Why has _Barchester Towers_ outpaced the other novels in popularity? First, I think, because the characters are strong, memorable, in conflict with one another, and elicit just enough sympathy for their positions that the reader smiles and even laughs. There is no sugarcoating; this is no tract intended to bring its readers to commit their lives to the service of the Church of England. The reader sees the deficiencies of even the most virtuous, such as Mr. Harding, but there is also just a touch of sympathy for the worst of the villains, such as Mr. Slope and (perhaps, on a sunny day) Mrs. Proudie. Trollope depicts the life of the church better than anyone else has done, before or since. He shows the affairs of the clergymen of Barchester much as he also shows us those of politicians, lawyers, merchants, and idle country gentlemen. Perhaps more than any other occupational group, the clergy of the close are bound together as an inner group, almost a fraternity. And this may be why clergy and politicians, the subjects of the Barsetshire series and the Palliser series, were such ready subjects for novel after novel: their professional association involved just enough interaction and jockeying for position to entertain the reader. Several of the characters come to us from _The Warden_, chiefly Mr. Septimus Harding, the Warden himself, bruised from his attack in _The Jupiter_, the newspaper of the day. Mr. Harding has surrendered his position as Warden of Hiram's Hospital, feeling that he could not justify the high salary attached to the position, and not caring to attempt to do so. In this matter he was in direct opposition to the advice of his son-in-law Archdeacon Grantly, aggressive warrior of the Church Militant, and one who benefits even more from the riches of the church. The author must have gloated to himself as he set up the situation with which the story begins: the saintly Bishop Grantly, dear friend of Mr. Harding and father of Archdeacon Grantly, is about to die. His successor is to be named by the prime minister, who is sufficiently friendly to the Grantlys that he would be expected to name the archdeacon to succeed his father. But the government is about to fall, and the next prime minister would be expected to look elsewhere for a successor. If the bishop dies quickly, there would be time for the present prime minister to act. The poor bishop apologizes on his deathbed for taking so long. And he does take too long. Though the conflicted archdeacon attempts to convey the news of his father's death to the prime minister before he leaves office, he does not succeed. A new prime minister makes the appointment, and the new bishop is to be a low churchman, one Dr. Proudie. The supreme irony in this situation is not left to implication and inference, as we read of the disappointed Archdeacon Grantly's reaction: