The Reluctant Vicar Martha Bebinger The monarch’s wings blinked, open and closed, with coy grace. Camden followed the rhythm: twice fast, twice slow, then a pause with a slight tremor. Was this science or seduction? Camden, at 10, did not know the differ ence. But he could feel both. Camden Farebrother was on a quest to find the illusive African monarch and the Gol iathus beetle. Each, it was rumored, had migrated to England aboard ships carrying future stable hands and maids. Camden’s tutor claimed he had seen both. So Camden, determine d to find the monarch and the beetle, had been crawling through the meadow behind his grandfather’s stable since dawn. George Noble’s stable fit the needs of a vicar in the most affluent parish (1 ) in Middlemarch (2). He kept three well-groomed horses, two for his carriage and one that could handle short rides in any weather, any time of the day or night. Camden fed the horses and led them out into the paddock befor e starting his expedition. One of the horses gazed at Camden now as he dragged himself along 1 1) In 1790, the approximate year of Camden Farebrother’ s birth, the “living” of a parish vicar was based on the mandatory tithing of his parishione rs. Daniel Pool, What Jane Austen Ate and Dickens Knew: From Fox Hunting to Whist - the Facts of Daily Life in 19th-Century England(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993)By the time Farebrother receives a parish in chapter 52 ofMiddlemarch, many were under the control of local landowners (as with Dorothea Casauban and Lowick parish). With this change, a vicar’s “living” depend ed on the whim of landed gentry, not their parishioners. Ibid2) Although Farebrother ’s mother says she was “born and bred in Exeter,” (Middlemar ch, chapter 17), Eliot suggests that the parsonage in which we meet the Farebrothers is the same one the vicar grew up in, so I set his earlyand later life in Middlemarch.
This document is posted to help you gain knowledge. Please leave a comment to let me know what you think about it! Share it to your friends and learn new things together.
The monarch’s wings blinked, open and closed, with coy grace.
Camden followed the rhythm: twice fast, twice slow, then a pause with a
slight tremor. Was this science or seduction? Camden, at 10, did not know
the difference. But he could feel both.
Camden Farebrother was on a quest to find the illusive African
monarch and the Goliathus beetle. Each, it was rumored, had migrated to
England aboard ships carrying future stable hands and maids. Camden’s
tutor claimed he had seen both. So Camden, determined to find the
monarch and the beetle, had
been crawling through the
meadow behind his
grandfather’s stable since
dawn.
George Noble’s stable fit
the needs of a vicar in the
most affluent parish (1) in Middlemarch (2). He kept three well-groomed
horses, two for his carriage and one that could handle short rides in any
weather, any time of the day or night. Camden fed the horses and led them
out into the paddock before starting his expedition. One of the horses gazed
at Camden now as he
dragged himself along
1
1) In 1790, the approximate year of Camden Farebrother’sbirth, the “living” of a parish vicar was based on the mandattithing of his parishioners.Daniel Pool, What Jane Austen Ate and Dickens Knew:From Fox Hunting to Whist - the Facts of Daily Life in19th-Century England (New York: Simon and Schuste1993)
By the time Farebrother receives a parish in chapter 52 of Middlemarch, many were under the control of local landown(as with Dorothea Casauban and Lowick parish). With thischange, a vicar’s “living” depended on the whim of landedgentry, not their parishioners. Ibid
2) Although Farebrother’s mother says she was “born and bred inExeter,” (Middlemarch, chapter 17), Eliot suggests that the
parsonage in which we meet the Farebrothers is the same one the
vicar grew up in, so I set his early and later life in Middlemarch.
a creek that traced the paddock’s back edge. Beetles loved the damp moss
on rocks lining the creek and butterflies flocked to clumps of sage like the
one Camden lay under, staring up at his treasure.
Camden’s heart filled with love and wonder, even though this monarch
was missing the red flame of Africa. He closed his eyes to savor the
moment. His mind drifted to the mild sting of sun and sweat penetrating
bramble cuts across his face. His stomach growled. It must be time for
breakfast. Would there be fresh bread?
The monarch. Camden knew before his eyes flew open that it was
gone. He had offended it by looking away. His treasure could not be far off.
Camden rose,
clenching the
stained doily that
held two common
dung beetles.
