CHAPTER XV.
When it became obvious that the College Grants Notification held fatefulpossibilities for John Church personally, and for his wife incidentally,it rapidly developed into a topic. Ladies, in the course of middayvisits in each other’s cool drawing-rooms, repeated things theirhusbands had let fall at dinner the night before, and said they wereawfully sorry for Mrs. Church; it must be too trying for her, poorthing. If it were only on _her_ account, some of them thought, theLieutenant-Governor—the “L.G.,” they called him—ought to let things goon as they always had. What difference did it make anyway! At the clubsthe matter superseded, for the moment, the case of an army chaplainaccused of improper conduct at Singapore, and bets were freely laid onthe issue—three to one that Church would be “smashed.” If this attitudeseemed less sympathetic than that of the ladies, it betokened at leastno hostility. On the contrary, no small degree of appreciation wascurrent for His Honour. He would not have heard the matter discussedoften from his own point of view, but that was because his own point ofview was very much his own property. He might have heard himselfcommended from a good many others, however, and especially on the groundof his pluck. Men said between their cigars that very few fellows wouldcare to put their hands to such a piece of _zubberdusti_[D] at this endof the century, however much it was wanted. Personally they hoped thebeggar would get it through, and with equal solicitude they proceeded tobet that he wouldn’t. Among the sentiments the beggar evoked, perhapsthe liveliest was one of gratitude for so undeniable a sensation so nearthe end of the cold weather, when sensations were apt to take flight,with other agreeable things, to the hill stations.
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Footnote D:
“High-handed proceeding.”
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The storm reached a point when the Bishop felt compelled to put forth anallaying hand from the pulpit of the Cathedral. As the head of theIndian Establishment the Bishop felt himself allied in no common waywith the governing power, and His Lordship was known to hold strongviews on the propriety with which lawn sleeves might wave abovequestions of public importance. Besides, neither Dr. MacInnes norProfessor Porter were lecturing on the binomial theorem underEstablished guidance, while as to Father Ambrose, he positively invitedcriticism, with his lives of the Saints. When, therefore, the Cathedralcongregation heard his Lordship begin his sermon with the sonorousannouncement from Ecclesiastes,
“_For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow. He—that increaseth—knowledge—increaseth—sorrow_,”
it listened, with awakened interest, for a snub to Dr. MacInnes andProfessor Porter, and for a rebuke, full of dignity and austerity, toFather Ambrose; both of which were duly administered. His Lordship’sviews, supported by the original Preacher, were doubtless more valuablein his sermon than they would be here, but it is due to him to say thatthey formed the happiest combination of fealty and doctrine. TheHonourable Mr. Ancram said to Sir William Scott on the Cathedral stepsafter the service—it was like the exit of a London theatre, with peoplewaiting for their carriages—that while his Lordship’s reference was veryproper and could hardly fail to be of use, public matters looked seriouswhen they came to be discussed in the pulpit. To which Sir William gavea deprecating agreement.
Returning to his somewhat oppressively lonely quarters, Ancram felt theneed of further conversation. The Bishop had stirred him to vigorousdissent, which his Lordship’s advantage of situation made peculiarlyirritating to so skilled an observer of weak points. He bethoughthimself that he might write to Philip Doyle. He remembered that Doylehad not answered the letter in which he had written of his changeddomestic future, frankly asking for congratulation rather than forcondolence; but without resentment, for why should a man trouble himselfunder Florentine skies with unnecessary Calcutta correspondents? Heconsulted only his own pleasure in writing again: Doyle was so readilyappreciative, he would see the humour in the development of affairs withHis Honour. It was almost a week since Mr. Ancram had observed at theball, with acute annoyance, what an unreasonable effect the matter washaving upon Judith Church, and he was again himself able to see thehumour of it. He finally wrote with much facility a graphicallydescriptive letter, in which the Bishop came in as a mere picturesquedetail at the end. He seemed to pick his way, as he turned the pages,out of an embarrassing moral quagmire; he was so obviously high and drywhen he could fix the whole thing in a caricature of effectiveparagraphs. He wrote:—
/# “I don’t mind telling you privately that I have no respect whateverfor the scheme, and very little for the author of it. He reminds one ofnothing so #/ /# much as an elderly hen sitting, with the obstinacy ofher kind, on eggs out of which it is easy to see no addled reform willever step to crow. He is as blind as a bat to his own deficiencies. Idoubt whether even his downfall will convince him that his proper sphereof usefulness in life was that of a Radical cobbler. He has a noblepreference for the ideal of an impeccable Indian administrator, which hegoes about contemplating, while his beard grows with the tale of hisblunders. The end, however, cannot be far off. Bengal is howling for hisretirement; and, notwithstanding a fulsome habit he has recentlydeveloped of hanging upon my neck for sympathy, I own to you that, ifcircumstances permitted, I would howl too.” #/
Ancram’s first letter had miscarried, a peon in the service of theSirkar having abstracted the stamps; and Philip Doyle, when he receivedthe second, was for the moment overwhelmed with inferences from hiscorrespondent’s silence regarding the marriage, which should have beenimminent when he wrote. Doyle glanced rapidly through another Calcuttaletter that arrived with Ancram’s for possible news; but the briefsensation of Miss Daye’s broken engagement had expired long before itwas written, and it contained no reference to the affair. The theory ofa postponement suggested itself irresistibly; and he spent an absorbedand motionless twenty minutes, sitting on the edge of his bed, while hispipe went out in his hand, looking fixedly at the floor of his room inthe hotel, and engaged in constructing the tissue of circumstances whichwould make such a thing likely. If he did not grow consciouslylighter-hearted with this occupation, at least he turned, at the end ofit, to re-peruse his letters, as if they had brought him good news. Heread them both carefully again, and opened the newspaper that came withthe second. It was a copy of the _Bengal Free Press_, and his friend ofthe High Court had called his special attention to its leading article,as the most caustic and effective attack upon the College GrantsNotification which had yet appeared. Mr. Justice Shears wrote:—
/# “As you will see, there is abundant intrinsic evidence that no nativewrote it. My own idea, which I share with a good many people, is that itcame from the pen of the Director of Education, which is as facile as itwould very naturally be hostile. Let me know #/ /# what you think.Ancram is non-committal, but he talks of Government’s prosecuting thepaper, which looks as if the article had already done harm.” #/
Doyle went through the editorial with interest that increased as his eyetravelled down the column. He smiled as he read; it was certainly atelling and a forcible presentation of the case against His Honour’spolicy, adorned with gibes that were more damaging than its argument.Suddenly he stopped, with a puzzled look, and read the last part of asentence once again:—
/# “But he has a noble preference for the ideal of an impeccable Indianadministrator, which he goes about contemplating, while his beard growswith the tale of his blunders.” #/
The light of a sudden revelation twinkled in Doyle’s eyes—a revelationwhich showed the Chief Secretary to the Bengal Government led on byvanity to forgetfulness. He reopened Ancram’s letter, and convincedhimself that the words were precisely those he had read there. Forfurther assurance, he glanced at the dates of the letter and thenewspaper: the one had been written two days before the other had beenprinted. Presently he put them down, and instinctively rubbed his thumband the ends of his fingers together with the light, rapid movement withwhich people assure thems
elves that they have touched nothing soiling.He permitted himself no characterisation of the incident—loftydenunciation was not part of Doyle’s habit of mind—beyond what mighthave been expressed in the somewhat disgusted smile with which here-lighted his pipe. It was like him that his principal reflection had apersonal tinge, and that it was forcible enough to find words. “And I,”he said, with a twinkle at his own expense, “lived nine months in thesame house with that skunk!”