MR ARABIN READS HIMSELF IN AT ST EWOLD'S
On the Sunday morning the archdeacon with his sister-in-law and Mr
Arabin drove over to Ullathorne, as had been arranged. On their way
thither the new vicar declared himself to be considerably disturbed
in his mind at the idea of thus facing his parishioners for the
first time. He had, he said, been always subject to mauvaise honte
and an annoying degree of bashfulness, which often unfitted him for
any work of a novel description; and now he felt this so strongly
that he feared he should acquit himself badly in St Ewold's
reading-desk. He knew, he said, that those sharp little eyes of
Miss Thorne would be on to him, and that they would not approve.
All this the archdeacon greatly ridiculed. He himself knew not, and
had never known, what it was to be shy. He could not conceive that
Miss Thorne, surrounded as she would be by the peasants of
Ullathorne, and a few of the poorer inhabitants of the suburbs of
Barchester, could in any way affect the composure of a man well
accustomed to address the learned congregations of St Mary's at
Oxford, and he laughed accordingly at the idea of Mr Arabin's
modesty.
Thereupon Mr Arabin commenced to subtilise. The change, he said,
from St Mary's to St Ewold's was quite as powerful on the spirits
as would be that from St Ewold's to St Mary's. Would not a peer
who, by chance of fortune, might suddenly be driven to herd among
the navvies be as afraid of the jeers of his companions, as would
any navvy suddenly exalted to a seat among the peers? Whereupon the
archdeacon declared with a loud laugh that he would tell Miss
Thorne that her new minister had likened her to a navvy. Eleanor,
however, pronounced such a conclusion unfair; a comparison might be
very just in its proportions which did not at all assimilate the
things compared. But Mr Arabin went in subtilising, regarding
neither the archdeacon's raillery nor Eleanor's defence. A young
lady, he said, would execute with most perfect self-possession a
difficult piece of music in a room crowded with strangers, who
would not be able to express herself in any intelligible language,
even on any ordinary subject and among her most intimate friends,
if she were required to do so standing on a box somewhat elevated
among them. It was all an affair of education, and he at forty
found it difficult to educate himself now.
Eleanor dissented on the matter of the box; and averred she could
speak very well about dresses, or babies, or legs of mutton from
any box, provided it were big enough for her to stand upon without
fear, even though all her friends were listening to her. The
archdeacon was sure she would not be able to say a word; but this
proved nothing in favour of Mr Arabin. Mr Arabin said that he would
try the question out with Mrs Bold, and get her on a box some day
when the rectory might be full of visitors. To this Eleanor
assented, making condition that the visitors should be of their own
set, and the archdeacon cogitated in his mind, whether by such a
condition it was intended that Mr Slope should be included,
resolving also that, if so, the trial should certainly never take
place in the rectory drawing-room at Plumstead.
And so arguing, they drove up to the iron gates of Ullathorne
Court.
Mr and Miss Thorne were standing ready dressed for church in the
hall, and greeted their clerical visitors with cordiality. The
archdeacon was an old favourite. He was a clergyman of the old
school, and this recommended him to the lady. He had always been an
opponent of free trade as long as free trade was an open question;
and now that it was no longer so, he, being a clergyman, had not
been obliged, like most of his lay Tory companions, to read his
recantation. He could therefore be regarded as a supporter of the
immaculate fifty-three, and was on this account a favourite with Mr
Thorne. The little bell was tinkling, and the rural population were
standing about the lane, leaning on the church stile, and against
the walls of the old court, anxious to get a look at their new
minister as he passed from the house to the rectory. The
archdeacon's servant had already preceded them thither with the
vestments.
They all went together; and when the ladies passed into the church
the three gentlemen tarried a moment in the lane, that Mr Thorne
might name to the vicar with some kind of one-sided introduction,
the most leading among his parishioners.
'Here are our churchwardens, Mr Arabin; Farmer Greenacre and Mr
Stiles. Mr Stiles has the mill as you go into Barchester; and very
good churchwardens they are.'
