Punch (99.1890)

October 25, 1890.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. 193

MR. PUNCH'S PRIZE NOVELS.

No. IV-BOB SILLIMERE.

(By Mrs. Humphry John Waed Preacher, Autlwr of ''Master
Sisterson.")

[On the paper in which the MS. of this novel was wrapped, the following
note was written in a bold feminine hand :—" This is a bighly religious story.
Geoegb Eliot was unable to write properly about religion. The novel is
certain to be well reviewed. It is calculated to adorn the Btudy-table of a
Bishop. The £1000 prize must be handed over at once to the Institute
which is to be founded to encourage new religions in the alleys of St.
Pancras.—H. J. W. P."]

Chaptee I.

It was evening—evening in Oxford. There are evenings in other
plaees_ occasionally. Cambridge sometimes puts forward weak
imitations. But, on the whole, there are no evenings which have so
much of the true, inward, mystic spirit as Oxford evenings. A
solemn hush broods over the grey quadrangles, and this, too, in spite
of the happy laughter of the undergraduates playing touch last on
the grass-plots, and leaping, like a merry army of marsh-dwellers,
each over the back of the other, on their way to the deeply impressive
services of their respective college chapels. Inside, the organs

taken occasion to point out to Black that family livings were corrupt
and indefensible institutions. Still, the thing had to be done ; and
bitterly as Bob pined for the bracing air of the East End of London,
he acknowledged, with one of his quick, bright flashes, that, unless
he went to "Wendover, he could never meet Squire Mtjbewell,
whose powerful arguments were to drive him from positions he had
never qualified himself, except by an irrational enthusiasm, to defend.
Of Cathebine a word must be said. Cold, with the delicate but
austere firmness of a Westmoreland daisy, gifted with fatally Bharp
lines about the chin and mouth, and habitually wearing loose grey
gowns, with bodices to match, she was admirably calculated, with
her narrow, meat-tea proclivities, to embitter the amiable Silli-
meee's existence, and to produce, in conjunction with him, that
storm and stress, that perpetual clashing of two estimates without
which no modern religious novel could be written, and which not
even her pale virginal grace of look and form could subdue. That is
a long sentence, but, ah! how short is a merely mortal sentence,
with its tyrannous full stop, against the immeasurable background
of the December stars, by whose light Bob was now walking, with
heightened colour, along the vast avenue that led to Wendover Hall,
the residence of the ogre Squire.

Chat-tee IV.

were pealing majestically, in response to 'the deft fingers of many The Squire was at home. On the door-Btep Bob was greeted by
highly respectable musicians, and all the proud traditions, the I Mrs. Farcey, the Squire's sister. She looked at him in her bird-like

legendary struggles, the well-loved
examinations, the affectionate memo-
ries of generations of proctorial officers,
the innocent rustications, the warning
appeals of authoritative Deans — all
these seemed gathered together into
one last loud trumpet-call, as a tall,
impressionable youth, carrying with
him a spasm of feeling, a Celtic tem-
perament, a moved, flashing look, and
a surplice many Bizes too large for him,
dashed with a kind of quivering,
breathless sigh, into the chapel of St.
Boniface's just as the porter was about
to close the door. This was Robert,
or, as his friends lovingly called him,
Bob Sillimebe. His mother had been
an Irish lady, full of the best Irish
humour ; after a short trial, she was,
however, found to be a superfluous
character, and as she began to develop
differences with Catherine, she caught
an acute inflammation of the lungs,
and died after a few days, in the
eleventh chapter.

Bob sat Btill awhile, his agitation
soothed by the comforting sense of the
oaken seat beneath him. At school he
had been called by his school-fellows
"the Knitting-needle," a remarkable
example of the well-known fondness of boys for sharp, short nicknames;
but this did not trouble him now. He and his eagerness, his boundless
curiosity, and his lovable mistakes, were now part and paroel of the
new life of Oxford—new to him, but old as the ages, that, with their

rhythmic recurrent flow, like the pulse of-[ Two pages of fancy

writing are here omitted. Ed.] Bbigham and Black were in chapei,
too. They were Dons; older than Bob, hut his intimate friends.
They had but little belief, but Black often preached, and Bbigham
held undecided views on life and matrimony, having been brought
up in the cramped atmosphere of a middle-class parlour. At Oxford,
the two took pupils, and helped to shape Bob's life. Once Bbigham
had pretended, as an act of pure benevolence, to be a Pro-Proctor,
but as he had a sardonic scorn, and a face which could become a
marble mask, the Vice-Chancellor called upon him to resign his
position, and he never afterwards repeated the experiment.

