correct taste with which the ecclesiastical
architects of those days were imbued. It stands on the banks of the
little river, which flows nearly round the cathedral close, being on
the side furthest from the town. The London road crosses the river
by a pretty one-arched bridge, and, looking from this bridge, the
stranger will see the windows of the old men's rooms, each pair of
windows separated by a small buttress. A broad gravel walk runs
between the building and the river, which is always trim and cared
for; and at the end of the walk, under the parapet of the approach to
the bridge, is a large and well-worn seat, on which, in mild weather,
three or four of Hiram's bedesmen are sure to be seen seated. Beyond
this row of buttresses, and further from the bridge, and also further
from the water which here suddenly bends, are the pretty oriel windows
of Mr Harding's house, and his well-mown lawn. The entrance to the
hospital is from the London road, and is made through a ponderous
gateway under a heavy stone arch, unnecessary, one would suppose, at
any time, for the protection of twelve old men, but greatly conducive
to the good appearance of Hiram's charity. On passing through this
portal, never closed to anyone from 6 A.M. till 10 P.M., and never
open afterwards, except on application to a huge, intricately hung
mediæval bell, the handle of which no uninitiated intruder can
possibly find, the six doors of the old men's abodes are seen, and
beyond them is a slight iron screen, through which the more happy
portion of the Barchester elite pass into the Elysium of Mr Harding's
dwelling.
Mr Harding is a small man, now verging on sixty years, but bearing few
of the signs of age; his hair is rather grizzled, though not gray;
his eye is very mild, but clear and bright, though the double glasses
which are held swinging from his hand, unless when fixed upon his
nose, show that time has told upon his sight; his hands are delicately
white, and both hands and feet are small; he always wears a black
frock coat, black knee-breeches, and black gaiters, and somewhat
scandalises some of his more hyperclerical brethren by a black
neck-handkerchief.
Mr Harding's warmest admirers cannot say that he was ever an
industrious man; the circumstances of his life have not called on
him to be so; and yet he can hardly be called an idler. Since his
appointment to his precentorship, he has published, with all possible
additions of vellum, typography, and gilding, a collection of our
ancient church music, with some correct dissertations on Purcell,
Crotch, and Nares. He has greatly improved the choir of Barchester,
which, under his dominion, now rivals that of any cathedral in
England. He has taken something more than his fair share in the
cathedral services, and has played the violoncello daily to such
audiences as he could collect, or, _faute de mieux_, to no audience
at all.
We must mention one other peculiarity of Mr Harding. As we have
before stated, he has an income of eight hundred a year, and has no
family but his one daughter; and yet he is never quite at ease in
money matters. The vellum and gilding of "Harding's Church Music"
cost more than any one knows, except the author, the publisher, and
the Rev. Theophilus Grantly, who allows none of his father-in-law's
extravagances to escape him. Then he is generous to his daughter, for
whose service he keeps a small carriage and pair of ponies. He is,
indeed, generous to all, but especially to the twelve old men who are
in a peculiar manner under his care. No doubt with such an income Mr
Harding should be above the world, as the saying is; but, at any rate,
he is not above Archdeacon Theophilus Grantly, for he is always more
or less in debt to his son-in-law, who has, to a certain extent,
assumed the arrangement of the precentor's pecuniary affairs.