'Not very severe, I hope,' said Mr Arabin: the two ecclesiastical
officers touched their hats, and each made a leg in the approved
rural fashion, assuring the vicar that they were glad to have the
honour of seeing him, and adding that the weather was very good for
the harvest. Mr Stiles being a man somewhat versed in town life,
had an impression of his own dignity, and did not quite like leaving
his pastor under the erroneous idea that he being a churchwarden
kept the children in order during church time. 'Twas thus he
understood Mr Arabin's allusion to his severity, and hastened to
put matters right by observing that 'Sexton Clodheave looked to the
younguns, and perhaps sometimes there maybe a thought too much
stick going on during sermon.' Mr Arabin's bright eye twinkled as
he caught that of the archdeacon; and he smiled to himself as he
observed how ignorant his officers were of the nature of their
authority, and of the surveillance which it was their duty to keep
even over himself.
Mr Arabin read the lessons and preached. It was enough to put a man
a little out, let him have been ever so used to pulpit reading, to
see the knowing way in which the farmers cocked their ears, and set
about a mental criticism as to whether their new minister did or
did not fall short of the excellence of him who had lately departed
from them. A mental and silent criticism it was for the existing
moment, but soon to be made public among the elders of St Ewold's
over the green graves of their children and forefathers. The
excellence, however, of poor old Mr Goodenough had not been
wonderful, and there were few there who did not deem that Mr Arabin
did his work sufficiently well, in spite of the slightly nervous
affection which at first impeded him, and which nearly drove the
archdeacon beside himself.
But the sermon was the thing to try the man. It often surprises us
that very young men can muster courage to preach for the first time
to a strange congregation. Men who are as yet little more than
boys, who have but just left, what indeed we may not call a school,
but a seminary intended for their tuition as scholars, whose
thoughts have been mostly of boating, cricketing, and wine parties,
ascend a rostrum high above the heads of the submissive crowd, not
that they may read God's word to those below, but that they may
preach their own word for the edification of their hearers. It
seems strange to us that they are not stricken dumb by the new and
awful solemnity of their position. How am I, just turned
twenty-three, who have never yet passed then thoughtful days since
the power of thought first came to me, how am I to instruct these
grey beards, who with the weary thinking of so many years have
approached so near the grave? Can I teach them their duty? Can I
explain to them that which I so imperfectly understand, that which
years of study may have made so plain to them? Has my newly acquired
privileges, as one of God's ministers, imparted to me as yet any
fitness for the wonderful work of a preacher?
It must be supposed that such ideas do occur to young clergymen,
and yet they overcome, apparently with ease, this difficulty which
to us appears to be all but insurmountable. We have never been
subjected in the way of ordination to the power of a bishop's
hands. It may be that there is in them something that sustains the
spirit and banishes the natural modesty of youth. But for ourselves
we must own that the deep affection which Dominie Sampson felt for
his young pupils has not more endeared him to us than the bashful
spirit which sent him mute and inglorious from the pulpit when he
rose there with the futile attempt to preach God's gospel.
There is a rule in our church which forbids the younger order of
our clergymen to perform a certain portion of the service. The
absolution must be read by a minister in priest's orders. If there
be no such minister present, the congregation can have the benefit
of no absolution but that which each may succeed in administering
to himself. The rule may be a good one, though the necessity for it
hardly comes home to the general understanding. But this
forbearance on the part of youth would be much more appreciated if
it were extended likewise to sermons. The only danger would be that
the congregation would be too anxious to prevent their young
clergymen from advancing themselves to the ranks of the ministry.
Clergymen who could not preach would be such blessings that they
would be bribed to adhere to their incompetence.
Mr Arabin, however, had not the modesty of youth to impede him, and
he succeeded with his sermon even better than with the lessons. He
took for his text two verses out of the second epistle of St John:
'Whosoever trangresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ,
hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ he hath
both the Father and Son. If there come any unto you and bring you
not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him
God speed.' He told them that the house of theirs to which he
alluded was this their church in which he now addressed them for
the first time; that their most welcome and proper manner of
bidding him God speed would be their patient obedience to this
teaching of the gospel; but that he could put forward no claim to
such conduct on their part unless he taught them the great
Christian doctrine of works and faith combined. On this he
enlarged, but not very amply, and after twenty minutes succeeded in
sending his new friends home to their baked mutton and pudding well
pleased with their new minister.
