It's gude to be off with the old love—Mr. Slope,Before you are on with the new.'Ha, ha, ha!'
Mr. Slope's sins were such as to merit little mercy from the court of public and private opinion. And perhaps his punishment did fit his crime. But his punishment was severe.
This meeting was no serious interview. But Trollope does give the more serious sort its name in Chapter 29, "A Serious Interview," as described in the Introduction. Suffice it to repeat here, the Archdeacon assumes falsely that his daughter Eleanor Bold is likely to accept the suit of Mr. Slope. His wife had told him he would not prevail with Eleanor, but he was so sure he was right and that it was his duty to intervene, that he could not go to bed quietly. His wife, of course, was right.
Barchester Towersis a comedy, and it has a happy ending, which required a good bit of doing by the author. Trollope self-consciously bemoaned the difficulty of pronouncing a credible happy ending to a novel; but he did it anyway.
Doctor Thorneis a fairy tale. What else can one say after finishing a book in which the heroine, a poor girl of illegitimate birth but "the sweetest girl in the world," is changed at a stroke (although long anticipated) into the wealthiest heiress in the county, gaining the blessings of her lover's mother, Lady Arabella, for her marriage to the most eligible young bachelor in Barsetshire? So much for the plot. Trollope cared little, in general, for maintaining the reader's suspense and usually revealed in advance how it would turn out. But the questions are: What about the good parts? The serious interviews? The irony? The social satire? And though the general outlines of the plot are predictable, are there details that keep us going?
Few of Trollope's young lovers are very complex; the supporting characters are often the ones with interesting quirks and turns. The young may be true or false, or they may be first one and then the other (as Frank Gresham, heir to the rapidly disappearing Gresham estate, shows himself to be); and one often views such turns with the detachment of Olympian gods. What fools these mortals be! But Dr. Thorne, Roger Scatcherd, Lady Arabella: they have a history as well as a future, and there is more to learn about them as one turns the pages.
I think the book succeeds as comedy, not as romance. My second time through the story was through a reading by David Case, a genius of the spoken word, and his inflections bring out the comedy that the reader may not take the time to extract while merely gliding over the text.
One of the serious interviews, the confrontation between Doctor Thorne and Lady Arabella, is a masterpiece, as she strives to use her position as a De Courcy to separate his niece Mary Thorne from her daughter Beatrice, in order to prevent a union of Mary with her son Frank.
A student in the school of life could do worse than to use Trollope as a guide in playing this game. Dr. Thorne and Lady Arabella play their hands with skill and subtlety. And lest the student miss some of the finer points, the author provides a running commentary on how each is doing in the contest. Here Dr. Thorne responds to her suggestion that his niece has been throwing herself in the way of her son, asking, "What would my dear friend Mr. Gresham say, if some neighbor's wife should come and so speak to him? I will tell you what he would say: he would quietly beg her to go back to her own home and meddle only with her own matters." Lady Arabella cannot accept Dr. Thorne's unprecedented hint that she might be at the same level as common humanity. Declaring that it would not become her to argue with him, she ends the interview.
Dr. Thorne, we see, can take care of himself. One would expect him to perform equally well in his profession, though we see relatively little of his medical life. In contrast to a "surgeon," who would be addressed as "Mr.," Dr. Thorne was a "graduated physician," entitled to be addressed as "Doctor." There was a third class of medical practitioners in England, also descended from the medieval guilds, known as "apothecaries." They compounded and sold medications. Here also Dr. Thorne differed from his proud colleagues; he served as a dispensing apothecary as well as a physician, as did many other country doctors who were more concerned with their patients' comforts than with their own dignity. Dr. Thorne was reviled in the nearby towns of Barchester, home to a number of locally eminent physicians, and Silverbridge, home to a physician for some forty years. None of these dispensed medications.
In this arcane classification of health care providers, so strange to us today, the "general practitioner" apparently played a role similar to that of the "nurse practitioner" in a rural practice today. Dr. Thorne had been preceded at Greshemsbury by an humble general practitioner, a faithful soul who duly respected the county physicians. Though he had sometimes treated the children and servants, he "had never had the presumption to put himself on a par with his betters."
Dr. Thorne at the time of his story had been in practice in the small town of Greshamsbury for over twenty years. He is described as a proud man with a sharp tongue, but his outlook was so similar to that of the author that Trollope has been said to have poured into the character of Dr. Thorne those characteristics that he himself most admired, which comprised the ideal of the conservative English country gentleman. His integrity obliged him to be open about his fees; he had a fixed schedule of how much was to be charged for each visit, with allowance for the distance he had to travel. His colleagues considered this to be unprofessional. "A physician should take his fee without letting his left hand know what his right hand was doing; it should be taken without a thought, without a look, without a move of the facial muscles; the true physician should hardly be aware that the last friendly grasp of the hand had been made more precious by the touch of gold."
In one of our few glimpses of Dr. Thorne at work, he visits his childhood friend who has become Sir Roger Scatcherd, the wealthiest man in the county. Sir Roger refuses to accept a recommendation of abstinence from alcohol and rest from work, and he threatens to call another of the town doctors, Dr. Fillgrave. Dr. Thorne calls his bluff and dares him to call Dr. Fillgrave, requesting only that he let Lady Scatcherd remove the brandy bottle.
Of course a consultation with a childhood friend can hardly be considered a representative sample of Dr. Thorne's bedside manner. But it can be assumed that he made himself sufficiently acceptable to make a living in his country practice. We are told that he was occasionally summoned to neighboring towns to consult with colleagues on difficult cases.
The great crisis in Dr. Thorne's practice had to do with Lady Arabella Gresham. After he refused to forbid his daughter to see her son, she angrily transferred her case to the infamous Dr. Fillgrave. She still did not thrive, however, and as she became worse, the family in desperation sent to London for the great Sir Omicron Pie, who came and assessed her condition. "'You should have Thorne back here, Mr. Gresham,' said Sir Omicron, almost in a whisper, when they were quite alone. 'Dr. Fillgrave is a very good man, and so is Dr. Century; very good, I am sure. But Thorne has known her ladyship so long.'" And so Dr. Thorne was recalled to the care of Lady Arabella.
The story of Dr. Thorne himself is almost a subplot in the novel that bears his name. It is enough to say here that the author is careful to take good care of Dr. Thorne in the end. And the major plot moves along its fairy tale course. We stay with the story not so much because of the plot as because of the characters who propel it. Sir Roger's story is a rather unlikely one of a stone mason who rises to become an immensely wealthy builder and contractor, but an alcoholic (more plausible) who cannot survive long to enjoy the fruits of his labors. His son Louis succumbs a bit early to the ravages of alcohol, but this is a necessary plot device.
Frank Gresham, ordered by his mother Lady Arabella to marry money, makes a rather half-hearted effort to do so, but he is put right by Miss Dunstable, who rebukes his suit but remains a constant friend and encourages him to remain true to his love for Mary despite the prohibitions by his family. We are barely introduced to Miss Dunstable before she demonstrates her social skills by trouncing Mrs. Proudie, the ardent anti-Papist wife of the bishop, who makes a cameo appearance at Courcy Castle. Discounting Mrs. Proudie's concern that the Sabbath is hardly observed at all in Rome, Miss Dunstable agrees but says that Rome is a "delicious place" and asks the bishop's wife if she has ever been there. Of course not. It's a dangerous place—not because of malaria, as Miss Dunstable appears to assume, but because of the danger to the soul in a city with no Sabbath observations.
With that Miss Dunstable turns away abruptly and asks Mr. Gresham if he has been in Rome.
