Anthony Trollope: Barchester Towers

33. CHAPTER XXXIII: MRS PROUDIE VICTRIX (continued)

The bishop said nothing further to excuse either himself or his chaplain, and having shown himself passive and docile was again taken into favour. They soon went to dinner, and he spent the pleasantest evening he had had in his own house for a long time. His daughter played and sang to him as he sipped his coffee and read his newspaper, and Mrs Proudie asked good-natured little questions about the archbishop; and then he went happily to bed, and slept as quietly as though Mrs Proudie had been Griselda herself. While shaving himself in the morning and preparing for the festivities of Ullathorne, he fully resolved to run no more tilts against a warrior so fully armed at all points as was Mrs Proudie.