Then came the lunch at Ullathorne. As soon as they were in the hall
Miss Thorne took Mr Arabin's hand, and assured him that she
received him into her house, into the temple, she said, in which
she worshipped, and bade him God speed with all her heart. Mr
Arabin was touched, and squeezed the spinster's hand without
uttering a word in reply. Then Mr Thorne expressed a hope that Mr
Arabin found the church easy to fill, and Mr Arabin having replied
that he had no doubt he should do so as soon as he had learnt to
pitch his voice to the building, they all sat down to the good
things before them.
Miss Thorne took special care of Mrs Bold. Eleanor still wore her
widow's weeds, and therefore had about her that air of grave and
sad maternity which is the lot of recent widows. This opened the
soft heart of Miss Thorne, and made her look on her young guest as
though too much could not be done for her. She heaped chicken and
ham upon her plate, and poured out for her a full bumper of port
wine. When Eleanor, who was not sorry to get it, had drunk a little
of it, Miss Thorne at once essayed to fill it again. To this
Eleanor objected, but in vain. Miss Thorne winked and nodded and
whispered, saying that it was the proper thing and must be done,
and that she knew all about it; and so she desired Mrs Bold to
drink it up, and mind any body.
'It is your duty, you know, to support yourself,' she said into the
ear of the young mother; 'there's more than yourself depending on
it;' and thus she coshered up Eleanor with cold fowl and port wine.
How it is that poor men's wives, who have no cold fowl and port
wine on which to be coshered up, nurse their children without
difficulty, whereas the wives of rich men, who eat and drink
everything that is good, cannot do so, we will for the present
leave to the doctors and mothers to settle between them.
And then Miss Thorne was great about teeth. Little Johnny Bold had
been troubled for the last few days with his first incipient
masticator, and with that freemasonry which exists between ladies,
Miss Thorne became aware of the fact before Eleanor had half
finished her wing. The old lady prescribed at once a receipt which
had been much in vogue in the young days of her grandmother, and
warned Eleanor with solemn voice against the fallacies of modern
medicine.
'Take his coral, my dear,' said she, 'and rub it well with
carrot-juice; rub it till the juice dries on it, and then give it
to him to play with--'
'But he hasn't got a coral,' said Eleanor.
'Not got a coral!' said Miss Thorne, with almost angry vehemence.
'Not got a coral!--How can you expect that he should cut his teeth?
Have you got Daffy's Elixir?'
Eleanor explained that she had not. It had not been ordered by Mr
Rerechild, the Barchester doctor whom she employed; and then the
young mother mentioned some shockingly modern succedaneum, which Mr
Rerechild's new lights had taught him to recommend.
Miss Thorne looked awfully severe. 'Take care, my dear,' said she,
'that the man knows what he is about; take care he doesn't destroy
your little boy. 'But'--and her voice softened into sorrow as she
said it, and spoke more in pity than in anger--'but I don't know
who there is in Barchester now that you can trust. Poor dear old Dr
Bumpwell, indeed--'
'Why, Miss Thorne, he died when I was a little girl.'
'Yes, my dear, he did, and an unfortunate day it was for
Barchester. As to those young men that have come up since' (Mr
Rerechild, by the by, was quite as old as Miss Thorne herself),
'one doesn't know where they came from or who they are, or whether
they know anything about their business or not.'
'I think there are very clever men in Barchester,' said Eleanor.
'Perhaps there may be; only I don't know them; and it's admitted on
all sides that medical men aren't now what they used to be. They
used to be talented, observing, educated men. But now any
whipper-snapper out of an apothecary's shop can call himself a
doctor. I believe no kind of education is now thought necessary.'
Eleanor was herself the widow of a medical man, and felt a little
inclined to resent all these hard sayings. But Miss Thorne was so
essentially good-natured that it was impossible to resent anything
she said. She therefore sipped her wine and finished her chicken.
