| | | | | | The recent death of Mrs. Proudie, who was so well known | and so little loved by the readers of Mr. Trollope's novels, | is one of those occasions which ought not to be allowed to | pass away without being improved. To many men it will | suggest many things. She was a type. As a type ought to | be, she was perfect and full-blown. But her characteristics | enter into other women in varying degrees, and with all | sorts of minor colours. The Proudie element in wives and | women is one of those unrecognised yet potent conditions | of life which master us all, and yet are admitted and taken | into calculation and account by none. It is in the nature of | things that such an element should exist, and should be | powerful in this peculiar and oblique way. We deny | women the direct exercise of their capacities, and the | immediate gratification of an overt ambition. The natural | result is that they run to artifice, and that a good-natured | husband is made the conductor between an ambitious wife | and the outer world where the prizes of ambition are | scrambled for. He is the wretched buffer through which the | impetuous forces of his wife impinge upon his neighbours. | That is to say, he leads an uneasy life between two ever | colliding bodies, being equally misunderstood and equally | reviled by either. This is the evil result of a state of things | in which natural distinctions are a very long way from | coinciding. The theory is that women are peaceful | domestic beings, with no object beyond household cares, | no wish nor will outside the objects of the man and his | children, no active opinion or concern in the larger affairs | of the State. Every man, on the other hand, is supposed to | have views and principles about public topics, and to be | anxious to make more or less of a figure in the enforcement | of his views, to exercise in some shape an influence among | his fellows, and to win renown of one sort or another. Of | course if this division of the male and female natures | covered the whole ground, society would be in a very | well-balanced state, and things would go on very smoothly in | consequence of the perfect equilibrium established by the | exceeding contentedness of women and the constant | activity and ambition of men. But a very small observation | of life is quite enough to disclose how ill the facts | correspond with the accepted hypothesis about them. We | are constantly being told of some aspiring man that he is, in | truth, no more than the representative of an aspiring wife. | He would fain live his life in dignified or undignified | serenity, and cares not a jot for a seat in the House of | Commons, or for being made a bishop, or for any of those | other objects which allure men out of a tranquil and | independent existence. But he has a wife who does care for | these things. She cannot be a member of Parliament or a | bishop in her own person, but it is something to be the wife | of somebody who can be these things. A part of the glory | of the man is reflected upon the head of the woman. She | receives her reward in a second-hand way, but still it is | glory of its own sort. She becomes a leading lady in a | provincial town, and during the season in town she is asked | out to houses which she is very eager to get into, and of | which she can talk with easily assumed familiarity when | she returns to the provinces again. She is presented at | Court too, and this makes her descend to the provincial | plain with an aroma of celestial dignity like that of Venus | when she descended from Olympus. A bishop's wife is still | more amply rewarded. Without being so imperious as the | late Mrs. Proudie was, she has still a thousand of those | opportunities for displaying power which are so dear to | people who are fictitiously supposed to be too weak to care | for power. Minor canons, incumbents curates, and all their | wives, pay her profound deference; or, if they do not, she | can

"put the screw on"