Familiar figures from the two previous Barsetshire novels,The WardenandBarchester Towers, make infrequent and brief appearances, but they make good use of them. And we meet a personage who is to be prominent in the Palliser series when Frank is invited to a dinner at Omnium Castle by the Duke of Omnium and Gatherum. Frank feels himself insulted that the Duke not only doesn't welcome him to the castle but only makes a token appearance at the dinner, sitting alone at the head of the table and making an early exit.
If some of the conventions of Victorian life appear incongruous to us in the twenty-first century, we find that Trollope, the contemporary observer of the scene, found them grist for his mill. Some of the subtleties of rank and duty were spelled out in correspondence between Miss Augusta Gresham, the once-jilted eldest daughter of the proud Lady Arabella, and Augusta's mentor in such matters, her cousin Lady Amelia de Courcy of Courcy Castle. Augusta has received a proposal of marriage from an attorney who has been assisting with family business affairs, and she would like to accept him; but even more she would like to have the blessing of such a union from Courcy Castle.
She pleads that her younger sister is to marry a clergyman, and she pleads further that some attorneys are better than others. But Lady Amelia reminds Augusta that since "it has been God's pleasure that we should be born with high blood in our veins," duty must take precedence over inclination.
Thus instructed and vanquished, Augusta refuses Mr. Gazebee. But the author cannot forbear disclosing in an immediate epilogue that some four years after this exchange of correspondence, the proud Lady Amelia succeeded so well in overcoming her scruples that she could accept her own proposal of marriage from Mr. Gazebee.
Thus we see that in theory the attorney, the physician, the wealthy businessman, and to a large extent the clergyman, are viewed with disdain from the heights of nobility, whose inherited wealth seems to come from the land. But does that mean the lord of the manor is a farmer? Frank Gresham receives a lesson in this from his father when he suggests that since his proposed marriage to a penniless woman would destroy his chance for a large estate, perhaps he could settle for a relatively small farm. Preoccupied with the ruin to the family that will result from this injudicious marriage, his father—also preoccupied with the reflection that it was his own squandering of the family fortune that has led his son to the consideration of working for a living—can hardly bring himself to think of it. He barely hears his son say that it would take so much time to become an attorney or a doctor.
"Yes: I dare say you could have a farm."
How quaint these conventions seem to our twenty-first century American sensitivities, liberated from hereditary nobility! Or are they? In Boston, "where the Lowells speak only to the Cabots, and the Cabots speak only to God?" In New Orleans, where Rex is a deity? In any city, where the names of prominent families may outlast the family fortunes and retain a meaning for those who know? What is the basis for our subliminal awareness of class snobbishness, if not from a place and time so well described for us in the novels of Trollope?
And how would this Victorian romance play out in today's world? Dr. Thorne would probably not be making house calls today. Perhaps he would be the senior partner in the family practice section of a large multi-specialty clinic. Lady Arabella would be Mrs. Gresham, but she would still find a way to run through her husband's money. Her son Frank would still marry a charming though penniless young woman; and they would succeed in some ways by virtue of their own gifts, though the measure of success would be a bit different. And with luck, some wry observer of the human comedy would tell us about it. If the observer should be blessed with a certain genius, the story would be as entertaining asDr. Thorne.
Framley Parsonageis altogether a charming piece in the Barsetshire collection. The major figures in the story are new ones, but familiar friends from previous volumes reappear in subplot roles, lending continuity for the benefit of faithful readers. Indeed,Framley Parsonageis almost an all-star game, or Old Timers' Day at the Ball Park, with brief appearances by stars of previous and future novels—the Duke of Omnium and Gatherum, Rev. Josiah Crawley, Mrs. Proudie, Miss Dunstable, and Griselda Grantly. Mark Robarts appears as a favored young parson at Framley, and one gets the impression early on that this is the story of a Pinocchio, a naive and untested cleric who falls into bad company and does a few foolish things. Specifically, he becomes one of a large company of Trollope's young men who sign their names to bills of accommodation, basically cosigning a note, with no means of paying the sum involved. Perhaps this was a frequent route of descent for the foolish in Victorian society.
Following the course of Mark's stupidity becomes a bit tedious. There are, of course, other threads of action. Mark's sister Lucy Robarts falls in love with the young lord of the manor—Lord Lufton. The familiar problem of working out a match between a deserving but poor young girl and a highly-placed lover was just addressed inDr. Thorne, and here again we have the conflict between the young swain and his mother who feels obliged to place her son's interests above every other consideration. Lady Lufton is presented as a basically kind woman who attempts to ward off little Lucy, sister of the clergyman of the parish that was "a part of her own establishment." Lady Lufton is almost persuaded to abandon her objection by Lucy's forthright presentation.
Lucy alludes to King Cophetua, a legend about a king who saw a beggar maid from his window and went out and told her that she was to be his wife. No mention is made of King Cophetua's having had a mother or an aunt to try to dissuade him from such an unequal liaison, but the efforts of such mothers and aunts have provided a useful writer's device.
Lucy's wit emerges as she tells her brother that Lady Lufton had been civil: "You would hardly believe it, but she actually asked me to dine. She always does, you know, when she wants to show her good humour. If you'd broken your leg, and she wished to commiserate you, she'd ask you to dinner."
The story rumbles along slowly but is redeemed by the great scene in which Lucy accompanies her brother to Hogglestock Parsonage and kidnaps Mr. Crawley's four children and sends them to Framley for proper care while she stays at Hogglestock to risk her life by nursing Mrs. Crawley, who has typhus, all despite the objections of Mr. Crawley, the poor but proud parson. Humble little Lucy takes action while the men at the scene, Dean Arabin and her brother Mark, just stand around.
The patient reader is rewarded for wading through familiar machinations by a number of rollicking scenes. Mr. Harold Smith delivers a lecture on the South Sea islands to the humble citizens of Barchester in which he extols the virtues of Civilization—"'And to Christianity,' shouted Mrs. Proudie, to the great amazement of the assembled people and to the thorough wakening of the bishop."
Framley Parsonage gives us our first look into the character of a singular personage who will later be the protagonist inThe Last Chronicle of Barset: the Reverend Josiah Crawley. Mr. Crawley is the impoverished parson of the parish of Hogglestock, where he serves the Lord and the parish and attempts to feed his wife and four children on ninety pounds a year. His religion and his pride are unbending and immune to compromise. He is chosen by Lady Lufton to counsel her wayward parson Mark Robarts, and the scene in which he visits Mark in his study is one in which young Mark is chastened by a prophet of old. One does not envy Mark his position under the gaze of Mr. Crawley, whose "sunken gray eyes" make his victim quail under a repetition of the question: "I now make bold to ask you, Mr. Robarts, whether you are doing your best to lead such a life as may become a parish clergyman among his parishioners?"
Besides the Serious Interview, such as the one above, Trollope revels in the Victorian party scene, two of which are presented as theconversazioneof Mrs. Proudie and the subsequentconversazioneof Miss Dunstable. On each occasion familiar characters are summoned to play cameo roles. Lord Dumbello is introduced as a suitor for the hand of the statuesque but silent beauty Griselda Grantly, and we are given full disclosure of the extent of the courtship. Griselda observes that it is "rather cold." Lord Dumbello replies with two words: "Deuced cold." That's it. They were subsequently married, and the reader may wonder whether their conversations ever became more substantial.
Mrs. Proudie has a little tilt with Mrs. Grantly, and Miss Dunstable reappears as the good-natured fairy godmother from the previous novel,Dr. Thorne. But the meeting of meetings is that between Lady Lufton and the personification in her eyes of all that is evil and opposed to her interests in the county, the Duke of Omnium. Aware that the crowding in the room had led the Duke to being pressed close against her, she turns quickly but with maintenance of her dignity and removes her dress from the contact. Thus face to face, the Duke begs her pardon—the only words ever to pass between them in their lives. Retreating, she makes a low and slow curtsey.
[B]ut the curtsey, though it was eloquent, did not say half so much—did not reprobate the habitual iniquities of the duke with a voice nearly as potent as that which was expressed in the gradual fall of her eyes and the gradual pressure of her lips. When she commenced her curtsey she was looking full in her foe's face. By the time that she had completed it her eyes were turned upon the ground, but there was an ineffable amount of scorn expressed in the lines of her mouth.
[B]ut the curtsey, though it was eloquent, did not say half so much—did not reprobate the habitual iniquities of the duke with a voice nearly as potent as that which was expressed in the gradual fall of her eyes and the gradual pressure of her lips. When she commenced her curtsey she was looking full in her foe's face. By the time that she had completed it her eyes were turned upon the ground, but there was an ineffable amount of scorn expressed in the lines of her mouth.
Lady Lufton had conquered. If one is looking for a passage that illustrates Trollope's mastery of the subtleties of human interaction, this is it. What is not said, what is not done, and what little may be said or done when the world assumes that much must have been said or done, rarely escapes Trollope's notice. Griselda Grantly and Lord Hartletop hardly speak to each other; Lady Lufton says nothing to the Duke of Omnium; and nothing much is said at Gatherum Castle when the world assumes that the political powers assembled there must be constantly discussing matters of state.
Lady Lufton does not finish the course undefeated. Her inevitable fall comes when she attempts to dismiss the "insignificant," "brown," "little" Lucy Robarts as her son's intended bride. Lucy fears a lecture when she is summoned, and she heads it off at every turn, and when she makes her little speech acknowledging her love for her son, she refuses to allow Lady Lufton to interrupt her: "I beg your pardon, Lady Lufton; I shall have done directly, and then I will hear you. …"
Never fear: all ends happily. Indeed, the author develops the reader's good will with such memorable scenes and characters that repetitious themes and plotlines are readily forgiven.
The Small House at Allington may be, after all, what Anthony Trollope's novel of this title is about. Is it really about Lily Dale? She is a major figure and comes across as a strong, even dominating individual. But her fate as a rejected woman, determined to embrace a life of spinsterhood, is settled early in the book, so that the plot is finished in Part I. What is Part II for, if not to determine the fate of the Small House, which seems doomed to be abandoned by Lily and her sister and mother?
Of the subplots, the most amusing is the celebrated introduction of Plantagenet Palliser, whose scandalous affair with Lady Dumbello is discussed all over London. The reader knows that the outward manifestations of this affair are limited to one or two comments about the weather when he comes to stand by her chair at large parties. The climax of the affair occurs when Mr. Palliser dares to address her as "Griselda," and it concludes when she promptly responds by asking him to send for her coach. Around these modest happenings the Duke of Omnium and Gatherum feels obliged to threaten to cut off his nephew from his allowance and perhaps even cut off his status as heir by marrying and begetting a son himself, at his advanced age. With no interest in Griselda until so threatened, the young nephew feels obliged to challenge his uncle by addressing Griselda. However, the seeding of the wild oats is finished with the arranged marriage of the young Member of Parliament to the wealthy young Lady Glencora McCluskie. All these events are dramatized in the 1974 BBC television series,The Pallisers, and form the prequel to Trollope's series of six novels about the Pallisers.
Such comic relief is welcome in a rather serious novel which is destined to have no fairy tale ending. As such, it stands as a credible account of human affairs as we humans may conduct them. I suppose that sometimes women do indeed take voluntary private vows of chastity after being jilted, and sometimes keep them, and perhaps it happened more often in Victorian society over a hundred years ago than in our seemingly more open society today, but it takes a strong woman to do it; and the unusual occurrence of the phenomenon is emphasized by the author in the refusal of any of Lily's family or friends to acknowledge her statement of purpose. John Eames, faithful in his unrequited love for Lily, seems to understand it better than any of them, but he sympathizes with her position in his own profession never to love anyone else.
One could make a case for the novel's being a story about the hobbledehoy, the author's term for awkward late bloomers like John Eames. Johnny progresses toward manhood and is considered to have succeeded in this by the end of Part II; he "thrashes" Adolphus Crosbie by punching him in the eye at a railway station; he is promoted to be the private secretary to Sir Raffle Baffle in the bureaucracy, and he never allows himself to be demeaned by fetching Sir Raffle's boots; he earns the friendship and patronage of the Earl de Guest by saving him from a bull in his pasture; he escapes a foolish liaison with Amelia Roper, the designing daughter of his landlady; and he receives encouragement from the Earl and from Lily's mother in his suit. But he doesn't get the girl.
Lilian Dale is one of Trollope's acclaimed heroines, and for good reason. She dominates every encounter from first to last, from proclaiming that Adolphus Crosbie is a swell when we first meet her, to her compulsive interruptions of her mother at the last as Mrs. Dale endeavors to tell her daughter of the Squire's conversion from being an old grump to being a generous old grump. She rather quickly falls in love with the swell from London and accepts his proposal of marriage, expressing her love without qualification and making generous concessions to the prospect of marrying a relatively poor London clerk. Her loving attentions to Adolphus leave the reader in no doubt as to Mr. Crosbie's good fortune in winning her hand. No scene in the book is better presented than that in which Mrs. Dale tells Lily that her letter from Mr. Crosbie puts a definite end to their engagement. Lily had expected it, and she assumes the fortitude of a Joan of Arc as she hears it, astonishing her mother with her presence of mind and astonishing the reader when she does not resort to the universal ploy of Trollope's women, who routinely retire to their room and weep on the bed after a crucial development.
The author succeeds in showing us Adolphus Crosbie as a cad and a scoundrel in the eyes of the world. But we also see the world through the eyes of Mr. Crosbie; and from his own perspective he is shown rather non-judgmentally to be stupid and lacking in a sense of purpose that would reward him with happiness. The torments of Mr. Crosbie as the son-in-law to the Earl de Courcy constitute the just punishment that his sins deserve.
And what of the Small House? It succeeds where Johnny Eames had failed: it gets the girl. We are left with the prospect of Lily and her mother permanently in residence in the Small House, which Mrs. Dale had announced that she would leave, at the behest of her daughters, in rebellion against the authority and interference of their uncle the Squire, who allowed them the use of the house rent-free. The title of the book is indeed appropriate; the Dale women's residence in the house indicates harmony and stability in their little world in Allington. In the end, communication overcomes pride, and peace returns, even though in Lily's case it is a peace of resignation and acceptance.
One accepts certain conditions in reading Trollope, and in this instance the conditions are a bit heavier than usual. Plot concludes in Part I; Part II is one of the longer epilogues in literature. The pace is leisurely; there is a bit of repetition. But the conditions, though heavy, are not without reward. Lilly is well presented, and the reader, like her friends and family, love and admire her but wish she could be a bit more flexible. Lady Dumbello is shown in a masterpiece of irony and caricature, just closely enough that one suspects that the portrait is plausible and not far from true. The phenomenon of the hobbledehoy is given its definitive representation in John Eames. In Adolphus Crosbie's disillusionment with the noble family into which he marries, we see the difference between perception and reality in how the "quality" sometimes live. One might wish for a bit of a story; but the reader is grateful for a kindly but ironic and amusing guide to the gentle country life.
