The Vicar of Wrexhill

by Frances Milton Trollope

Spring succeeded to winter, and summer to spring, without producing any important change at Cartwright Park. Charles Mowbray requested and obtained permission to continue his studies without interruption, and for five months Helen and Rosalind lived upon his letters, which, spite of all his efforts to prevent it, showed a spirit so utterly depressed as to render them both miserable.

They seemed both of them to be converted into parts of that stately and sumptuous machine which Mr. Cartwright had constructed around him, and of which he was himself the main spring. The number of servants was greatly increased, the equipages were much more splendid, and from an establishment remarkably simple and unostentatious for the income of its owners, the Park became one of the most magnificent in the country.

Among the periodical hospitalities with which the vicar,—for Mr. Cartwright was still Vicar of Wrexhill,—among his periodical hospitalities was a weekly morning party, which opened by prayers read by his curate, and ended by a blessing pronounced by himself.

At about two o'clock a déjeûner à la fourchette was laid in the dining-room, around which were discussed all the serious, and serio-political, and serio-literary subjects of the day. On this occasion the selection of company, though always pious, was not so aristocratical as at the pompous dinners occasionally given at the Park. But what was lost to vanity on one side by the unconspicuous rank of some of the guests, was gained to it on the other by the profound veneration for their host expressed in every word and in every look. Not only Mr. Corbold, the lawyer,—who was indeed in some sort ennobled by his relationship to the great man himself,—but the new curate, and the new apothecary, and even the new schoolmaster, were admitted.

The company were always received by Mr. Cartwright and his lady in the drawing-room, where all the family were expected (that is, commanded on pain of very heavy displeasure) to assemble round them. The tables were covered with bibles, tracts, Evangelical Magazines, sanctified drawings, and missionary begging machines.

Hardly could Chivers, who was become an example to all serious butlers in voice, in look, and in step, produce a more delightful sensation on his master's organs by announcing my Lord This, or my Lady That, than that master received from watching the reverential bows of the sycophants who hung upon his patronage. A sort of frozen blandishment on these occasions smoothed his proud face as he stood, with his lady beside him, to receive them. The tall, obsequious curate, who hardly dared to say his soul was his own, though he freely took upon himself to pronounce the destiny of other people's, bent before him, lower than mortal ever need bend to mortal; and he was rewarded for it by being permitted to aspire to the hand of the only daughter of Mr. Cartwright, of Cartwright Park. The little round apothecary, who by evangelical aid withal had pushed out his predecessor as effectually as ever pellet did pellet in a popgun, sighed, whined, bought tracts, expounded them, kneeled down, though almost too fat to get up again, and would have done aught else that to a canting doctor's art belongs so that it were not physically impossible, for one sole object, which for some months past had hardly quitted his thoughts by day or by night. This lofty object of ambition and of hope was the attending the lady of Mr. Cartwright, of Cartwright Park, at her approaching accouchement.

The new schoolmaster, who was already making hundreds where his unprofessing predecessor made tens of pounds, was a huge, gaunt man, who had already buried three wives, and who had besides, as he hoped and believed, the advantage of being childless;—for he had always made it a custom to quarrel early with his sons and daughters, and send them to seek their fortune where they could find it;—this prosperous gentleman actually and bonâ fide fell in love with Miss Torrington; and having very tolerably good reasons for believing that there were few things at Cartwright Park which might not be won by slavish obedience and canting hypocrisy, he failed not to divide the hours during which he was weekly permitted an entrée there, between ogling the young lady, and worshipping the master of the mansion.

Poor Rosalind had found means, after her dreadful scene with Mowbray, secretly to convey a note to Sir Gilbert, informing him that she no longer wished to change her guardian; as her doing so would not, she feared, enable her to free Helen from her thraldom: she was still therefore Mrs. Cartwright's ward, and the vicar had not yet quite abandoned the hope that his talented son might obtain her and her fortune; but hitherto Mr. Jacob had declined making proposals, avowing that he did not think he was sufficiently advanced in the fair lady's good graces to be quite sure of success. So, as no avowed claim had been hitherto made to her hand, the schoolmaster went on ogling every Wednesday morning, and dreaming every Wednesday night, unchecked by any: for the fair object of his passion was perfectly unconscious of having inspired it.

Mrs. Simpson, of course, never failed to embellish these morning meetings with her presence when she happened to be in the country; but she had lately left it, for the purpose, as it was understood, of making a visit of a month or two to a distant friend, during which she had intended to place her charming little Mimima at a boarding-school in a neighbouring town; but Mr. Cartwright so greatly admired that sweet child's early piety that he recommended his lady to invite her to pass the period of her mamma's absence at Cartwright Park.

Then there were the Richards' family, who for various reasons were among the most constant Wednesday visitors. Mrs. Richards came to see Rosalind, little Mary to whisper good counsel to her friend Fanny, and the two elder sisters to meet all the serious young men that the pompous vicar could collect round him from every village or town in the vicinity.