wn daughter! He is; he is noble and good and
high-minded; he is all that a woman can love and a man admire. He
shall be my son, my own son. He shall be as close to my heart as you
are. My Nelly, my child, my happy, happy child!"

We need not pursue the interview any further. By degrees they returned
to the subject of the new promotion. Eleanor tried to prove to him,
as the Grantlys had done, that his age could be no bar to his being a
very excellent dean, but those arguments had now even less weight on
him than before. He said little or nothing but sat, meditative. Every
now and then he would kiss his daughter and say "yes," or "no," or
"very true," or "well, my dear, I can't quite agree with you there,"
but he could not be got to enter sharply into the question of "to be,
or not to be" Dean of Barchester. Of her and her happiness, of Mr.
Arabin and his virtues, he would talk as much as Eleanor desired--and
to tell the truth, that was not a little--but about the deanery
he would now say nothing further. He had got a new idea into his
head--why should not Mr. Arabin be the new dean?

CHAPTER L

The Archdeacon Is Satisfied with the State of Affairs

The archdeacon, in his journey into Barchester, had been assured
by Mr. Harding that all their prognostications about Mr. Slope and
Eleanor were groundless. Mr. Harding, however, had found it very
difficult to shake his son-in-law's faith in his own acuteness. The
matter had, to Dr. Grantly, been so plainly corroborated by such
patent evidence, borne out by such endless circumstances, that he at
first refused to take as true the positive statement which Mr. Harding
made to him of Eleanor's own disavowal of the impeachment. But at last
he yielded in a qualified way. He brought himself to admit that he
would at the present regard his past convictions as a mistake, but in
doing this he so guarded himself that if, at any future time, Eleanor
should come forth to the world as Mrs. Slope, he might still be able
to say: "There, I told you so. Remember what you said and what I
said; and remember also for coming years, that I was right in this
matter--as in all others."

He carried, however, his concession so far as to bring himself to
undertake to call at Eleanor's house, and he did call accordingly,
while the father and daughter were yet in the middle of their
conference. Mr. Harding had had so much to hear and to say that he
had forgotten to advise Eleanor of the honou