Is there a more memorable scene in all Trollope's novels than the image of the Rev. Josiah Crawley walking miles through the mud to answer the summons of the Bishop of Barchester? Mrs. Crawley had arranged for a local farmer to offer him a ride, but the ruse only took him part of the way, and Mr. Crawley forgot his suspicions of his wife as he thought of how, with his dirty boots and pants, he would crush the sleek and clean bishop in his own study—"crush him—crush him—crush him!" And the subsequent interview with Bishop and Mrs. Proudie stands as one of Trollope's great set pieces. Mr. Crawley, the underdog, the Perpetual Curate of Hogglestock, ignores the interruptions of the bishop's wife as he argues against the bishop's illegal request (which the reader knows originated with Mrs. Proudie) that Mr. Crawley vacate his pulpit at Hogglestock until his trial for theft of twenty pounds is concluded. And two more memorable words are not uttered in the Barsetshire series than "Peace, woman," when he finally acknowledges her presence. After further admonishing her that she was debasing her husband's high office by interfering, he wishes the bishop good morning and is out the door. "Yes, he had, he thought, in truth crushed the bishop."
One can hardly quarrel with Trollope's assertion that he considered Plantagenet and Lady Glencora Palliser and Josiah Crawley to be his best creations. AlthoughThe Last Chronicleserves as a grand summation of the Barsetshire series and reprise for its characters, it is around Mr. Crawley and the mystery of how he got the twenty pound check that everything revolves. The stubborn Perpetual Curate whom we met inFramley Parsonagecontinues to cling to his principles in spite of every adversity. He doubts himself to the extent that he concedes he may have absent-mindedly taken the check in question, but when roused to defend whatever position he stakes out, he does so with boldness and authority that none can withstand. And this list includes such formidable opponents as Archdeacon Grantly of the thundering "Good Heavens!", Mr. Crawley's loving wife and daughters, and the heretofore undefeated Mrs. Proudie, ruler of the episcopal palace.
Is Mr. Crawley mad? Well we may wonder: his wife thinks he sometimes is; his daughter thinks so. And he even suspects it himself. Mr. Crawley is an articulate victim of the inequalities within the Church. He knows many of the Odes of Pindar and Horace by heart, in Greek, and teaches them to his daughters. His friend from school days, Dean Arabin, dean of the Close, had not done so well in class as he had. But Mr. Arabin is Dean, wealthy enough to be traveling to Jerusalem at the time of the story, and Mr. Crawley's family can barely find enough food for the table with his meager stipend in Hogglestock. We have previously seen Mr. Crawley descending as the Voice of God on the worldly Mr. Robarts, vicar of Framley, inFramley Parsonage. And now we see him as the long-suffering servant of the brick makers of Hogglestock. He resigns his curacy (and his minuscule income) after being accused of theft, as a matter of principle. Several of his esteemed colleagues attempt to reason with him, but none can contend with him in his determination.
Trollope claimed to have avoided theological issues and to have limited himself to the personal lives of the people of the church in the Barsetshire series. Perhaps so. Few sermons are quoted. But political issues of the church rear their head at every turn: Archdeacon Grantly is twice denied the bishopric. Mr. Arabin becomes a dean. The bishop's authority is challenged. High Church contends with Low Church. Bishop Proudie and his wife come into Barsetshire opposed to its high church tendencies, and Mrs. Proudie preaches the importance of keeping the Sabbath Day holy according to her standards. No railway trips on Sunday. No games. Services twice on Sunday. The old ways of the Church are battered. Even the saintly Mr. Harding had been known to chant in Evensong, but no more.
Yet Mr. Crawley cares not for either faction. He resents the bishop's wife's interference in his right and obligation to his parish, but he cites the importance of obedience to the bishop within the limits of legality. He stands down the bishop when challenged, but he is also an uncomfortable member of the family of the bishop's chief antagonist, Archdeacon Grantly. Mr. Crawley is not comfortable with the riches of the world and conducts himself as if convinced of the literal truth of the difficulty of a rich man's entering the kingdom of heaven.
Archdeacon Grantly is not the protagonist in any of the Barsetshire novels, but he makes his appearance in the first of the series,The Warden, and appears so prominently in the others as to become one of the most memorable of Trollope's men of the cloth. Rector of Plumstead Episcopi, Archdeacon of Barsetshire, son of the Bishop, and son-in-law of Mr. Harding (the Warden), the Archdeacon is a wealthy and worldly churchman who defends the church energetically throughout the series. A wealthy clergyman? Surely a contraindication in terms. After all, this was only a little over a hundred years ago. But so it was. He inherited his wealth from his saintly father the Bishop, who possessed his wealth in connection with his position in the church. Those blessed by the material riches of the church alluded to their position with the same euphemisms employed by the nobility—those whom God has endowed, and so forth.
But not all clergymen were so endowed, as we are continually reminded by Mr. Crawley. We are not accustomed to thinking of Trollope as a social crusader, and he probably was not, certainly not in the tradition that Charles Dickens established. Trollope had his psychological baggage resulting from his impoverished childhood and a certain amount of rough treatment as a town boy among the more privileged classmates in school. But although he had no connection and little experience with the church, there is no reason to think that he didn't tell it like it was.
InThe Last ChronicleTrollope was careful to conclude several of the lives. Even Mrs. Proudie meets a somewhat untimely death. If we are to believe Trollope's own account in his autobiography, he overheard some men in his club saying how tired of her they had become, and he announced to them that he was going home right away to kill her off. Her demise of a sudden cardiac death is epidemiologically correct, in that 250,000 Americans die in this way every year now. Few, however, have such a dramatic end as does Mrs. Proudie, found standing up, leaning against her bedpost. Mrs. Proudie was a great comic creation, personifying the conflict between low church and high church—yet another of the women in Victorian society who were forced to achieve their goals through the agency of their lord and master. Several others come to mind—Alice Vavasor, Glencora Palliser, Lady Laura Standish.
Mr. Septimus Harding meets a more orthodox end, dying quietly in his old age. Mr. Harding was a gentler saint than Mr. Crawley; he had also faced the humiliation of displacement from his post of service, inThe Warden, accepting his fate with quietness and resignation. There are few more sympathetic portraits of the loneliness of the aged than that of Mr. Harding finishing his days wandering about the rooms of his daughter's house, "ashamed when the servants found him ever on the move."
While Mr. Crawley is facing the judgment of his community for a crime he suspects he may have actually committed, his daughter Grace finds herself in love with Major Henry Grantly, son of the Archdeacon, who violently opposes a proposed union of his son with an impoverished woman, however worthy she may be. We follow every opportunity the father and son miss in their stubborn refusal to concede any of their pride and independence in their relationship with each other. Here Trollope's persistence in showing every nuance of each character's thoughts is effective in presenting each of the men as understandable and even likeable, even though we follow each mistaken turn that each of them takes. Thank goodness they had a little help. Conflict resolution occurs only when the women in their lives lead the two men into agreement without suffering the embarrassment of losing face.
The subplot in which John Eames becomes involved in a flirtation with Madalina Desmolines through his friendship with the painter Conway Dalrymple tries the reader's patience at times; here, however, the author spins out the story of how Dalrymple mocks the impassive Clara Van Siever by offering to paint her portrait as Jael driving a peg through the head of Sisera, a story from Judges often portrayed by painters who devoutly chose Biblical themes but selected the bloodiest. This subplot concludes with a farcical scene that could be played on the stage with few alterations, in which John is entrapped by Madalina's mother. Threatened with a shotgun wedding, he only manages his escape after opening the window and calling to a policeman on the street.
