“No,” said the archdeacon, “you’ve only drawn our teeth and cut out our tongues; you’ve allowed us still to breathe and swallow.”
“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed the bishop; “it’s not quite so easy to cut out the tongue of an Oxford magnate — and as for teeth — ha, ha, ha! Why, in the way we’ve left the matter, it’s very odd if the heads of colleges don’t have their own way quite as fully as when the hebdomadal board was in all its glory; what do you say, Mr. Dean?”
“An old man, my lord, never likes changes,” said the dean.
“You must have been sad bunglers if it is so,” said the archdeacon; “and indeed, to tell the truth, I think you have bungled it. At any rate, you must own this; you have not done the half what you boasted you would do.”
“Now, as regards your system of professors —” began the chancellor slowly. He was never destined to get beyond such beginning.
“Talking of professors,” said a soft clear voice close behind the chancellor’s elbow; “how much you Englishmen might learn from Germany; only you are all too proud.”
The bishop, looking round, perceived that that abominable young Stanhope had pursued him. The dean stared at him as though he were some unearthly apparition; so also did two or three prebendaries and minor canons. The archdeacon laughed.
“The German professors are men of learning,” said Mr. Harding, “but —
“German professors!” groaned out the chancellor as though his nervous system had received a shock which nothing but a week of Oxford air could cure.
“Yes,” continued Ethelbert, not at all understanding why a German professor should be contemptible in the eyes of an Oxford don. “Not but what the name is best earned at Oxford. In Germany the professors do teach; at Oxford, I believe, they only profess to do so, and sometimes not even that. You’ll have those universities of yours about your ears soon, if you don’t consent to take a lesson from Germany.”
There was no answering this. Dignified clergymen of sixty years of age could not condescend to discuss such a matter with a young man with such clothes and such a beard.
“Have you got good water out at Plumstead, Mr. Archdeacon?” said the bishop by way of changing the conversation.
“Pretty good,” said Dr. Grantly.
“But by no means so good as his wine, my lord,” said a witty minor canon.
“Nor so generally used,” said another; “that is, for inward application.”
“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed the bishop, “a good cellar of wine is a very comfortable thing in a house”
“Your German professors, Sir, prefer beer, I believe,” said the sarcastic little meagre prebendary.
“They don’t think much of either,” said Ethelbert, “and that perhaps accounts for their superiority. Now the Jewish professor —”
The insult was becoming too deep for the spirit of Oxford to endure, so the archdeacon walked off one way and the chancellor another, followed by their disciples, and the bishop and the young reformer were left together on the hearth-rug.
“I was a Jew once myself,” began Bertie.
The bishop was determined not to stand another examination, or be led on any terms into Palestine, so he again remembered that he had to do something very particular and left young Stanhope with the dean. The dean did not get the worst of it for Ethelbert gave him a true account of his remarkable doings in the Holy Land.
“Oh, Mr. Harding,” said the bishop, overtaking the ci-devant warden; “I wanted to say one word about the hospital. You know, of course, that it is to be filled up.”
Mr. Harding’s heart beat a little, and he said that he had heard so.
“Of course,” continued the bishop; “there can be only one man whom I could wish to see in that situation. I don’t know what your own views may be, Mr. Harding —”
“They are very simply told, my lord,” said the other; “to take the place if it be offered me, and to put up with the want of it should another man get it.”
The bishop professed himself delighted to hear it; Mr. Harding might be quite sure that no other man would get it. There were some few circumstances which would in a slight degree change the nature of the duties. Mr. Harding was probably aware of this, and would, perhaps, not object to discuss the matter with Mr. Slope. It was a subject to which Mr. Slope had given a good deal of attention.
Mr. Harding felt, he knew not why, oppressed and annoyed. What could Mr. Slope do to him? He knew that there were to be changes. The nature of them must he communicated to the warden through somebody, and through whom so naturally as the bishop’s chaplain? ’Twas thus he tried to argue himself back to an easy mind, but in vain.
Mr. Slope in the meantime had taken the seat which the bishop had vacated on the signora’s sofa and remained with that lady till it was time to marshal the folk to supper. Not with contented eyes had Mrs. Proudie seen this. Had not this woman laughed at her distress, and had not Mr. Slope heard it? Was she not an intriguing Italian woman, half wife and half not, full of affectation, airs, and impudence? Was she not horribly bedizened with velvet and pearls, with velvet and pearls, too, which had not been torn off her back? Above all, did she not pretend to be more beautiful than her neighbours? To say that Mrs. Proudie was jealous would give a wrong idea of her feelings. She had not the slightest desire that Mr. Slope should be in love with herself. But she desired the incense of Mr. Slope’s spiritual and temporal services and did not choose that they should be turned out of their course to such an object as Signora Neroni. She considered also that Mr. Slope ought in duty to hate the signora, and it appeared from his manner that he was very far from hating her.
“Come, Mr. Slope,” she said, sweeping by and looking all that she felt, “can’t you make yourself useful? Do pray take Mrs. Grantly down to supper.”
Mrs. Grantly heard and escaped. The words were hardly out of Mrs. Proudie’s mouth before the intended victim had stuck her hand through the arm of one of her husband’s curates and saved herself. What would the archdeacon have said had he seen her walking downstairs with Mr. Slope?
Mr. Slope heard also but was by no means so obedient as was expected. Indeed, the period of Mr. Slope’s obedience to Mrs. Proudie was drawing to a close. He did not wish yet to break with her, nor to break with her at all, if it could be avoided. But he intended to be master in that palace, and as she had made the same resolution it was not improbable that they might come to blows.
Before leaving the signora he arranged a little table before her and begged to know what he should bring her. She was quite indifferent, she said — nothing — anything. It was now she felt the misery of her position, now that she must be left alone. Well, a little chicken, some ham, and a glass of champagne.
Mr. Slope had to explain, not without blushing for his patron, that there was no champagne.
Sherry would do just as well. And then Mr. Slope descended with the learned Miss Trefoil on his arm. Could she tell him, he asked, whether the ferns of Barsetshire were equal to those of Cumberland? His strongest worldly passion was for ferns — and before she could answer him he left her wedged between the door and the sideboard. It was fifty minutes before she escaped, and even then unfed.
“You are not leaving us, Mr. Slope,” said the watchful lady of the house, seeing her slave escaping towards the door, with stores of provisions held high above the heads of the guests.
Mr. Slope explained that the Signora Neroni was in want of her supper.
“Pray, Mr. Slope, let her brother take it to her,” said Mrs. Proudie, quite out loud. “It is out of the question that you should he so employed. Pray, Mr. Slope, oblige me; I am sure Mr. Stanhope will wait