The Vicar of Wrexhill

by Frances Milton Trollope

"Absolutely!" was the word caught by echo for the reply.

"Have the goodness, Mr. Hetherington, to sit down at that small table—you will there find all things needful for writing, and indite the handbill that will be necessary for us. There is a warmth of feeling at this blessed moment generated among us towards this holy work, which it would be sin to neglect. Let it not, like those good feelings and resolutions of which we have been told by the preacher, pass away from us to pave the courts of hell, and be trodden under the feet of the scorners who inhabit there. No, my brethren; let it rather rise like a sweet savour of incense, to tell that not in vain do we pronounce His name on earth!"

Before these words were all spoken, the assiduous curate was already seated, pen in hand, as nearly as possible in the attitude of Dominichino's St. John, and looking up to Mr. Cartwright for inspiration.

In truth, the vicar, though the dignity of a secretary was in some sort necessary to his happiness, would by no means have intrusted the sketching out of this document to any hand but his own. He felt it to be probable that it might become matter of history, and as such it demanded his best attention. While Mr. Hetherington therefore sat with his pen between his fingers, like a charged gun waiting for the pressure of the finger that should discharge it, Mr. Cartwright, with the ready hand of a master produced the following outline in pencil.

Cartwright Park.
On Wednesday the 12th July, 1834,
will be held
a serious
Fancy Fair,
on the lawn of the Rev. Mr. Cartwright's
Mansion,
at
Cartwright Park,
For the promotion of an object
most precious
in the eyes of all
Professing Christians:
namely,
The fitting out a mission to Fababo, of which the Rev. Isaac
Isaacs is to be the head and chief; to him being intrusted the
first formation of an organised Christian establishment for
Fababo
and its dependencies, together with the regulation of all adult
and infant schools therein, and the superintendance of all the
bible societies throughout the district.
Large Funds
being required for this very promising and useful mission, the
ladies and gentlemen in the neighbourhood of Cartwright
Park are religiously requested to attend the Serious Fancy
Fair hereby announced, both as contributors and purchasers;
whereby they will ensure the especial favour of Providence to
themselves, and the blessings of religious and civil freedom,
and the purest evangelical instruction, to unnumbered
thousands
yet unborn
of
the natives
of
Fababo.
N.B.—Collations will be served at three o'clock in five
of the principal saloons of Mr. Cartwright's mansion.
Prayers to be pronounced at one.
Blessing (from the Reverend Mr. Cartwright himself) at five.
The whole of the religious ceremonies to be performed in the open air.

This sketch, as the inspired author called it, having been read aloud and approved by acclamation, was delivered to the curate to copy; and as soon as this was completed, Mr. Cartwright received it from him, and holding it aloft in his right hand, pronounced aloud, in a very solemn and impressive manner, these words: "May this service, dedicated to the Lord, be found acceptable in his sight, and bring forth honour and glory to us and to him in the world to come and the life everlasting. Amen."

This business happily completed, the religious amusements of the morning continued to go on as usual;—Mr. Bateman, the enamoured schoolmaster, constantly sitting, standing, and moving, with his eyes fixed on Miss Torrington; and the despairing Corbold, whose six passionate proposals had been six times formally refused by Helen, reposing himself on a sofa in deep meditation on the ways and means by which he might so wheedle or work himself into the secrets of his magnificent cousin as to make it necessary for him to wink at any means by which he could get Helen into his power, and so oblige her to marry him.

At length the elegant banquet drew the company from their tracts and their talk to the dinner-parlour; and iced champagne refreshed the spirits of all, but particularly of those exhausted by the zealous warmth with which they had discussed the sinful adherence to good works so frightfully prevalent among the unregenerated clergy of the Church of England and Ireland. This was a theme upon which the majority of the company at the Cartwright Park meetings never wearied.

At length, the final blessing was pronounced, the party separated, and the tired family left to repose themselves as they best liked till the hour of dinner.

The increasing delicacy of Miss Cartwright's health, and Rosalind's drooping spirits, had prevented the intimacy between them from gaining ground so rapidly as they had, perhaps, both expected, when the families of the Park and Vicarage became blended into one. Yet it was evident that Rosalind was the only person to whom the pale Henrietta ever wished to speak, and equally so that Rosalind always listened to her with interest.