They were the
latest additions to
a collection he
dreamed would one day rival his
hero, Gilbert White (3).
“Camden.” His mother’s voice,
floating across the field, was so faint,
he could pretend he didn’t hear. He
2
(3) “Mr. Farebrother, like another White of Selbourne, having
continually something new to tell of his inarticulate guests…”George Eliot, Middlemarch, chapter 80.
Eliot hints here that Farebrother has a serious interest in science. GilbertWhite, the man she connects to Farebrother, was a British naturalist, aChurch of England curate and author. His book, The Natural History and
Antiquities of Selborne (1788), would have been a primary reference forFarebrother, as it was for Charles Darwin. But White and Farebrother werenot of the same mind on religion. While Farebrother is comfortableexploring Methodism, White was loyal to the Church of England. White’sgreat grandnephew, Rashleigh Holt White, wrote The Life and Letters of Gilbert White of Selbourne in 1901, in part, to argue that his great uncleshould not be “taxed with pluralism.” New York Times book review,6/22/1901.
(4) Farebrother would have been about 20 yearsolder than Charles Darwin, but I believe Eliotintended to suggest a few parallels. Here’s Darwin,discussing his beetle collection:
“One day, on tearing off some old bark, I saw tworare beetles and seized one in each hand; then athird and new kind, which I could not bear to lose so Ipopped the one in my right hand into my mouth.Alas it ejected some intensely acrid fluid, which burntmy tongue so that I was forced to spit the beetle out,which was lost, as well as the third one.”
Darwin, Charles. The Autobiography of CharlesDarwin. London: W.W. Norton & Co., 1887, p 9.
kept moving slowly through the tall grass, squinting to focus his
concentration on anything small, dark and airborne. One of the beetles (4)
wiggled through the lace border of his doily. “Camden!” The whisper of a
voice gained an edge. Camden frowned. He’d finished his chores on this
beautiful Sunday in June. Oh, Sunday. His grandfather would expect to see
Camden between his mother and father in the front pew. His sister, Winifred
would be on the other side of his mother, ignoring imploring looks from
Solomon Featherstone (5).
Camden turned slowly away from his celebration of nature. His
magical day was about to be stolen by
the church. Camden loved and
resented church. He marveled at the
grand building that used the best of
man’s stone, wood and glass talents to
imitate the beauty of God’s sky, trees
and animals but shut them out. His soul soared with the organ every Sunday
only to have his grandfather’s sermons about sin and retribution beat it back
down.
Camden longed to linger in the field with the music of trilling birds, the
gurgling brook and currents in the wind. His god was in anthills, moth
cocoons, spider webs and beehives. Camden could not connect to the God
who required starched knickers and stillness on a hard bench beneath his
grandfather’s withering gaze.
3
5) In chapter 52, Farebrother tells hismother, sister and aunt he has the“Lowick living.”
“As for you, Winny,” the vicar wenton, “I shall make no difficulty aboutyour marrying any Lowick bachelor -Mr. Solomon Featherstone, forexample - as soon as I find you are in
But that’s where Camden found himself an hour after flirting with the
monarch that he now imagined was an African queen. He squirmed on the
bench as the heat of the day set in. Sweat, again, seeped into his bramble
scrapes and sores. He looked longingly towards a window at the end of his
pew and saw her. His queen; she had come for him.
The butterfly, with light bouncing off her stained glass wings, flew over
Camden towards the back of the church. Camden stood, in a trance, and
followed his queen past the hissed reproach of his own parents, the shudders
of other mothers, the stunned looks of parish elders and the wonder of other
Sunday slaves, longing to be free. With one final leap he was back in the
gleaming unfiltered sunlight. He would celebrate the Lord in his outdoor
sanctuary (6).
As the boy became a young man, he followed Gilbert White’s example
with a vengeance. Camden fashioned drawers for his more than 300
specimens of spiders, moths,
water bugs, bees and his
favorite, beetles. He had 12
versions of the Seven Spot
Ladybird alone. Camden loved
to find them hibernating in the
stable on a cold morning, 10 or
12 on top of each other to
keep warm. Sketches of his
4
(6) CF will struggle with the tension betweenscience and the church his whole life. Whileto the public, the church appears to win, itdoes not claim his heart.
There are at least three references to thistension. We learn in chapter 17 that “thevicar felt himself not altogether in the rightvocation.”
