w outfit for Mrs.
Quiverful and her three elder daughters. Such consolations come
home to the heart of a man, and quite home to the heart of a woman.
Whatever the husband might feel, the wife cared nothing for frowns
of dean, archdeacon, or prebendary. To her the outsides and insides
of her husband and fourteen children were everything. In her bosom
every other ambition had been swallowed up in that maternal ambition
of seeing them and him and herself duly clad and properly fed.
It had come to that with her that life had now no other purpose.
She recked nothing of the imaginary rights of others. She had no
patience with her husband when he declared to her that he could not
accept the hospital unless he knew that Mr. Harding had refused it.
Her husband had no right to be quixotic at the expense of fourteen
children. The narrow escape of throwing away his good fortune which
her lord had had, almost paralysed her. Now, indeed, they had
received a full promise, not only from Mr. Slope, but also from
Mrs. Proudie. Now, indeed, they might reckon with safety on their
good fortune. But what if all had been lost? What if her fourteen
bairns had been resteeped to the hips in poverty by the morbid
sentimentality of their father? Mrs. Quiverful was just at present a
happy woman, but yet it nearly took her breath away when she thought
of the risk they had run.

"I don't know what your father means when he talks so much of what is
due to Mr. Harding," she said to her eldest daughter. "Does he think
that Mr. Harding would give him L450 a year out of fine feeling? And
what signifies it whom he offends, as long as he gets the place?
He does not expect anything better. It passes me to think how your
father can be so soft, while everybody around him is so griping."

Thus, while the outer world was accusing Mr. Quiverful of rapacity
for promotion and of disregard to his honour, the inner world of his
own household was falling foul of him, with equal vehemence, for
his willingness to sacrifice their interests to a false feeling of
sentimental pride. It is astonishing how much difference the point
of view makes in the aspect of all that we look at!

Such were the feelings of the different members of the family at
Puddingdale on the occasion of Mr. Slope's second visit. Mrs.
Quiverful, as soon as she saw his horse coming up the avenue from the
vicarage gate, hastily packed up her huge basket of needlework and
hurried herself and her daugh