“His arrival was soon known at the Parsonage; for Mr. Collins was walking the whole morning within view of the lodges opening into Hunsford Lane, in order to have the earliest assurance of it; and after making his bow as the carriage turned into the Park, hurried home with the great intelligence.”

I posted before about how funny I thought it was that Mr. Collins waited all morning to bow at Darcy’s carriage as it drove by the parsonage to Rosings in Chapter 30. I just noticed during this reading that he does it again when Darcy and Col Fitzwilliam leave Rosings:

The two gentlemen left Rosings the next morning, and Mr. Collins having been in waiting near the lodges, to make them his parting obeisance, was able to bring home the pleasing intelligence of their appearing in very good health, and in as tolerable spirits as could be expected, after the melancholy scene so lately gone through at Rosings. (Chapter 37)

In both cases he rushes home with the intelligence but his information the second time around seems a little light. He says the gentlemen “appeared” in very good health and in as tolerable spirits as could be expected. Does this mean the carriage did not stop to acknowledge Mr. Collins? Did they merely tip their hats or not see him at all?

Mr. Collins shirks no opportunity to demean himself with grateful respect towards her Ladyship or her nephews. Perhaps in Mr. Collins eyes it is one and the same because all roads worth traveling lead back to Lady Catherine in the end. Her nephews surely gain much of their favor from that paragon of condescension and therefore are well deserving of Mr. Collins devotion. In Chapter 18 Mr. Collins introduces himself to Darcy because he is Lady Catherine’s nephew, I am not sure if he would have done this if not for the link to his patroness. I am only half-joking. I do think Mr. Collins is rather sly in a way—he employees the device of buttering up folks even when they have no relation to Lady Catherine when he believes it is advantageous to do so. In P&P it works on the more superficially weak minded dears—Mrs. Bennet, Sir William, Mrs. Phillips and Lady Catherine and her daughter. :D