And although one may have supposed that the story of Lily Dale and Johnny Eames was concluded inThe Small House at Allington, both reappear to provide yet another identical conclusion to his courtship. And as another part of the epilogue toThe Small House, we see Adolphus Crosbie suffering still more punishment in consequence of courting and jilting Lily. Dr. Thorne briefly appears as a magistrate considering the case of Mr. Crawley, and his wife the former Miss Dunstable also reappears to give counsel to Lily Dale. Mark Robarts ofFramley Parsonagealso sits with the magistrates.
Few bases remain untouched. Mr. Toogood, a London attorney and a relation of Mrs. Crawley, appears as a sleuth to dig out a few details of Mr. Crawley's mystery. Johnny Eames makes a heroic trip to Europe to help solve it. But when Mrs. Arabin (Mr. Harding's daughter) is finally notified of the problem, she sorts it out, as she would have done without any assistance.
And so the Barsetshire series is concluded.The Last Chroniclerewards the faithful reader of the previous five novels in the series with reunions with familiar friends. But it stands on its own as an outstanding novel of the nineteenth century, following the dogged Mr. Crawley as he gives his own witness to the less rigid world around him.
I met Glencora and Plantagenet Palliser when we were in England in 1974. They lived in their own television series,The Pallisers, Simon Raven's BBC television serial based on six Anthony Trollope novels. The Times published a supplement describing the Palliser series as "the finest sequence of fiction ever to be based on British Parliamentary life." Susan Hampshire played Glencora, and not only she, but the entire cast now represent those characters in my mind. And so, although I can be appropriately dispassionate and critical about Anthony Trollope and his novels, loyalty makes it difficult in regard to Plantagenet and Glencora. They are old friends.
Episodes 1-6 of The Pallisers are based on the first novel in the series,Can You Forgive Her?First, the reader and the viewer must understand that the woman we are asked to forgive is not Lady Glencora M'Cluskie, the true heroine, but Alice Vavasor, a distant cousin of Glencora's. Alice's story is indeed the main plot of the book, but Simon Raven apparently realized that Glencora's story would be more appealing to the television audience, and he focused the first episodes on her, starting with events that Trollope had described in a novel of the Barsetshire series,The Small House at Allington. The spectacular set piece in the television presentation is the first scene, a garden party given by the Duke of Omnium and Gatherum. (Trollope was shameless in the selection of names for his characters and places; other favorites include the Marquis of Auld Reekie in Scotland, the law firm of Slow and Bideawhile, and Dr. Fillgrave, who was the competitor of Dr. Thorne.) At this party Glencora flirts with Burgo Fitzgerald, a handsome rake, little knowing that her fate is being decided from on high. Her guardian, the Marchioness of Auld Reekie, is observing all from her chair beside a little Greek temple above the lake. There she negotiates with the Duke of Omnium for a marital alliance between Glencora and the Duke's heir, Plantagenet Palliser. The Duke replies, "I find the thing will suit me well enough."
The innocent reader goes from the television series to the text and immediately finds himself reading about Alice Vavasor, a young woman engaged to a young country gentleman, "John Grey, The Worthy Man." She had been previously engaged to her first cousin "George Vavasor, The Wild Man." We then stumble into subplot number one, in which George's sister goes to spend three weeks with her Aunt Greenow, a well-to-do widow who must deal with two suitors: Mr. Cheesacre, a "fat Norfolk farmer," and the rather disreputable Captain Bellfield.
Where is Glencora? Not yet to be found. By the time we reach Chapter Seventeen, the standard Trollope fox-hunting chapter, we find Burgo Fitzgerald first among theriders—
Burgo Fitzgerald, whom no man had ever known to crane at a fence, or to hug a road, or to spare his own neck or his horse's. And yet poor Burgo seldom finished well—coming to repeated grief in this matter of his hunting, as he did so constantly in other matters of his life.
Burgo Fitzgerald, whom no man had ever known to crane at a fence, or to hug a road, or to spare his own neck or his horse's. And yet poor Burgo seldom finished well—coming to repeated grief in this matter of his hunting, as he did so constantly in other matters of his life.
In the next chapter we learn that Burgo, eighteen months earlier, had almost won the hand, as he had already won the heart, of the Lady Glencora M'Cluskie. Finally. This is page 162. But what about the garden party? About the garden party, the text is silent. That this memorable scene appears nowhere in Trollope's novel is almost beside the point. The dialogue of the BBC production is as Trollopian as any of the rest, which adheres closely to the text. Raven has the Duke later admonish Plantagenet, who has been rumored to be having an affair with Lady Dumbello (another of Trollope's apt names), that he should not pursue such an affair until after he has become respectably married and produced an heir. "After that, you may suit yourself. Only see to it that there's no open scandal. When I was a boy it didn't matter much, but for some reason it does now."
And the grand wedding that we saw at Westminster Abbey? "She had married Mr. Palliser at St. George's Square." So we, and the author, have missed the most memorable scenes in the whole series. If we go back to a few pages ofThe Small House at Allington, we find the story of Plantaget Palliser's flirtation with Lady Dumbello, and we find the interview between Plantagenet and Mr. Fothergill, the "man of business" for the Duke of Omnium, in which Mr. Fothergill passed the word to the rebellious young buck that he must abandon his friendship with Lady Dumbello, who happened to be the daughter-in-law of an old friend (and former mistress) of the Duke. We find no description of the scene in which the Duke brings Lady Hartletop and Lady Dumbello to Plantagenet's drawing room for Lady Dumbello to declare to Plantagenet, in a choked voice, that their association is at an end.
What we do find inCan You Forgive Her?is a brief reference to Glencora's having attempted unsuccessfully to persuade her distant cousin Alice to allow her to use her house in London for a tryst with Burgo, to arrange an elopement. Alice barely knows Glencora, and she refuses. All things conspire against Glencora, and she finds herself engaged, by arrangement of "sagacious heads," to Mr. Palliser.
And now, finally, Glencora and Alice have a chance to become acquainted with each other. Alice receives an invitation from Glencora to come to Matching Priory for a visit before Christmas.
Important conversations in Trollope sometimes occur on carriage rides, and a chapter entitled "Dandy and Flirt" is ample warning that Dandy and Flirt are the horses pulling the "light stylish-looking cart" driven by Lady Glencora, who conveys Alice from the station to Matching Priory, and demonstrates in her breathless exposition of her situation that she is, in fact, a lonely little rich girl, way out in the country, who needs a friend. (In the television production, she is often shown carrying and holding a doll in her first months of marriage.)
My wife and I saw "Matching Priory," the stately home that was used in the BBC television series, when we visited Sudely Castle one afternoon in the course of a short stay in the Cotswolds. This castle's greatest historical significance was having been the last home, and the burial place, of Katherine Parr, last wife and widow of Henry VIII. Matching Priory, though, had a somewhat different history, as described by Lady Glencora, who shows Alice the "Matching oak, under which Coeur de Lion or Edward the Third, I forget, was met by Sir Guy de Palisere as he came from the war, or from hunting, or something of that kind." Sir Guy offered the king some brandy, the king responded with a generous bequest of real estate, and the rest was history. "As Jeffrey Palliser says, it was a great deal of money for a pull at his flask."
And so we have the history of England according to Lady Glencora. And having finally arrived at subplot two, the story of the Pallisers, we can follow the development of their marriage, which is the real story ofCan You Forgive Her?Trollope summarizes the contrasting personalities of Glencora and Plantagenet as he describes Glencora's reaction when she realizes that Mrs. Marsham has actually come to their house to be her duenna. Though Glencora knew little about the British Constitution, she "was much quicker, much more clever, than her husband." Though he had a keen intelligence, he could be easily deceived. "And, to a certain extent, she looked down upon him for this obtusity." This contrast in their personalities is played out in the book's production number, Lady Monk's ball. Lady Glencora begs her husband to be excused from attending because she knows Burgo, Lady Monk's nephew, will be there. But Plantagenet, saying that "it does not signify," insists that she attend. After Glencora arrives (separately), he excuses himself and takes his leave; she dances "recklessly" with Burgo, watched by her "nemesis" Mr. Bott (a political disciple of her husband) and her "duenna" Mrs. Marsham, who leaves to fetch Mr. Palliser. He arrives in the nick of time, Glencora gives him her hand, and they depart. In their carriage she says, "If you did not wish me to see Mr. Fitzgerald you should not have sent me to Lady Monk's. But, Plantagenet, I hope you will forgive me if I say that no consideration shall induce me to receive again as a guest, in my own house, either Mrs. Marsham or Mr. Bott."
There was more to be said. The night before must be followed by the morning after; Plantagenet invited his wife to breakfast with him after he had "slept on it." In these interviews the woman does not always win. But she usually does. In this case, though, it may be said that if Glencora won the battle, Plantagenet won the war. Glencora's wit and spirit posed a challenge to her husband. "'I am very serious,' she replied, as she settled herself in her chair with an air of mockery, while her eyes and mouth were bright and eloquent with a spirit which her husband did not love to see."
Plantagenet turned the tide, after her accusation that he had planted spies, with his admission: "If it were ever to come to that, that I thought spies necessary, it would be all over with me."
This changes the tone; she abandons her raillery and declares that she cannot make him happy, confesses that she loves Burgo Fitzgerald, and that she and Plantagenet do not love each other. Here Plantagenet does his duty, tells her he does love her, puts his arms around her, and decides on the spur of the moment to abandon politics for a while and take her to Europe. At this very moment the Duke of St. Bungay is announced, and he enters to offer Plantagenet the position of Chancellor of the Exchequer, the office that Plantagenet has coveted. But Plantagenet declines, pleading family reasons, and the conversation is over. No English gentleman would inquire or disclose anything further.
This is the turning point, and the rest all works itself out in subplot number two. As for the main plot, Alice Vavasor proves herself to be as contrary a heroine as Glencora is attractive, as she deals with successive engagements to George Vavasor, John Grey, back to George Vavasor, and back to John Grey, whose sainthood is assured by the persistence of his suit.
At this point we find Glencora's and Alice's personalities summarized as Glencora congratulates her friend on her fourth engagement: "I know that it is quite a misery to you that you should be made a happy woman at last. I understand it all, my dear, and my heart bleeds for you."
As for subplot number one: Simon Raven properly omitted it from his television presentation. It is a third variation on the theme of a woman torn between a dashing scoundrel and a boring steady gentleman. In this one, as it turns out, Aunt Greenow selects the impecunious Captain Bellfield, and we leave her beginning to get him housebroken.
Trollope's great achievement in this novel is the creation of Glencora and Plantagenet. They have not become household words in our time, but they had enough in them for elaboration of their stories in another medium, and they carried a series of six political novels in which they played sometimes major and sometimes quite minor roles. Political figures in England have cited these novels as the best fictional presentation of parliamentary process, and wives of great men have cited Lady Glencora as the model of all that a political wife should be and do.
It is Glencora's sense of fun and play that makes her an endearing figure to her friends, and also to the reader. At Baden she takes Alice with her to the casino to play "one little Napoleon," with which she wins a little pile and finally loses it. Plantagenet finds her, scolds her, and takes her away. Alice feels wrongly scowled upon by Mr. Palliser and follows them to their room, where Glencora affects laughter. "Here's a piece of work about a little accident."
Plantagenet fails to see the humor and admonishes her for sitting at a common gambling table amid heaps of gold. "You wrong me," Glencora replies. "There was only one heap, and that did not remain long. Did it, Alice?"
Alice, with her own agenda of being wronged, takes her candle and takes her leave. This was the set of family and friends that Simon Raven brought us on BBC. Glencora, pert and pretty, sometimes strayed, and she sometimes strayed further than to the tables of Baden; but she was a lot more fun than Alice. She was more fun than any of them.
And the inevitable question: Was the television series more fun than the book? And the required qualifying query: What did you do first—see it on television or read the book? In my case, the television series came first, and yes, the portrayal on television was more fun. But it was so much fun that the text is required reading.
Phineas Finnis a political novel. Others in Anthony Trollope's Palliser series stray here and there from the political scene in Victorian England, but this one is rooted in the pursuit of political ambition. A chapter is allocated to a cabinet meeting in which the members of the cabinet are named, described, and seated at the table. The furnishings of the "large dingy room" in Downing Street are enumerated, and rituals are observed. Political strategy is discussed and determined. The author obviously puts politics right up there with fox hunting among his passions.
Phineas Finn is the focal point of the story as he embarks on a career in the service of the nation as a Member of Parliament. Phineas appears as an impressionable young Irishman, whose charm and gift for pleasant conversation bring him opportunities that push his capacity for maintaining focus. He is several grades advanced beyond the stage of the hobbledehoy portrayed by Trollope in Johnny Eames of the Barsetshire series, but he is still learning the ways of the world. And so we learn the ways of Phineas's world as he endures the inconveniences and embarrassments of the learning process.
One could do worse than to use this novel as a textbook on the English Constitution. We follow Phineas through election to Parliament from two different boroughs, we observe the protocols and courtesies in the House of Commons, we see his landlord participate in a riot, we meet with the Cabinet, and we see governments formed, dissolved, and replaced.
Through all this Phineas pursues his career with ambition and charm. The men like him, and the women love him. He makes love to four of the women, including his childhood sweetheart, with varying results. A clandestine duel on a beach in Belgium, ending as happily as any duel can, is the central event of the story, after which our hero shrugs and marches on.
The first to refuse Phineas is Lady Laura Standish. One of Trollope's strong women, she sublimates her political interests and ambitions into a vicarious interest in Phineas's career. Though she is in love with him, they are both poor, and she decides to accept marriage to a wealthy Scot with a large home place in the country and a promising career in Parliament. Unfortunately for Laura, his unbending religious scruples destroy the marriage, affording us insights into the institution of marriage in Victorian times. Eventually she flees to Dresden to escape his lawful demand that she live in the same house with him.
Violet Effingham, beautiful and witty, also refuses a later offer of marriage. She rebels against the oppressive guardianship of her aunt, Lady Baldock, and she is too strong-willed to go along with marriage to Lord Chiltern at the first attempt, having the audacity to propose to him that he pursue a gainful occupation. Violet was shortchanged in the BBC production ofThe Pallisers, in which the strength of her character is sacrificed to the abbreviating demands of film making.
Madame Max Goesler figures in several of the novels as a friend to Lady Glencora and to the Duke of Omnium. Representing the foreign element in the story (and one of the few foreigners whom he presents in a favorable light), she is a wealthy young widow from Vienna, given to making innocent observations about some of the curious English customs. She attracts the elderly Duke of Omnium, who offers to marry her. Lady Glencora fears that this could lead to the birth of a son to the Duke, knocking her little son out of the line of succession to the Duke, and her interview with Madame Max is rather one-sided. Lady Glencora protests that a seventy year old Duke of Omnium "may not do as he pleases, as may another man."
Madame Max replies that his Grace should be allowed to try that question, but she puts this matter aside to assert that she would not degrade any man whom she should marry. On the other hand, she would not willingly do him any injury, and she assures Lady Glencora that her fears for her son are premature—unless Lady Glencora's arguments should drive her to marrying the Duke just to prove she is wrong. "But you had better leave me to settle the matter in my own bosom. You had indeed."
Madame Max bears the burden of offering wise observations on the world around her, acceptable to the reader who pictures her as a beautiful dark-haired young woman. Though she refuses the offer of marriage to the Duke, she remains his friend and offers this assessment of his role in society in refuting Phineas's claim that he is useless to society:
"You believe only in motion, Mr. Finn;—and not at all in quiescence. An express train at full speed is grander to you than a mountain with heaps of snow. I own that to me there is something glorious in the dignity of a man too high to do anything,—if only he knows how to carry that dignity with a proper grace. I think that there should be breasts made to carry stars."
"You believe only in motion, Mr. Finn;—and not at all in quiescence. An express train at full speed is grander to you than a mountain with heaps of snow. I own that to me there is something glorious in the dignity of a man too high to do anything,—if only he knows how to carry that dignity with a proper grace. I think that there should be breasts made to carry stars."
Conversational virtuosity of this order leaves the reader with jaw agape. The English are better at this than we Americans are, as can be seen by tuning in to the prime minister's question and answer sessions on BBC-TV. And the Victorians were better at it than we are. In any event, Madame Max holds her ground with poise and polish, justifying Shirley Robin Letwin's description of her inThe Gentleman in Trollope: Individuality and Moral Conduct(The Akadine Press, originally published 1982) as "the most perfect gentleman in Trollope's novels."
This is a picaresque novel that hangs together pretty well, following the hero from one adventure to the next. He meets fair damsels and does battle with dragons, also encountering mentors and would-be mentors who instruct him inle monde comme il faut. Surely the author was already planning a sequel,Phineas Redux, to rescue the young hero from the oblivion in which this story leaves him. This textbook on politics concludes with the reader waiting for one more lesson: Politicians may retire, but not for long.
Lizzie Eustace is beautiful and clever, and she has no intention of parting with her late husband's gift to her, the Eustace Diamonds. But does she really have them? And where are they? This well constructed mystery is one of those Trollope novels which deserves to be better known and more widely read. (Others in this list includeThe Last Chronicle of Barset,The Duke's Children, andOrley Farm.) Lizzie has been compared to Becky Sharp, the prime mover in William Makepeace Thackeray'sVanity Fair; Trollope actually invites such comparison, describing her early in the book as an "opulent and aristocratic Becky Sharp."
Like Becky, Lizzie attracts admirers. "Sometimes I think her the most beautiful woman I ever saw in the world," says the obviously smitten Frank Greystock in describing Lizzie Eustace.
But Becky casts a wider net, as described by a servant: "'Miss B., they are all infatyated about that young woman,' Firkin replied. … 'I can't tell for where nor for why; and I think somethink has bewidged everybody.' "
Lizzie does not succeed so widely, and she shows that she doesn't really understand everyone, as when she overplays her hand on first meeting her prospective mother-in-law, Lady Fawn. Lizzie had heard that a sermon was read every Sunday evening at Fawn Court, and that therefore Lady Fawn must be very religious. So it was quite natural for her to stretch her hand toward a book on Lady Fawn's table, claiming it as her guide to remind her of her duty to her noble husband. Lady Fawn, finding the book to be the Bible, replied that she could hardly do better—"but there was more of censure than of eulogy in the tone of her voice." We are told later that Lady Fawn was left with not a word to say in behalf of her future daughter-in-law, saying nothing about the little scene with the Bible, but never forgetting it.
As described above, however, Becky Sharp was capable of sweeping through a household. A governess in Crawley Hall (which she refers to as Humdrum Hall), she assists elderly Sir Pitt Crawley so effectively that he later proposes marriage to her. She is in love with Sir Pitt's second son, Rawdon Crawley, and she makes it a point to attend faithfully upon Sir Pitt's spinster sister, supplanting her dame de compagnie, Miss Briggs, so completely that her imitations of Briggs's weeping snuffle and her manner of using her handkerchief are performed so well that Miss Crawley "became quite cheerful."
Becky Sharp shows herself as a mistress of all she surveys, whereas Lizzie succeeds only with the men whom she targets. Lady Fawn and her daughters were not so easily taken in. On the other hand, Thackeray shows Becky to have an easier field—the "Vanity Fair" of foolish mortals, trusting and benighted souls, easily duped. Thackeray, like Dickens, entertains us much like Becky entertained Miss Crawley, by mockery; and their mockery spared very few. Trollope, on the other hand, may have had more respect for people in general; his portraits, though they did include "warts and all," were less caricatures than realistic renderings.
Lizzie stars in one of Trollope's memorable scenes, "The Diamonds are Seen in Public." Her fiancé Lord Fawn, troubled about the diamonds, has written a letter forbidding her to keep the diamonds, saying they belong rightfully to her late husband's family. They arrive separately at a party given by Lady Glencora, not having communicated in the three weeks since Lord Fawn's letter. She wears the diamonds, which "seemed to outshine all the jewellery in the room. … The only doubt might be whether paste diamonds might not better suit her character." Lord Fawn confronts her as soon as he sees her, but no ears hear the inconsequential words they speak to each other. Lady Eustace joins Lord Fawn in a quadrille, dances with no one else, and very soon asks him to get her carriage for her. Taking her seat, she tells him, "You had better come to me soon." And thus does Lady Eustace savor her triumph of displaying the diamonds at Lady Glencora's house.
This may have been the high point for Lizzie. Her one goal in life was to keep the diamonds, and all else was sacrificed to this goal. It is not so much that she has an overall strategy; rather, she constantly improvises from one point to the next, keeping (supposedly) the diamonds locked up in an iron box.
Of course the diamonds are at risk—not only from Mr. Camperdown, the Eustace family lawyer who is as determined to recover the diamonds for the family as Lizzie is to keep them, but also from thieves in the night. When Lizzie goes to her late husband's ancestral castle in Scotland, she surrounds herself with unscrupulous friends, runs through her potential suitors, and loses her diamonds. On the first attempt at the diamonds, the thieves get an empty iron box, while Lady Eustace retains the jewels "in her own keeping." Not being one to blurt out the truth at the first opportunity, however, Lizzie does not tell the police that she still has the diamonds, and she digs herself deeper and deeper into her deception until it carries the name of perjury.
As Lizzie sins, so is she punished, not by the law, but by the irony of fate, receiving a proposal of marriage by Mr. Joseph Emilius, described in words which we now find difficult to forgive: "a nasty, greasy, lying, squinting Jew preacher." This follows his assertions that he is the greatest preacher of the day and can move masses. Lizzie knows he is grossly exaggerating his assets, but "A man, to be a man in her eyes, should be able to swear that all his geese are swans." When he demands an answer to his proposal of marriage, Lizzie answers him in kind, making a speech that matches his in length, protesting that after losing "the dearest husband that a woman had ever worshipped," she had once thought of matrimony with a man of high rank for the sake of her child. But he had proved unworthy of her, she discloses with a scornful expression as she declares that she can no longer be willing to consider another marriage. "Upon hearing this, Mr. Emilius bowed low, and before the street-door was closed against him had begun to calculate how much a journey to Scotland would cost him."
