continued, as he declares, to 'live much in company with her ghost.' I should guess, though I cannot speak from a wide personal observation of the class, that no British bishop was ever so thoroughly henpecked as Dr. Proudie. The case was at any rate exceptional, and yet, or therefore, is thoroughly lifelike. Mrs. Proudie, that is, is one genuine type, albeit a very rare one, of the Englishwoman of the period, and Trollope draws her vigorously, because her qualities are only an excessive development of very commonplace failings. In such cases Trollope can deal with his characters vigorously and freely, and we do not feel that their vitality has been lowered from a mistaken desire to avoid a strain upon our powers of belief. He can really understand people on a certain plane of intelligence. His pompous officials at public offices, and dull members of Parliament, and here and there such disreputable persons as he ventures to sketch, as, for example, the shrewd contractor in Dr. Thorne, who is ruined by his love of gin, are solid and undeniable realities. We see the world as it was, only in a dark mirror which is incapable of reflecting the fairer shades of thought and custom.
Hawthorne's appreciation of Trollope's strain