in a gushing manner | which is exceedingly effective. | There are women, it is true, with souls above these light | social matters. They do not particularly value the privilege | of figuring as lady-patroness of a ball or bazaar, or the | delights of trampling on a curate, or of being distantly | adored by the wife of a minor canon. But they really have | an interest in politics, or in some one or two special | departments of that comprehensive subject. They would | like to pass an Act of Parliament making it a capital offence | for any guardian of the poor or relieving office to refuse to | give the paupers as much as they should choose to ask for. | Drainage is the strong point of some women. Sewage with | them is the key to civilization. Perhaps most political | women are actively interested in public affairs simply | because they perceive that this is the most openly | recognized sphere of influence and power; and what they | yearn after is to be influential, and to stand on something | higher than the ordinary level in the world, for no other | reason than that it is higher than the ordinary level. | Nobody has any right to find fault with this temper, | provided the ladies who are possessed by it do not mistake | mere domineering for the extraordinary elevation after | which they aspire. It is through this temper, whether in one | sex or the other, that the world is made better. If a certain | number of men and women were not ambitious what would | become of the rest of us who possess our souls in patience | and moderation? | The only question is whether what we may call vicarious | ambition, or aspirations by proxy, are particularly desirable | forms of a confessedly useful and desirable sentiment. For | the peace of mind of the man who is not ambitious, but is | only pretending to be so, we may be pretty sure that the | domestic stimulus has some drawbacks. We do not mean | drawbacks after the manner of Mrs. Caudle. These show a | coarse and vulgar conception of the goads which a man | may have applied to him in his inner circle. There are | moral and unheard reproofs. There is a consciousness in | the mind of a man that his wife thinks him (with all | possible affection and tenderness) rather a poor creature for | not taking his position in the world. And if he happens to | be a man of anything like fine sensibility, this will make | him exceedingly uneasy. The uneasiness may than become | sufficiently decided to make him willing to undergo any | amount of labour and outlay, rather than endure the | presence of this aethereal skeleton in the family closet. He | is quite right. He could barely preserve his self-respect | otherwise. But he is mistaken if he fancies that a single | step or a single series of steps will demolish the skeleton | entirely. One compliance with the ambition of his wife will | speedily beget the necessity for another. It is notorious that | a thoroughly aspiring man is never content without the | prospect of scaling new heights. No more is an aspiring | woman. Whether you are directly ambitious, as a man is, | and for yourself, or indirectly and for somebody else, as a | woman is, in either case the law is the same. New summits | ever glitter in the distance. You have got your husband into | the House of Commons. That glory suffices for a month. | At the end of two months it seems a very dim glory indeed, | and, having long been an end, it by this time sinks into the | second place of a means. The sacrificial calf must next be | made to speak. He must acquire a reputation. Here in a | good many cases, we suspect, the process finally stops. A | man may be got into the House, but the coveted exaltation | of that atmosphere does not convert a quiet, peaceable, dull | man into an orator. It does not give him ideas and the | faculty of articulate speech. At this point, if he be wise, he | draws the line. He endures the skeleton as best he may, or | else his wife, quenching her ambition, resigns herself to | incurable destiny, and learns to be content with the limits | set by the fates to her lord's capacities. There are still | certain fields open to her own powers, irrespective of what | he is able to do. For example, she may open a | salon, and there may exert | unspeakable influence over all kinds of important people. | This is not at present particularly congenial to English | ground. As yet, the most vigorous intellectual people seem | to have felt an active social life as something beneath them, | and the highly social people have not been conspicuous for | the activity of their intellectual life. The people who go so | greatly to parties do not care for what they sum up, with an | admirably comprehensive vagueness, as

"intellect"; |

while, on the other hand, scholars and thinkers are | wont to look on time given to society as something very | like time absolutely wasted. In such a state of feeling, it is | difficult for a clever woman to exercise much power. But, | as other things improve, this unsocial feeling will dissolve. | Clever men will see that a couple of hours spent with other | clever men are not wasted just because a lady is of the | party. Nobody would seriously maintain that this is so even | now, but people are very often strongly under the influence | of vague notions which they would never dream of | seriously maintaining. When women get their rights, the | salon will become an institution. | It will create a very fine field for the cultivation of their | talents. And in proportion as it allows a woman to make a | career for herself, it will bring relief to many excellent | husbands who will then no longer have to make careers for | them at the expense of overstraining their own too slender | powers. It is possible, however, that even then the husband | of an ambitious wife may not be fully contented. For | people with any degree of weakness or incapacity in them | are always more prone than their neighbours to littleness | and meannesses, and a man who is not able to win much | renown on his own account may possibly not be too well | pleased to see his wife surrounded by his intellectual | betters. Indeed, he may even, if he is of a very mean nature | indeed, resent the spectacle of her own predominance. It is | some comfort to think that in such case the man's own | temper will be his severest punishment. | As a rule, however, it is pleasant to think that with ambition | in women, which is not their peculiarity, is yoked tact, | which is their peculiarity emphatically. Hence, therefore, | wives who are ambitious for their lords have often the | discretion to conceal their mood. They may rule with a | hand of iron, but the hand is sagely concealed in a glove of | velvet. A man may be the creature of his wife's lofty | projects, and yet dream all the time that he is | | altogether chalking out his own course. George II, used to | be humoured in this way by Queen Caroline. Bishop | Proudie, on the other hand, was ruled by his wife, and knew | that he was a mere weapon in her hands; and, what was | even worse than all, knew that the rest of mankind knew | this. This must be uncommonly unpleasant, we should | suppose. The middle position of the husband who only | now and then suspects in a dreamy way that he is being | prompted and urged on and directed by an ambitious wife, | and has sense enough not inflame himself with chimerical | notions about the superiority and grandeur of the male sex | ~~ this perhaps is not so bad. If the tide of ambition runs | rather sluggish in yourself, it is a plain advantage to have | somebody at your side with enthusiasm enough to atone for | the deficiency. It is impossible to tell how much good the | world gets, which otherwise it would miss, simply out of | the fact that women are discontented with their position. | Now and then, it is understood, the husband who is thus | made a mere conductor for the mental electricity of a wife | who is too clever for him may feel a little bored, and almost | wish that he had married a girl instead. But enthusiasm | spreads, and in a general way the fervour of the wife who | aspires to distinction proves catching to the husband. Some | ladies are found to prefer this position to any other. They | are full of power, and have abundance of room for energy, | and yet they have no responsibility. They get their ample | share of the spoil, and yet they do not bear the public heat | and burden of the day. It is only the more martial souls | among them for whom this is not enough.