 CHAPTER VI. My lady's tongue is like the meadow-blades, that cut you stroking them with idle hand. Nice cutting is her function. She divides with spiritual edge the millet seed, and makes intangible savings. As Mr. Casabon's carriage was passing out of the gateway, it arrested the entrance of a pony faten driven by a lady with a servant seated behind. It was doubtful whether the recognition had been mutual, for Mr. Casabon was looking absolutely before him, but the lady was quick-eyed, and threw a nod, and a, how do you do, in the nick of time? In spite of her shabby bonnet and very old Indian shawl, it was plain that the lodge-keeper regarded her as an important personage, from the low curtsy which was dropped on the entrance of the small faten. "'Well, Mrs. Fitchett, how are your fowls laying now?' said the high-coloured, dark-eyed lady with the clearest chiseled utterance. "'Pretty well for laying, madam, but they've tamed to eating their eggs. I've no peace of mind with them at all.' "'Oh, the cannibals! Better sell them cheap at once. What will you sell them a couple? One can't eat fowls of a bad character at a high price.' "'Well, madam, half a crown. I couldn't let them go, not under.' "'Half a crown, these times? Come now, for the rector's chicken broth on a Sunday. He has consumed all hours that I can spare. You are half-paid with the sermon, Mrs. Fitchett, remember that. Take a pair of tumbler-pigeons for them, little beauties. You must come and see them. You have no tumblers among your pigeons.' "'Well, madam, Master Fitchett shall go and see him after work. He's very hot on new sorts. Do oblige you.' "'Ablige me! It'll be the best bargain he ever made.' "'A pair of church-pigeons for a couple of wicked Spanish fowls that eat their own eggs. Don't you and Fitchett boast too much, that is all.' The fainting was driven onwards with the last words, leaving Mrs. Fitchett laughing and shaking her head slowly, with an interjectional, "'Surely, surely!' From which it might be inferred that she would have found the countryside somewhat duller, if the rector's lady had been less free-spoken, and less of a skin-flint. Indeed, both the farmers and labourers in the parishes of Freshit and Tipton would have felt a sad lack of conversation, but for the stories about what Mrs. Catwalleter said and did. A lady of a measurably high birth, descended, as it were, from unknown earls, dim as the crowd of heroic shades, who pleaded poverty, peered down prices, and cut jokes in the most companionable manner, though with a turn of tongue that let you know who she was. Such a lady gave a neighbourliness to both rank and religion, and mitigated the bitterness of uncommuted tithe. A much more exemplary character with an infusion of sour dignity would not have furthered their comprehension of the thirty-nine articles, and would have been less socially uniting. Mr. Brooke, seeing Mrs. Catwalleter's merits from a different point of view, winced a little when her name was announced in the library, where he was sitting alone. "'I see you have had our Loic Cicero here,' she said, seating herself comfortably, throwing back her raps, and showing a thin but well-built figure. "'I suspect you and he are brewing some bad polities, else you would not be seeing so much of the lively man. I shall inform against you. Remember you are both suspicious characters, since you took Peele's side about the Catholic bill. I shall tell everybody that you are going to put up for middle-march on the Whigside when old Pinkerton resigns, and that Casabon is going to help you in an underhand manner, going to bribe the voters with pamphlets, and throw up in the public houses to distribute them. Come! Confess!" "'Nothing of the sort,' said Mr. Brook, smiling and rubbing his eyeglasses, but really blushing a little at the impeachment. Casabon and I don't talk politics much. He doesn't care much about the philanthropic side of things—punishments and that kind of thing. He only cares about church questions. That is not my line of action, you know." "'Rather too much, my friend. I have heard of your doings. Who was it that sold his bit of land to the papists at middle-march? I believe you bought it on purpose. You are a perfect guy, Fox. See if you are not burnt in effigy this fifth of November coming. Humphrey would not come to quarrel with you about it, so I am come.' "'Very good. I was prepared to be persecuted for not persecuting. Not persecuting, you know.' "'There you go. That is a piece of clap-trap you have got ready for the hustings. Now do not let them lure you to the hustings, my dear Mr. Brook. A man always makes a fool of himself speech-affying. There's no excuse but being on the right side, so that you can ask a blessing on your humming and hawing. You will lose yourself, I forewarn you. You will make a Saturday pie of all parties' opinions and be pelted by everybody." "'That is what I expect, you know,' said Mr. Brook, not wishing to betray how little he enjoyed this prophetic sketch. What I expect as an independent