“I can never make my work equal to that of a minister of the Gospel,” said she.
“But you can share the work of such a minister. You understand me now. And let me assure you of this; that in making this proposition to you, I am not self-seeking. It is not my own worldly comfort and happiness to which I am chiefly looking.”
“Ah,” said Mrs. Prime, “I suppose not.” Perhaps there was in her voice the slightest touch of soreness.
“No;—not chiefly to that. I want assistance, confidential intercourse, sympathy, a congenial mind, support when I am like to faint, counsel when I am pressing on, aid when the toil is too heavy for me, a kind word when the day’s work is over. And you—do you not desire the same? Are we not alike in that, and would it not be well that we should come together?” Mr. Prong as he spoke had put out his hand, and rested it on the table with the palm upwards, as though expecting that she would put hers within it; and he had tilted his chair so as to bring his body closer to hers, and had dropped from his face his assumed look of dignity. He was quite in earnest, and being so had fallen away into his natural dispositions of body.
“I do not quite understand you,” said Mrs. Prime. She did however understand him perfectly, but thought it expedient that he should be required to speak a little further before she answered him. She wanted time also to arrange her reply. As yet she had not made up her mind whether she would say yes or no.
“Mrs. Prime, I am offering to make you my wife. I have said nothing of love, of that human affection which one of God’s creatures entertains for another;—not, I can assure you, because I do not feel it, but because I think that you and I should be governed in our conduct by a sense of duty, rather than by the poor creature-longings of the heart.”
“The heart is very deceitful,” said Mrs. Prime.
“That is true—very true; but my heart, in this matter, is not deceitful. I entertain for you all that deep love which a man should feel for her who is to be the wife of his bosom.”
“But Mr. Prong—”
“Let me finish before you give me your answer. I have thought much of this, as you may believe; and by only one consideration have I been made to doubt the propriety of taking this step. People will say that I am marrying you for—for your money, in short. It is an insinuation which would give me much pain, but I have resolved within my own mind, that it is my duty to bear it. If my motives are pure,”—here he paused a moment for a word or two of encouragement, but received none—“and if the thing itself be good, I ought not to be deterred by any fear of what the wicked may say. Do you not agree with me in that?”
Mrs. Prime still did not answer. She felt that any word of assent, though given by her to a minor proposition, might be taken as involving some amount of assent towards the major proposition. Mr. Prong had enjoyed the advantage of thinking over his matrimonial prospects in undisturbed solitude, but she had as yet possessed no such advantage. As the idea had never before presented itself to her, she did not feel inclined to commit herself hastily.
“And as regards money,” he continued.
“Well,” said Mrs. Prime, looking down demurely upon the ground, for Mr. Prong had not at once gone on to say what were his ideas about money.
“And as regards money—need I hardly declare that my motives are pure and disinterested? I am aware that in worldly affairs you are at present better off than I am. My professional income from the pew-rents is about a hundred and thirty pounds a year.”—It must be admitted that it was very hard work. By this time Mr. Prong had withdrawn his hand from the table, finding that attempt to be hopeless, and had resettled his chair upon its four feet. He had commenced by requesting Mrs. Prime to hear him patiently, but he had probably not calculated that she would have listened with a patience so cruel and unrelenting. She did not even speak a word when he communicated to her the amount of his income. “That is what I receive here,” he continued, “and you are probably aware that I have no private means of my own.”
“I didn’t know,” said Mrs. Prime.
“No; none. But what then?”
“Oh, dear no.”
“Money is but dross. Who feels that more strongly than you do?”
Mr. Prong in all that he was saying intended to be honest, and in asserting that money was dross, he believed that he spoke his true mind. He thought also that he was passing a just eulogium on Mrs. Prime, in declaring that she was of the same opinion. But he was not quite correct in this, either as regarded himself, or as regarded her. He did not covet money, but he valued it very highly; and as for Mrs. Prime, she had an almost unbounded satisfaction in her own independence. She had, after all, but two hundred a year, out of which she gave very much in charity. But this giving in charity was her luxury. Fine raiment and dainty food tempted her not at all; but nevertheless she was not free from temptations, and did not perhaps always resist them. To be mistress of her money, and to superintend the gifts, not only of herself but of others; to be great among the poor, and esteemed as a personage in her district—that was her ambition. When Mr. Prong told her that money in her sight was
