Trollope made little secret of his religious tastes--traditional Anglicanism, of the high church sort, but not papist. And he had no patience with any evidence of fanaticism in religion. "But there are women of the class to which Madame Staubach belonged who think that the acerbities of religion are intended altogether for their own sex. That men ought to be grateful to them who will deny?" Poor Linda's final escape is too late to save her; she makes her way to her uncle's house in Cologne, where her Aunt Grüner, a Catholic, tells her that her Aunt Charlotte's mistreatment of her comes of her religion. "We think differently, my dear. Thank God, we have got somebody to tell us what we ought to do and what we ought not to do." Linda was not strong enough to argue the question, or to remind her aunt that this somebody, too, might possibly be wrong. Linda's progressive downhill and melodramatic course makes for a rather grim story. Mercifully, it is a short one. The descriptions of Aunt Charlotte and of Peter Steinmarc leave little room for subtlety. However, Aunt Charlotte's breastplate of righteousness was not entirely without a few little chinks, as we see in her last encounter with Linda's wild lover. Trollope's description, I fear, will bring few feminists to his side: He could get in and out of the roofs of houses, and could carry away with him a young maiden. These are deeds which always excite a certain degree of admiration in the female heart, and Madame Staubach, though she was a Baptist, was still a female. When, therefore, she found herself in the presence of Ludovic, she could not treat him with the indignant scorn with which she would have received him had he intruded upon her premises before her fears of him had been excited. Like _Nina Balatka_, _Linda Tressel_ was published as an anonymous work; only later did Trollope declare himself as the author. It has been stated that he wanted to prove that he could write a different kind of novel, set in Europe. _Linda Tressel_ was clearly an effort to take his writing in a different direction. Though it was not a commercial success, it can hardly be dismissed. The story moves inexorably to a tragic ending for the heroine; the author stays on task with the progression of the story, but it is seasoned with bits of irony. The reader begins to suspect that there is heavy weather ahead as the storm clouds gather over the picturesque little red house in Nuremberg; perhaps it is the impact of the inevitable deluge that is so depressing. THE DOWNSIDE OF CHIVALRY HE KNEW HE WAS RIGHT