In ch. 50 Lydgate tells Dorothea that the
vicar often hints he’s in the wrongprofession, “He is very fond of naturalhistory and various scientific matters, andhe is hampered in reconciling these tasteswith his position.”
In ch. 52, when accepting the Lowick living,Farebrother seems ready to reconcilehimself to a life in the church. He tellsLydgate, “I often used to wish I had beensomething else than a clergyman, but
perhaps it will be better to try and make asgood a clergyman out of myself as I can.”
But by the time Camden turned 16, Vicar Noble made it clear, he was
grooming his only grandson for a future inside the church. Camden did not
resist, but he dreaded the daily drills. “Have we reviewed the ‘Songs of the
Suffering Servant’?, and can you tell me how this image applies to our Lord?”
his grandfather asked as Camden entered the study one gorgeous morning
in May. “Yes grandfather,” Camden answered with a small sigh. “We read
‘Isaiah’ twice last year and the Suffering Servant is our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Vicar Noble did not favor
interpretive preaching (7) . His
grandson must have a firm grasp of the
Bible’s direct meaning. The pair had
completed the entire Bible twice so far
in their studies. Camden wanted a
break. It was planting season. He would offer to sow a new field; one rich
with orthoptera, although he wouldn’t mention this attraction to his
grandfather. The buzz of crickets, locusts and grasshoppers were pulling him
back outdoors.
Camden was late, as usual, for his morning lesson. He often lingered
in the paddock after cleaning the stable. He couldn’t tear himself away from
the drama: an execution in the spider webs or a major colonial expansion
among the termites. The dung beetles were sluggish. Was it the chilly night
air or could there be a more troubling problem affecting the whole pod? A
5
(7) In ch. 17, Mrs. Farebrother tellsLydgate when she was growing up,“every respectable Church personhad the same opinions.” Herfather, continued Mrs. Farebrother,was a consistent, reliableclergyman. “My father neverchanged, and he preached plainmoral sermons without arguments,and was a good man-few better.
colony of bees was building a hive in the tree that shaded the north corner.
Camden wondered if they were related to the colony across the road or were
they an invading tribe? He must catch one and compare.
Glancing towards the native bees, Camden saw a gentleman
inspecting their work. The stranger’s head bounced back and forth between
the nest and a book cradled on his left arm. He was writing furiously. Or
was he drawing? Camden thought about the beetle sketch tucked into the
cover of the Bible he carried. He wanted to say hello to the stranger, to
show him the sketch. But he was already late. Camden hurried towards his
grandfather’s house.
It was a handsome stone cottage, a miniature of the manor house at
the end of the long drive. Camden and his family moved in when he was
eight. His father, a lawyer, had come down with tuberculosis and was too
weak to work or maintain a house. Erasmus Farebrother faded quickly after
the move despite the best efforts of his wife. Camden and Winifred were
left to the care of a spinster aunt, Henrietta Noble, who fawned over them.
“Oh Henrietta, you’ve spoiled the children forever,” worried Mrs. Farebrother
when she was back in charge, reminding Camden and Winifred “to wear
flannel and not over-eat themselves” (Middlemarch, ch. 17). Henrietta died
years later with lumps of sugar she’d saved for the children in her pockets.
When Camden
entered the study, his
grandfather was pacing,
6
( 8) Lydgate in chapter 18 says of Farebrother, “very few men could havebeen as filial and chivalrous as he was tothe mother, aunt and sister, whosedependence on him had in many waysshaped his life rather uneasily for himself…”
And in ch. 50, when recommendingFarebrother to Dorothea, Lydgate says, “hismother, sister and aunt all live with him and
depend on him. I believe he has nevermarried because of them.”
“Pardon my interruption,” said Mr. Kirby, including the teacher and the
student with one nod. “I don’t know if you remember me, Vicar? It’s been
thirty years since we shared meals at Cambridge. I was walking this lovely
country when I saw your nameplate at the road. I thought I might pay my
respects and ask permission to observe the bee colonies on your land.”
