Salisbury which are disgraceful to me, to
my cloth, and to the parish of which I am the incumbent. I do not
believe that your lordship will deny that you have done so, and I,
therefore, call upon you at once to apologise to me for the calumny,
which, in its nature, is as injurious and wicked as calumny can
be, and to promise that you will not repeat the offence." The
Marquis, when he received this, had not as yet written that letter
to the bishop on which he had resolved after his interview with
Gilmore,--feeling, perhaps, some qualms of conscience, thinking that
it might be well that he should consult his son,--though with a
full conviction that, if he did so, his son would not allow him to
write to the bishop at all,--possibly with some feeling that he had
been too hard upon his enemy, the Vicar. But, when the letter from
Bullhampton reached him, all feelings of doubt, caution, and mercy,
were thrown to the winds. The tone of the letter was essentially
aggressive and impudent. It was the word calumny that offended him
most, that, and the idea that he, the Marquis of Trowbridge, should
be called upon to promise not to commit an offence! The pestilent
infidel at Bullhampton, as he called our friend, had not attempted to
deny the visits to the young woman at Salisbury. And the Marquis had
made fresh inquiry which had completely corroborated his previous
information. He had learned Mrs. Stiggs's address, and the name of
Trotter's Buildings, which details were to his mind circumstantial,
corroborative, and damnatory. Some dim account of the battle at the
Three Honest Men had reached him, and the undoubted fact that Carry
Brattle was maintained by the Vicar. Then he remembered all Fenwick's
old anxiety on behalf of the brother, whom the Marquis had taught
himself to regard as the very man who had murdered his tenant.
He reminded himself, too, of the murderer's present escape from
justice by aid of this pestilent clergyman; and thus became
convinced that in dealing with Mr. Fenwick, as it was his undoubted
duty to do, he had to deal with one of the very worst of the human
race. His lordship's mind was one utterly incapable of sifting
evidence,--unable even to understand evidence when it came to him.
He was not a bad man. He desired nothing that was not his own, and
remitted much that was. He feared God, honoured the Queen, and loved
his country. He was not self-indulgent. He did his duties as he knew
them. But he was an arro