These were read by the chaplain, as it was
proper and decent that they should be: but I cannot but think that
Mrs. Proudie a little exceeded her office in taking upon herself
to pronounce the blessing when the prayers were over. She did it,
however, in a clear, sonorous voice, and perhaps with more personal
dignity than was within the chaplain's compass.
Mrs. Proudie was rather stern at breakfast, and the vicar of Framley
felt an unaccountable desire to get out of the house. In the first
place she was not dressed with her usual punctilious attention to the
proprieties of her high situation. It was evident that there was to
be a further toilet before she sailed up the middle of the cathedral
choir. She had on a large loose cap with no other strings than those
which were wanted for tying it beneath her chin, a cap with which the
household and the chaplain were well acquainted, but which seemed
ungracious in the eyes of Mr. Robarts after all the well-dressed
holiday doings of the last week. She wore also a large, loose,
dark-coloured wrapper, which came well up round her neck, and which
was not buoyed out, as were her dresses in general, with an under
mechanism of petticoats. It clung to her closely, and added to the
inflexibility of her general appearance.
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