8
(10) William Kirby is considered the founderof entomology. He, unlike many naturalistsof the time, was not a member of the clergy(even Charles Darwin’s family assumed hewould enter the clergy after he gave up
medicine). Kirby’s best-known work“Monograph on the Bees of England,” waspublished in 1802. He wrote about God’soverarching presence in science and religionin this passage from 1800:
‘The author of Scripture is also the author of Nature: and this visible world, by typesindeed, and by symbols, declares the sametruths as the Bible does by words. To makethe naturalist a religious man – to turn his
attention to the glory of God, that he maydeclare his works, and in the study of hiscreatures may see the loving-kindness of the Lord – may this in some measure be thefruit of my work…’
Kirby, William, On the Power Wisdom and Goodness of God. As Manifested in theCreation of Animals and in Their History,Habits and Instincts; Bridgewater Treatises,W. Pickering, 1835 (reissued by Cambridge
Camden’s grandfather blanched. He had heard of these naturalists,
but did not expect one in a
man from Cambridge (11).
The gentlemen sat down for
tea and lapsed into that idle
exchange that has no
beginning or end. Camden
watched a warbler add
twigs, leaves and bits of
grass to its nest outside the
window. How wonderful it
would be to spend an
afternoon rocking in the
nest, looking towards
heaven through the
flickering new green of
spring leaves.
The warbler flew off
and Camden returned to
the room. He slid the beetle sketch from the back cover of his Bible and
worked quietly on shading the wings. A shadow fell across the page as
Camden heard his grandfather say, “I’m sorry you can’t stay for dinner,
Kirby, but do stop in again sometime.” The shadow didn’t move. Camden
9
(11) I’m intrigued by the question, is Farebrother aman of the old science (naturalism) or the newscience that Lydgate represents? Does GE useFarebrother as another way to illustrate how dense
Lydgate can be or is Farebrother lost to a world of dead bugs?
Sally Shuttleworth’s investigation of science focuseson Lydgate as the symbol of advancement. She doeschallenge Lydgate who “dismisses Farebrother’spractice of natural history” when the two mendiscuss science for the first time in Farebrother’sstudy (ch. 17).
But Marc Wormald argues that this scene establishesFarebrother as both a forward thinking scientist andas a sort of twin narrator. Farebrother and thenarrator both act as a “a cautious microscopist,” saysWormald. In science, Farebrother shows asophistication Lydgate doesn’t appreciate. “If onlyLydgate knew it, the amateur natural historian hasmuch to offer his own quest for organic origins andstructure”. (pg. 23)
On the narrative level, Wormald argues that forFarebrother and the narrator, “the lenses of theirdeveloping instruments are focused on the sameobjects, that ‘water-drop’ of provincial life and theprimitive creatures moving obscurely within it.” HereWormald refers both to the scene in Ch. 36 whenFarebrother comes to Lydgate’s room” with somepond products he wanted to examine under a bettermicroscope than his own” and in the way in which hebecomes a lens through with the reader seesLydgate, Fred Vincy and others.
moment before Mr. Kirby arrived, Vicar Noble had been ready to announce
that Camden would begin his exam preparations. The Vicar could not
understand wasting a minute on bees unless you needed to smash one. Still,
his grandson seemed young to sit for exams. Perhaps a little time in a
bustling port town would add some wisdom to his age.
Camden’s sheltered view of the world cracked the first day of his
journey with Mr Kirby. The wizened traveler and his 18 year old apprentice
stopped for the night in the “gently-swelling meadow and wooded valley” of
the village, Hayslope ( Adam Bede, ch.2). The carriage driver let them out at
the village green. It was crowded with men, women and children, looking
towards a maple tree and a small cart that was “to serve as a pulpit.” (Ibid)
They were waiting to hear the Methodist “preacher-woman.” Camden had
never heard a woman preach. His grandfather warned him about Methodists
(12), those disrespectful
men who urged
parishioners to speak
directly to God. But a
woman preacher; what
could that mean?
Camden’s grandfather had
not prepared him for this
possibility.
In a moment she
11
(12) There are several references toFarebrother as “Methodistical” (see Mr. Hawleyusing the word as an insult in ch. 18). But hedoes not fit the mold either personally orprofessionally. Farebrother feeds “a weaknessor two (tobacco and gambling) lest they shouldget clamorous” (ch. 17), which would not beallowed of a Methodist. In addition, hepreaches with “plain and easy eloquence,”according to Lydgate in ch. 50, not the passionascribed to Methodists of the time.