Chaptee II.

One evening Bob was wandering dreamily on the banks of the
Upper River. He sat down, and thought deeply. Opposite to him
was a wide green expanse dotted with white patches of geese. There
and then, by the gliding river, with a mass of reeds and a few
poplars to fill in the landscape, he determined to become a clergyman.
How strange that he should never have thought of this before; how
sudden it was; how wonderful! But the die was cast; alea facta
est, as he had read yesterday in an early edition of St. Augustine ;
and, when Bob rose, there was a new brightness in his eye, and a
fresh springiness in his steps. And at that moment the deep hell ef

St. Mary's-[Three pages omitted. Ed.]

Chaptee III.

And thus Bob was ordained, and, having married Cathebine, he
accepted the family living of Wendover, though not before he had

way. At other times she was elf-like,
and played tricks with a lace hand-
kerchief.

" You know," she whispered to Bob,
"we're all mad here. I'm mad, and
he," she continued, bobbing diminu-
tively towards the Squire's study-door,
" he's mad too—as mad as a hatter."

Before Bob had time to answer this
strange remark, the study-door flew
open, and Squire Mueewell stepped
forth. He rapped out an oath or two,
which Bob noticed with faint polite-
ness, and ordered his visitor to enter.
The Squire was rough—very rough;
but he had studied hard in Germany.

"So you're the young fool," he
observed, "who intends to tackle me.
Ha, ha, that's a good joke. I '11 have
you round my little finger in two twos.
Here," he went on gruffly, " take this
book of mine in your right hand.
Throw your eyes up to the ceiling."
Robert, wishing to conciliate him, did
as he desired. The eyes stuck there,
and looked down with a quick lovable
look on the two men below. "Now,"
said the Squire, " you can't see.
Pronounce the word ' testimony' twice,
slowly. Think of a number, multiply
by four, subtract the Thirty-nine Articles, add a Sunday School and
a packet of buns. Result, you 're a freethinker." And with that
he bowed Bob out of the room.

Chapter V.

A tebetble stoTm was raging in the Rector's breast as he strode,
regardless of the cold, along the verdant lanes of Wendover. " Fool
that I was! " he muttered, pressing both hands convulsively to his
sides. " Why did I not pay more attention to arithmetic at school ?
I could have cmshed him, but I was ignorant. Was that result
right ? " He reflected awhile mournfully, but he could bring it out
in no other way. " I must go through with it to the bitter end," he
concluded, "and Catherine must be told." But the thought of
Cathebine knitting quietly at home, while she read Fox's Book
of Martyrs, with a tender smile on her thin lips, unmanned him.
He sobbed bitterly. The front-door of the Rectory was open. He

walked in.-The rest is soon told. He resigned the Rectory, and

made a brand-new religion. Cathebine frowned, but it was useless.
Thereupon she gave him cold bacon for lunch during a whole fort-
night, and the brave young soul which had endured so much
withered under this blight. And thus, acknowledging the novelist's
artistic necessity, Robebt died.-[The End,]

Wintee Season at Covent Gaede:n,~Opening of Italian Opera
last Saturday, with A 'ida. Very well done. '' Wait'' between Second
and Third Act too long: "Waiters" in Gallery whistling. Wind
whistling, too, in Stalls. Operatic and rheumatic. Rugs and fur capes
might be kept on hire by Stall-keepers. Airs in A'ida delightful:
draughts in Stalls awful. Signor Lago called before Curtain to receive
First Night congratulations. Signor Lago ought to do good business
'' in front," as there's evidently no difficulty in " raising the wind."

vol, xoxs.

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