'At any rate, my dear, don't forget the carrot-juice, and by all
means get him a coral at once. My grandmother Thorne had the best
teeth in the county, and carried them to the grave with her at
eighty. I have heard her say it was all the carrot-juice. She
couldn't bear the Barchester doctors. Even poor Dr Bumpwell didn't
please her.' It clearly never occurred to Miss Thorne that some
fifty years ago Dr Bumpwell was only a rising man, and therefore as
much in need of character in the eyes of the then ladies of
Ullathorne, as the present doctors were in her own.
The archdeacon made a very good lunch, and talked to his host about
turnip-drillers and new machines for reaping; while the host,
thinking it only polite to attend to a stranger, and fearing that
perhaps he might not care about turnip crops on a Sunday, mooted
all manner of ecclesiastical subjects.
'I never saw a heavier lot of wheat, Thorne, than you've got there
in the field beyond the copse. I suppose that's guano,' said the
archdeacon.
'Yes, guano. I get it from Bristol myself. You'll find you often
have a tolerable congregation of Barchester people out here, Mr
Arabin. They are very fond of St Ewold's, particularly of an
afternoon, when the weather is not too hot for a walk.'
'I am under an obligation to them for staying away today, at any
rate,' said the vicar. 'The congregation can never be too small for
a maiden sermon.'
'I got a ton and a half at Bradley's in High Street,' said the
archdeacon, 'and it was a complete take in. I don't believe there
was five hundred-weight of guano in it.'
'That Bradley never has anything good,' said Miss Tborne, who had
just caught the name during her whisperings with Eleanor. 'And such
a nice shop as there used to be in that very house before he came.
Wilfred, don't you remember what good things old Ambleoff used to
have?'
'There have been three men since Ambleoff's time,' said the
archdeacon, 'and each as bad as the other. But who gets it for you
at Bristol, Thorne?'
'I ran up myself this year and bought it out of the ship. I am
afraid as the evenings get shorter, Mr Arabin, you'll find the
reading desk too dark. I must send a fellow with an axe and make
him lop off some of those branches.'
Mr Arabin declared that the morning light at any rate was perfect,
and deprecated any interference with the lime trees. And then they
took a stroll out among the trim parterres, and Mr Arabin explained
to Mrs Bold the difference between a naiad and a dryad, and dilated
on vases and the shapes of urns. Miss Thorne busied herself among
the pansies; and her brother, finding it quite impracticable to
give anything of a peculiarly Sunday tone to the conversation,
abandoned the attempt, and had it out with the archdeacon about the
Bristol guano.
At three o'clock they again went into church; and now Mr Arabin
read the service and the archdeacon preached. Nearly the same
congregation was present, with some adventurous pedestrians from
the city, who had not thought the heat of the mid-day August sun
too great to deter them. The archdeacon took his text from the
Epistle of Philemon. 'I beseech thee for my son Onesimus, whom I
have begotten in my bonds.' From such a text it may be imagined the
kind of sermon which Dr Grantly preached, and on the whole it was
neither dull, nor bad, nor out of place.
He told them it had become his duty to look about for a pastor for
them; to supply the place of one who had been long among them; and
that in this manner he regarded as a son him whom he had selected,
as St Paul had regarded the young disciple whom he sent forth. Then
he took a little merit to himself for having studiously provided
the best man he could without reference to patronage or favour; but
he did not say that the best man according to his views was he who
was best able to subdue Mr Slope, and make that gentleman's
situation in Barchester too hot to be comfortable. As to the bonds,
they had consisted in the exceeding struggle which he had made to
get a good clergyman for them. He deprecated any comparison between
himself and St Paul, but said that he was entitled to beseech them
for their good will towards Mr Arabin, in the same manner that the
apostle had besought Philemon and his household with regard to
Onesimus.
The archdeacon's sermon, text, blessing and all, was concluded
within the half hour. Then they shook hands with their Ullathorne
friends, and returned to Plumstead. 'Twas thus that Mr Arabin read
himself in at St Ewold's.