Farebrother sounds more like the ReverendIrwine in Adam Bede whom Elizabeth Ermarthdescribes as an “honorable, effectiveclergyman, comfortable in his elegant habitsbut mindful of his duties to a widowed motherand sickly sister, and far better for hisparishioners than a more dogmatic andconsistent man could ever be.”
handing Camden a piece of peppermint. “Myself, I’m reminded that while
my bees buzz and occasionally sting, they don’t carry the power of those
biting words,” continued Kirby. “There is order in nature, Camden, and that
order serves the glory of our Lord. You can depend on it.” It took Camden a
long time to finish the peppermint and gather his wits. He resolved to
admire powerful women from a distance from now on.
In Ipswich, Camden’s days were a blur of bees, the docks and men with
ideas that baffled the young mind. They talked about similarities between
the habits of bees, birds and even bears. A few visitors to Mr. Kirby’s home
described slicing open mice and dissecting their organs with the help of a
microscope. Camden had seen but never used a microscope. He was
curious but he didn’t
understand the point of
looking at how animals
were put together on the
inside.
Somehow what these
men could see in small
slices lead them to argue
that the rules of nature
were separate from the will
of God (13). They
challenged the Bible and
13
13) Farebrother illustrates a central theme inMiddlemarch, the growing influence of sciencein Victorian England at the expense of thechurch.
In the early 19th
Century, the prevailing viewwas that “natural objects show evidences of design, thus showing the existence of adesigning God.”
Fyfe, Aileen. “Victorian Science and Religion.”Victorian Web. Ed. George P. Landow. BrownUniversity. 11 June 2002.http://www.victorianweb.org/science/science&religion.html.
But this view of nature as God’s creation wasstarting to break down. Broadview says “thepredominance of scientific rationalism andempiricist method” along with a “destabilizedChristian certainty,” created a tide of “religious skepticism.”
Black, Joseph, ed. The Broadview Anthology of British Literature. Toronto: Broadview Press,2006, p. xlviii.
We know that George Eliot was, during thewriting of Middlemarch, also translating The
showed no fear of retribution. Camden listened with fascination, but he was
scared too.
By day, Camden organized, catalogued, cleaned and sketched Kirby’s
collection of hundreds of bees. By night he worked on his beetle drawings
and listened to men who were shaping the new field of entomology. Mr. Kirby
was their leader although his position as the leading thinker of the time was
beginning to slip. There were heated arguments about who could take credit
for discoveries, names and ideas. Camden watched the passion of these men
with great interest. He loved his insects but could not understand claiming
ownership of nature. It did not belong to man. Creation belonged to the
creator, God.
Most of the men who stopped by Mr. Kirby’s house in the evenings
ignored Camden. But one night Mr. James Stephens stopped to look at one
of his beetle sketches. Stephens was beginning work on a book about
beetles and he invited Camden to submit a few drawings from his collection.
“Your current samples are not unique,” he warned Camden. “But if you find
something unusual, can define its generic and specific distinctions and
establish its common location,
then send me a sketch.”
The invitation sent Camden
scurrying out into the woods
many early mornings and for
longer excursions on Sundays.
14
14) Both Farebrother and his friendsdescribe a man for whom it is too late to bewhat he might have been (to paraphrase aquote attributed to George Eliot).
In ch. 18, the vicar tells Lydgate, “the worldhas been too strong for me…I shall neverhave been a man of renown.” Lydgate, tohimself, concludes “that there was a pitiableinfirmity of will in Mr. Farebrother.”
But we could also conclude that Farebrotherwas caught in the conflicted roles of a son, ascientist and a clergyman in an age of rapidchange. And of course, there’s thequestion, what does it mean to achieverenown?
He crawled across fields and through bogs, gently pulling moss off damp
rocks and bark off trees, holding his breath in anticipation of what might lay
underneath. After two months he found what appeared to be the Sherwood
Forrest hazel pot beetle. Camden produced a drawing that Mr. Kirby called
“sublime.” 20 years later it appeared in Stephens’ highly acclaimed,
Illustrations of British Entomology . Camden’s last name was misspelled, C.
Farbother (14). It would be the only time Camden’s name, in any form,
appeared in a publication.
