Framley Parsonage, Anthony Trollope [popular e readers txt] 📗

our mutton is devoured, or in a lukewarm state past our power of managing; and Ganymede, the greengrocer, though we admire the skill of his necktie and the whiteness of his unexceptionable gloves, fails to keep us going in Sherry.

Seeing a lady the other day in this strait, left without a small modicum of stimulus which was no doubt necessary for her good digestion, I ventured to ask her to drink wine with me. But when I bowed my head at her, she looked at me with all her eyes, struck with amazement. Had I suggested that she should join me in a wild Indian war-dance, with nothing on but my paint, her face could not have shown greater astonishment. And yet I should have thought she might have remembered the days when Christian men and women used to drink wine with each other.

God be with the good old days when I could hobnob with my friend over the table as often as I was inclined to lift my glass to my lips, and make a long arm for a hot potato whenever the exigencies of my plate required it.

I think it may be laid down as a rule in affairs of hospitality, that whatever extra luxury or grandeur we introduce at our tables when guests are with us, should be introduced for the advantage of the guest and not for our own. If, for instance, our dinner be served in a manner different from that usual to us, it should be so served in order that our friends may with more satisfaction eat our repast than our everyday practice would produce on them. But the change should by no means be made to their material detriment in order that our fashion may be acknowledged. Again, if I decorate my sideboard and table, wishing that the eyes of my visitors may rest on that which is elegant and pleasant to the sight, I act in that matter with a becoming sense of hospitality; but if my object be to kill Mrs. Jones with envy at the sight of all my silver trinkets, I am a very mean-spirited fellow. This, in a broad way, will be acknowledged; but if we would bear in mind the same idea at all times⁠—on occasions when the way perhaps may not be so broad, when more thinking may be required to ascertain what is true hospitality⁠—I think we of the eight hundred would make a greater advance towards really entertaining our own friends than by any rearrangement of the actual meats and dishes which we set before them.

Knowing as we do, that the terms of the Lufton-Grantly alliance had been so solemnly ratified between the two mothers, it is perhaps hardly open to us to suppose that Mrs. Grantly was induced to take her daughter to Mrs. Proudie’s by any knowledge which she may have acquired that Lord Dumbello had promised to grace the bishop’s assembly. It is certainly the fact that high contracting parties do sometimes allow themselves a latitude which would be considered dishonest by contractors of a lower sort; and it may be possible that the archdeacon’s wife did think of that second string with which her bow was furnished. Be that as it may, Lord Dumbello was at Mrs. Proudie’s, and it did so come to pass that Griselda was seated at the corner of a sofa close to which was a vacant space in which his lordship could⁠—“group himself.”

They had not been long there before Lord Dumbello did group himself. “Fine day,” he said, coming up and occupying the vacant position by Miss Grantly’s elbow.

“We were driving today, and we thought it rather cold,” said Griselda.

“Deuced cold,” said Lord Dumbello, and then he adjusted his white cravat and touched up his whiskers. Having got so far, he did not proceed to any other immediate conversational efforts; nor did Griselda. But he grouped himself again as became a marquis, and gave very intense satisfaction to Mrs. Proudie.

“This is so kind of you, Lord Dumbello,” said that lady, coming up to him and shaking his hand warmly; “so very kind of you to come to my poor little tea-party.”

“Uncommonly pleasant, I call it,” said his lordship. “I like this sort of thing⁠—no trouble, you know.”

“No; that is the charm of it: isn’t it? no trouble, or fuss, or parade. That’s what I always say. According to my ideas, society consists in giving people facility for an interchange of thoughts⁠—what we call conversation.”

“Aw, yes, exactly.”

“Not in eating and drinking together⁠—eh, Lord Dumbello? And yet the practice of our lives would seem to show that the indulgence of those animal propensities can alone suffice to bring people together. The world in this has surely made a great mistake.”

“I like a good dinner all the same,” said Lord Dumbello.

“Oh, yes, of course⁠—of course. I am by no means one of those who would pretend to preach that our tastes have not been given to us for our enjoyment. Why should things be nice if we are not to like them?”

“A man who can really give a good dinner has learned a great deal,” said Lord Dumbello, with unusual animation.

“An immense deal. It is quite an art in itself; and one which I, at any rate, by no means despise. But we cannot always be eating⁠—can we?”

“No,” said Lord Dumbello, “not always.” And he looked as though he lamented that his powers should be so circumscribed.

And then Mrs. Proudie passed on to Mrs. Grantly. The two ladies were quite friendly in London; though down in their own neighbourhood they waged a war so internecine in its nature. But nevertheless Mrs. Proudie’s manner might have showed to a very close observer that she knew the difference between a bishop and an archdeacon. “I am so delighted to see you,” said she. “No, don’t mind moving; I won’t sit down just at present. But why didn’t the archdeacon come?”

“It was quite impossible; it was indeed,” said Mrs. Grantly. “The archdeacon never has a moment in London that