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“Excellent, my dear!” cried Mr Collins as his wife finished her song with a dramatic flourish. Looking around the drawing room while he applauded, he was pleased to see that their neighbours remained quite transfixed by his dear Mary’s performance. His chest swelled. How fortunate he was to have married such an accomplished woman! None of the other ladies of the neighbourhood would have dared to attempt such a long and difficult piece. Even their hosts, the Metcalfes, would surely be impressed.
“Mrs Collins,” he went on, “you must indulge us with another song. I am sure that Lady Metcalfe should like to hear that new Italian one you have been practicing.”
The lady thus applied to gave Mr Collins a small but exceedingly civil smile. “Mrs Collins is very kind to entertain us for so long, but I fear she must be getting tired – we should not wish her to strain her voice—”
“We are very grateful for your kind solicitude, madam, but I assure you that Mrs Collins is not the least tired. Is that not so, my dear?”
“Indeed, husband,” replied his wife with solemn dignity. “What we hope to do with ease, we must learn first to do with diligence; and I hope that I may say without undue vanity that I have been diligent in my practice.”
“Very true – that is exactly what I say!” cried Mr Collins. “Do go on, my dear! Everybody wishes to hear you.”
Mary required no further persuasion. As she began her aria, Mr Collins leaned contentedly back in his seat. His fellow guests were listening rapturously. Mr Webb, in the far corner of the room, appeared positively transported by the music – his eyes closed, his head tilted back, his hands resting loosely in his lap as he half reclined in a reverie. Only Lady Metcalfe looked a little stiff, but that was no doubt due to her rheumatism. He must hint to Mary that she should have Cook send some coddled apples over. It was important to show one’s neighbours such delicate little attentions, so that one might be remembered by them in turn.
“I have certainly never heard such an… extraordinary performance,” whispered one of the Miss Webbs behind him. “How long can she go on? She has been singing half the evening already!”
Mr Collins beamed with pride. He had perhaps not married the handsomest of the Miss Bennets, but he certainly had no cause to repine. None of Mary’s sisters, he was sure, could have provided their neighbours with such splendid entertainment.
“It is a fine sermon,” pronounced Mary judiciously. “I thought your reflections on the perils of vanity solidly expressed, and the extract from Johnson was well chosen. However, you ought perhaps to dwell longer on the distinction between vanity and pride, that there should not be any confusion on that point. We must remember, dear husband, that not everybody in the parish is as inclined towards study and reflection as we.”
Privately, Mary felt that Mr Collins, too, ought to have put a little more value on intellectual labours and a little less on earthlier concerns. His solicitude to their neighbours, while laudable, was at times somewhat excessive. Exertion, she held, should always be in proportion to what was required, and every little twinge of Lady Metcalfe’s rheumatism surely did not require Mary’s personal attention.
Still, they had not yet been married for very long. Her influence, Mary was sure, was already steering Mr Collins in the right direction. She was the one who had suggested that he read Johnson.
“Ah! Well thought, my dear,” replied Mr Collins. “It is the responsibility of a clergyman to assist his parishioners in the improvement of their minds. I believe it comes second in importance only to his duty towards his patron. Yet here, we may accomplish both at once, for Lady Catherine, too, is very anxious to see her tenants properly schooled in the moral virtues. The distinction between pride and vanity – yes, I am sure she will think it a suitable lesson indeed. There are instances in which a certain degree of pride is justified by higher rank or greater understanding, and such natural superiority must by no means be mistaken for improper vanity.”
Mary smiled triumphantly. “I have already prepared several extracts on the subject.”
Mr Collins might not be quite as clever as herself, but with her guidance, he could yet accomplish a great deal in his parish.
“Oh, no, sir,” said Mrs Miller earnestly, “there is not the least need for anybody to come. Mr Miller is on the mend already. It is very good of you to offer, but I am sure that there are others in greater need of such comfort.”
To her distress, however, Mr Collins did not look convinced.
“Mrs Collins and I,” he replied ponderously, “are never too busy to minister to the sick. It will be no trouble at all for one of us to come sit with your husband during his convalescence. Mrs Collins assured me that he appeared to find great solace in Cooper’s sermons when she was with him yesterday. Your humility does you credit, my dear Mrs Miller, but you shall not be left unattended.”
Mr Miller had, in truth, found very great solace indeed in Mrs Collins’s finally leaving his bedside, and so had Mrs Miller. Mrs Collins’s punctilious recitation of Mr Cooper’s thoughts on the unfruitfulness and misery of sin had been neither cheering nor enlivening for the invalid, and her consumption of a plate of cold meats and three slices of apple tart had left Mrs Miller’s larder sadly depleted.
But Mr Collins was not to be gainsaid. Mrs Miller, her excuses exhausted, must at last give in and invite him into their little cottage – and, of course, offer what refreshments she had.
When the distinguished guest at last departed several hours later, having quite worn Mr Miller out with his incessant stream of conversation, Mrs Miller hurried to her receipt book. It was time to ply her husband with all her grandmother’s best remedies, in the hope that it would save him and their larder from any more such ministering.
“Very good, Mr Collins,” said Lady Catherine with a regal nod, “very good indeed. You and Mrs Collins are to be commended for your efforts. I do not recall the villagers ever being in such fine health before. Why, when I visited my tenants yesterday, they were all most eager to assure me that there was not the slightest hint of sickness to be found among their families!”
She surveyed her rector and his wife with satisfaction. She had, when considering candidates for the living, harboured some slight doubts as to the ability of such a young man to manage the parish according to her wishes, but Mr Collins had proven himself precisely as useful as she had hoped.
“It is exceedingly good of your Ladyship to notice our humble labours,” Mr Collins replied with an appropriately low bow. “Our triumph, if I may be so bold as to term it so, is all due to your Ladyship’s example in such matters. The poor must be guided with a firm hand to show them the sinfulness of malingering, and that is precisely the approach I have taken when providing spiritual counsel.”
“Indeed,” Mrs Collins broke in, “and they must have suitable examples of virtue before them. I have made a point of displaying my own quest for self-improvement in the hope of inspiring others in the parish to better themselves.”
Lady Catherine nodded complacently. Mrs Collins, too, had proven a valuable addition to the neighbourhood. Though even younger than her husband, she was pleasingly devoid of any frivolous habits and dedicated herself to her books and her instrument with an industry that Lady Catherine entirely approved of.
“Precisely, my dear!” cried Mr Collins. “Lady Catherine, of course, is the supreme paragon of virtue to whom everybody must look first, but I flatter myself that you and I are not entirely insignificant in this respect either. Why, only the other day Mr Webb was kind enough to tell me…”
Here was the only point on which Lady Catherine was not entirely satisfied with the Collinses: they had not yet learned when to speak and when to remain silent in deference to those wiser than themselves. She did not at all object to their expressing the admiration and gratitude which she was owed, but their discourse on other matters could at times be excessively voluble.
“That is all as it should be, Mr Collins,” she interrupted. “Now you must simply keep up your diligent work. Continue your frequent visits among the parishioners, and I shall send for you again in due time to hear how you get on.” She nodded in gracious but clear dismissal.
And so Mr and Mrs Collins went off in happy assurance of their patroness’s approval. Their neighbours might not have been quite as happy, but that mattered not. Regardless of the parishioners’ wishes, Mr and Mrs Collins would cheerfully continue to regale them with all their wisdom and accomplishments.