While Camden finished the sketches for Mr. Kirby’s treatise on bees,
his mentor wrote the text for the book and prepared a series of lectures he
was to deliver at Cambridge University that fall. Mr. Kirby hoped the lectures
and book would help him win an open position for a professor of Botany.
Kirby, a Tory, was not politically popular among the Cambridge elite and he
faced stiff competition.
The final decision would rest on a debate between Kirby and John
Stevens Henslow (15), a brilliant, but
not well established, young scientist.
The gentle Camden tried to assume
Henslow’s fiery speech as he helped his
mentor prepare for the match.
Inside the Cambridge lecture hall,
supporters of Kirby and Henslow
mingled in the front row. Camden sat
15
15) John Stevens Henslow may bebest remembered as a tutor andmentor for Charles Darwin, but healso held weekly science soireesthat Farebrother would haveattended while at Cambridge.Henslow, a botanist, gave hisstudents plants and told them to
dissect and define the innerstructure and then compare notes.He influenced many leadingscientists of the times. JohnAudubon named the HenslowSparrow for him. Henslow was avicar in a parish outsideCambridge. He did have a sisternamed Charlotte. I don’t know if she had a pet spider.
Walters, S.M and Stow, E.A.Darwin’s Mentor: John StevensHenslow 1796-1861. Cambrid e:
Paris shortly. I am embarking on a critically important endeavor…”.
Camden pretended to listen as
Trawley explained that he
would join his friend Tertius
Lydgate in Paris. The two
visionaries would work with a
team of scientists, said
Trawley, who were proving
that the secret to
understanding illness lay
outside the boundaries of
conventional medicine (16). Camden tried to absorb the ideas that spilled
out of Trawley. They didn’t fit Camden’s understanding of nature, created by
God, in his own image. Camden excused himself for a little sedation. Fishing
in a pocket he found and lit his trusted pipe.
As Camden’s tenure with Kirby drew to a close, he felt confused about
the world of science. He was more excited than ever about watching ants
build a nest or mapping the stages of a cocoon, but scientific discovery was
moving quickly beyond simple observation. Camden did not like the endless
arguments among the men who gathered in Kirby’s study and often
retreated to a chair near the window to continue a sketch. Later, Camden
would see many of these men become Full Fellows in the Linnean Society,
the London-based association of natural history leaders. He would wonder if
20
16) Trawley is the man who describesLydgate to Farebrother before the newdoctor arrives in Middlemarch (ch. 17).
He is the unseen medical man whoforeshadows Lydgate’s defeat. Trawley,with Farebrother as the lense, warns that“the medical profession was aninevitable system of humbug.” As LilianFurst writes, Lydgate’s “defeat shows thestrength of the entrenched conservativeforces aligned against him.” I wouldargue that Farebrother falls victim to thesame conservative forces, although in hiscase they are moral and social. Hefollows his duty to his family rather thanhis passions.
Furst, Lilian R., Struggling for MedicalReform in Middlemarch, Nineteenth-
Camden carried the letter back to the caterpillar. He waited until it
had finished eating the leaf and then opened the letter. His grandfather was
dead. Camden’s mother said he must arrange to take the exams early and
come home as soon as possible. She would ask that Camden be considered
to replace Vicar Noble so the family would not have to move. Did Camden
have a sermon or two that he could send for review?
The hand holding the letter dropped to the desk. Camden’s eyes
drifted to the window where a
moth was hitting the glass, intent
on getting out. He felt the urge
to open the window and follow
the moth over the ledge. A life he
had been poised to leave behind
was now his only option, indefinitely (17).
For a few days before leaving Cambridge, Camden held out hope that
Charlotte would follow him to Middlemarch. He would make sure she had a
small lab. She would not need to have children right away. His mother and
aunt (who would, of course, live with them) could take care of many of the
house and parish duties. Charlotte cried as Camden began speaking. She
was calm and hardened by the time he finished. How could Camden, she
wondered, imagine her in the life he described?
Ten years later, Camden was in his study, admiring a Bombardier
23
(17) Here’s one last twist. Eliot makesFarebrother the vicar of St. Botolph’s, thepatron saint of travelers. InFarebrother’s case we might stretch theimage to wanderers. The St. Botolph’s of Eliot’s day is inCambridge and, according to the churchsite, Darwin’s family members wereparishioners. To bring it home for me,the name Boston comes from “Botolph’s