man, as to the wigs—a man who goes with the thinkers is not likely to be hooked on by any party. He may go with them up to a certain point, up to a certain point, you know. But that is what you ladies never understand.' "'Where your certain point is?' "'No. I should like to be told how a man can have any certain point when he belongs to no party, leading a roving life and never letting his friends know his address. Nobody knows where Brook will be. There's no counting on Brook. That is what people say of you, to be quite frank. Now do turn respectable. How will you like going to sessions with everybody looking shy on you, and you with a bad conscience and an empty pocket?' "'I don't pretend to argue with a lady on politics,' said Mr. Brook, with an air of smiling indifference, but feeling rather unpleasantly conscious that this attack of Mrs. Cadwalladers had opened the defensive campaign to which certain rash steps had exposed him. "'Your sex are not thinkers, you know. Varyum et mutilabe semper—that kind of thing. You don't know, Virgil. I knew,' Mr. Brook reflected in time that he had not had the personal acquaintance of the Augustan poet, "'I was going to say, poor stoddard, you know. That was what he said. You ladies are always against an independent attitude, a man's caring for nothing but truth and that sort of thing. And there is no part of the county where opinion is narrower than it is here. I don't mean to throw stones, you know, but somebody is wanted to take the independent line, and if I don't take it, who will?' Who? Why any upstart who has gotten either blood nor position? People of standing should consume their independent nonsense at home, not hawk it about. And you, who are going to marry your niece, as good as your daughter, to one of our best men? Sir James would be cruelly annoyed. It will be too hard on him if you turn round now and make yourself a wig sign-board." Mr. Brook again winced inwardly. For Dorothy his engagement had no sooner been decided than he had thought of Mrs. Cadwallader's prospective taunts. It might have been easy for ignorant observers to say, quarrel with Mrs. Cadwallader, but where is a country gentleman to go who quarrels with his oldest neighbours? Who could taste the fine flavour in the name of Brook if it were delivered casually, like wine without a seal? Certainly a man can only be cosmopolitan up to a certain point. I hope Chetum and I shall always be good friends, but I am sorry to say there is no prospect of his marrying my niece," said Mr. Brook, much relieved to see through the window that Celia was coming in. Why not? said Mrs. Cadwallader, with a sharp note of surprise. It is hardly a fortnight since you and I were talking about it. My niece has chosen another suitor. Has chosen him, you know? I have had nothing to do with it. I should have preferred Chetum, and I should have said Chetum was the man any girl would have chosen. But there is no accounting for these things. Your sex is capricious, you know. Why, whom do you mean to say that you are going to let her marry? Mrs. Cadwallader's mind was rapidly surveying the possibilities of choice for Dorothea. But here Celia entered, blooming from a walk in the garden, and the greeting with her delivered Mr. Brook from the necessity of answering immediately. He got up hastily, and saying, by the way, I must speak to write about the horses, shuffled quickly out of the room. My dear child, what is this—this about your sister's engagement? said Mrs. Cadwallader. She is engaged to marry Mr. Casabon, said Celia, resorting as usual to the simplest statement of fact, and enjoying this opportunity of speaking to the rector's wife alone. This is frightful! How long has it been going on? I only knew of it yesterday. They are to be married in six weeks. Well, my dear, I wish you joy of your brother-in-law. I am so sorry for Dorothea. Sorry? It is her doing, I suppose. Yes, she says Mr. Casabon has a great soul. With all my heart. Oh, Mrs. Cadwallader, I don't think it can be nice to marry a man with a great soul. Well, my dear, take warning. You know the look of one now. When the next comes and wants to marry you, don't you accept him? I'm sure I never should. No, one such in a family is enough. So your sister never cared about Sir James Chetham. What would you have said to him for a brother-in-law? I should have liked that very much. I am sure he would have been a good husband. Only, Celia added, with a slight blush, she sometimes seemed to blush as she breathed. I don't think he would have suited Dorothea. Not high-flown enough. Dodo is very strict. She thinks so much about everything, and is so particular about what one says. Sir James never seemed to please her. She must have encouraged him, I am sure. That is not very creditable. Please don't be angry with Dodo. She does not see things. She thought so much about the cottages, and she was rude to Sir James sometimes, but he is so kind, he never noticed it. Well, said Mrs. Cadwallader, putting on her shawl and rising as if in haste, I must go