One of the things said of Anthony Trollope by an enthusiastic reader of his work which struck me was ‘I trust Trollope’. Should we? Is there mischief in Anthony, a sly misdirection between the deictic events, what he shows and what he tells us in his direct interpolations. Henry James did not like this breaking of the fabulous spell preferring to lay his mazing anfractuosities there on the page. None of your, please note I have nothing up my sleeve and my fingers never leave my hand.
Is Trollope telling the truth? Looking the Palliser series I find his insistence that Frank Tregear was not after the money that Lady Mary would undoubtedly bring his way a little strained. After all Lady Mabel and he had broken off their attachment due to the fact that neither of them had any money. She loves him but knows that a life of penury would be impossible for them owing to their aristocratic taste for the finer things in life. I also recall that Frank has a brother that is due to inherit the modest estate in Cornwall but that he will probably not ever marry and is generally abroad travelling. Might he be eaten by a lion or destroyed by Corsican bandits or succumb to yellow fever? This could be a way of resolving the funds impasse. Frank however does not live in that suspended state and in a few months, takes his permission to seek another to Rome. He doesn’t go in for languish as does Lady Mabel who is secretly put out by his speed in moving on. As the Scots steward said in ‘The Eustace Diamonds’ don’t go after money but go where the money is. Which he does. Lady Mary, with her beauty and ‘sterling’ qualities falls and as we know Daddy Pally demurs. A penniless adventurer and my girl; that can never be. By the way have you noticed how fickle men are in the novels. Phineas Finn skips like a stone over the lake of love but sheers off when the wealthy Madam Marie puts it to him. In the end those two outsiders are married which brings me to what I think might have lurked in the back of Trollope’s mind. Can the beautiful but alien Isabel Boncassen be a suitable spouse for the future Duke of Omnium? I really think that from an aristocratic point of view the union with Lady Mabel who is beautiful, witty and wise would be more fitting and durable given the duties of that elevated sphere. Can the republican and the monarchist be friends over the long stretch of mutual accommodations that is marriage? Isabel must be an eternal outsider and she will feel it. Such an ending would make a subtle reprise of Plantagenet’s marriage which was to begin with against Lady Glen’s true feelings. In this case Silverbridge would simply have to revert to his initial love for Mabel. There could be Trollopian prosing about duty over several pages.
Think of that.
For me this novel was the weakest link in the series which probably took too long to die. The comedy element was more about social embarrassment, again the oil and water of different classes. The pathos of a man who neglected his family for quints (the decimal farthing) is there but is it enough.