All these events did not go unnoticed by the gods on Mount Olympus—in this case, the Pallisers and their friends at Matching Priory. The Pallisers were less involved in this story than in any of the other five novels in the Palliser series. Lady Glencora had intervened a bit, and she had not been wise in choosing sides (a tendency which was to recur in her favoritism of the villain Lopez inThe Prime Minister), and she had called on Lady Eustace to offer her support. But none of the other gods and goddesses challenged her. "It was understood that Lady Glencora was not to be snubbed, though she was very much given to snubbing others. She had attained this position for herself by a mixture of beauty, rank, wealth, and courage;—but the courage had, of the four, been her greatest mainstay." None at Matching were more entertained, however, than the greatest god of all, the old Duke of Omnium. The old duke was in his last days, and "It was admitted by them all that the robbery had been a godsend in the way of amusing the duke."
The Duke was not alone in his enjoyment of the adventures of Lizzie Eustace. The little vixen has provided pleasant diversion for many readers; she continues to amuse.
Perhaps the story of Phineas Finn just wouldn't fit into one novel, at least not within the limits of Trollope Standard Time, in which no nuance of thought or motive is left unexplored. Hence,Phineas Redux. Phineas (as he was known to many of his acquaintances even under the formal conventions of Victorian England) is no more heroic in the second novel than in the first. Would these two novels rank higher in our consciousness if the protagonist had been less flawed? Perhaps. But Phineas's penchant for muddling through without much in the way of strength or resolution is essential to the story. And even though the reader may lose patience with Phineas at times, his foibles and fallibility provide the necessary pinch of charm to this story of political gamesmanship and matrimonial maneuvering.
The familiar characters ofPhineas Finncarry on for us. Mary Flood Jones Finn is missing, her early death having freed Phineas to return to London as a widower and resume his career and his old friendships—especially those with women. The page brightens whenever the Duchess of Omnium or Madame Max Goesler appear.
Why are these women so delightful? Bright, irreverent, saucy, the Duchess uses her lofty position in society as a springboard for making things happen. She appears and reappears in several novels in the Palliser series, sometimes as the prime mover and always as a breath of fresh air. (She even makes a cameo appearance inMiss Mackenzie, an unrelated story.) InPhineas Reduxshe adopts Phineas as a favorite and meddles in his fate, most prominently when she promotes his candidacy for office in opposition to the ambitions of Mr. Bonteen, whom she lures into exposing himself as a boor when her wine prompts him to make some inappropriate speeches at a dinner party. How did the author pass up the opportunity to give us the details of this dialogue? (Simon Raven's screenplay for the BBC television series remedies this omission, showing the viewer exactly how Mr. Bonteen destroyed his career.)
We see the Duchess at work when she initiates her project of promoting the status of Mr. Finn, telling the Duke of St. Bungay that he must find some place for him. In vain does he protest that he never interferes. "Why, Duke, you've made more cabinets than any man living."
She undertakes to promote the marriage prospects of her husband's cousin Adelaide Palliser by making imaginative use of an unclaimed legacy that can be used to remedy the young couple's poverty. She volunteers to intervene in Lord Chiltern's irate assertion that foxes are being poisoned at the Duke's behest. When she offers her money to get Phineas acquitted of the accusation of murdering Mr. Bonteen, the attorney, Mr. Low, is unsuccessful in persuading her that this would be immoral, illegal, and ineffective. "The more money you spend," she says, "the more fuss you make. And the longer a trial is about and the greater the interest, the more chance a man has to escape. If a man is tried for three days you always think he'll get off, but if it lasts ten minutes he is sure to be convicted and hung. I'd have Mr. Finn's trial made so long that they never could convict him."
And what if he should be convicted?
"I'd buy up the Home Secretary. It's very horrid to say so, of course, Mr. Low; and I dare say there is nothing wrong ever done in Chancery. But I know what Cabinet Ministers are. If they could get a majority by granting a pardon they'd do it quick enough."
"I'd buy up the Home Secretary. It's very horrid to say so, of course, Mr. Low; and I dare say there is nothing wrong ever done in Chancery. But I know what Cabinet Ministers are. If they could get a majority by granting a pardon they'd do it quick enough."
She also provides opportunities for her friend Marie Goesler to put herself in the way of Phineas Finn in another match-making venture. And in all these projects she succeeds.
How much help does Madame Max (Marie) Goesler need? Not much, though she accepts the assistance. We have already seen Madame Goesler outface Lady Glencora (before she became Duchess), mocking Glencora when she makes a clumsy effort to dissuade Marie from pursuing a marriage with the old Duke, which would potentially disinherit her oldest son. And in this novel she again takes the high ground with Glencora, winning the love and another proposal from the dying Duke but turning him down, and then refusing the fortune and jewels bequeathed her by the old Duke (except for one little ring she says she will always wear).
Is Madame Goesler too good to be true? She is presented as a young woman, about thirty-two years of age, the same age as Phineas Finn. But she is miles beyond Phineas in maturity and capability. And not only that. Wisdom. Her utterances come across as the wisdom of the ages. In urging Phineas to accept an appointment to the cabinet, she says, "Your foot must be on the ladder before you can get to the top of it."
Madame Max never seems to make a mistake. She handles the attentions of the Duke impeccably, and she manages her relationship with Lady Glencora with wit and consummate skill. Maybe our greatest reservation about her judgment has to do with her steadfast preference for Phineas Finn. But one can hardly doubt the happiness of the favored couple. There is little reason to doubt that Phineas can handle prosperity.
And Phineas Finn: not exactly a hobbledehoy. His gift of gab permits him to sail through social challenges. Perhaps his success with the ladies gives him self confidence. But the reader grits his teeth as Phineas allows himself to be sucked into a foolish quarrel with Mr. Bonteen. And we share Madame Max's counsel to him at the end when he is offered office and cannot bring himself to accept. His density is more believable than Madame Max's wisdom. But here the critic is at odds with the enthusiastic reader who cheers her on.
And what of poor Lady Laura, the other woman who loves Phineas? None of Trollope's women appear more true to life. She pays a long and bitter price for having sacrificed herself to bring financial solvency to her family by a marriage to a lord who ultimately proves himself to be crazy. She bares her soul to Phineas, who gamely attempts to bring temporary solace to a grieving woman. But how can she ever be comforted? Poor Phineas. Many readers may conclude that he does as well as a kind-hearted Irishman can do.
The climax of the story is Phineas's trial for murder, a device that lends pace and urgency to the story. In some respects the case is handled like that of Mr. Crawley inThe Last Chronicle of Barset, in which a trip to the continent is heroically taken by an advocate for the accused, bringing back evidence that breaks open the case—though it is not necessarily essential.
One more thing: Trollope's touch in portraying the professional lawyer is as entertaining a presentation of the creed of the Law as one can hope for. Mr. Chaffanbrass, who is to defend Phineas Finn, has no interest in knowing the truth about the murderer, despite being told that the public wants to know. "[T]he public is ignorant." The public should want to know the truth about the evidence about the murder. "Now the last man to give us any useful insight into the evidence is the prisoner himself. In nineteen cases out of twenty a man tried for murder in this country committed the murder for which he is tried."
After meeting Phineas Finn, Chaffanbrass maintains that he never expresses an opinion of guilt or innocence of a client until the trial is over. In a four-hour speech he argues persuasively for Phineas's innocence, though he reflects over a pint of port wine in a small room afterward that he privately believes him to be guilty. "But to no human being had he expressed this opinion; nor would he express it—unless his client should be hung."
Though perhaps not among the best few of Trollope's novels, why shouldPhineas Reduxnot be rated among the very good ones? The difficulty of such a judgment lies in the even quality of many of the contenders. I would give this one a "very good" rating.