straight to Sir James and break this to him. He will have brought his mother back by this time, and I must call. Your uncle will never tell him. We are all disappointed, my dear. Young people should think of their families in marrying. I set a bad example, married a poor clergyman, and made myself a pitiable object among the debracies, obliged to get my coals by stratagem, and pray to heaven for my salad-oil. However, Casabon has money enough. I must do him that justice. Not his blood. I suppose the family quarterings are three cuttlefish sable, and a commentator rampant. By the by, before I go, my dear, I must speak to your Mrs. Carter about pastry. I want to send my young cook to learn of her. Poor people with four children like us, you know, can't afford to keep a good cook. I have no doubt Mrs. Carter will oblige me. Sir James's cook is a perfect dragon. In less than an hour Mrs. Cadwallader had circumvented Mrs. Carter and driven to Freshett Hall, which was not far from her own parsonage, her husband being resident in Freshett and keeping a cure at in Tipton. Sir James Chetum had returned from the short journey which had kept him absent for a couple of days, and had changed his dress, intending to ride over to Tipton Grange. His horse was standing at the door when Mrs. Cadwallader drove up, and he immediately appeared there himself, whip in hand. Lady Chetum had not yet returned, but Mrs. Cadwallader's errand could not be dispatched in the presence of grooms, so she asked me to be taken into the conservatory close by, to look at the new plants, and on coming to a contemplative stand, she said. I have a great shock for you. I hope you are not so far gone in love as you pretended to be." It was of no use protesting against Mrs. Cadwallader's way of putting things. But Sir James's countenance changed a little. He felt a vague alarm. I do believe Brooke is going to expose himself after all. I accused him of meaning to stand for Middlemarch on the liberal side, and he looked silly and never denied it, talked about the independent line and the usual nonsense. Is that all? said Sir James, much relieved. Why? rejoined Mrs. Cadwallader with a sharper note. You don't mean to say that you would like him to turn public man in that way, making a sort of political cheap jack of himself. He might be dissuaded, I should think. He would not like the expense. That is what I told him. He is vulnerable to reason there—always a few grains of common sense and an ounce of miserliness. Miserliness is a capital quality to run in families—it's the safe side for madness to dip on. And there must be a little crack in the Brooke family, else we should not see what we are to see. What? Brooke standing for Middlemarch. Worse than that. I really feel a little responsible. I always told you Miss Brooke would be such a fine match. I knew there was a great deal of nonsense in her—a flighty sort of methodistical stuff. But these things were out of girls. However, I am taken by surprise for once. What do you mean, Mrs. Cadwallader? said Sir James. His fear lest Miss Brooke should have run away to join the Moravian brethren, or some preposterous sect unknown to good society, was a little allayed by the knowledge that Mrs. Cadwallader always made the worst of things. What has happened to Miss Brooke? Pray speak out. Very well. She is engaged to be married. Mrs. Cadwallader paused a few moments, observing the deeply hurt expression in her friend's face, which he was trying to conceal by a nervous smile while he whipped his boot. But she soon added, Engaged to Cazabon. Sir James let his whip fall and stoop to pick it up. Perhaps his face had never before gathered so much concentrated disgust as when he turned to Mrs. Cadwallader and repeated, Cazabon. Since so, you know my errand now. Good God! It is horrible! He is no better than a mummy! This point of view has to be allowed for, as that of a blooming and disappointed rival. She says he is a great soul, a great bladder for dried peas to rattle in, said Mrs. Cadwallader. What business has an old bachelor like that to marry, said Sir James? He has one foot in the grave. He means to draw it out again, I suppose. Brooke ought not to allow it. He should insist on its being put off till she is of age. She would think better of it then. What is a guardian for? As if you could ever squeeze a resolution out of Brooke. Cadwallader might talk to him. Not he. Humphrey finds everybody charming. I never can get him to abuse Cazabon. He will even speak well of the bishop, though I tell him it is unnatural and a benefit to clergymen. What can one do with a husband who attends so little to the decencies? I hide it as well as I can by abusing everybody myself. Come, come, cheer up! You are well rid of Miss Brooke, a girl who would have been requiring you to see the stars by daylight. In between ourselves, little Celia is worth two of her, and likely, after all, to be the better match, for this marriage to Cazabon is as good as going to a nunnery. I have won my own account. It is for Miss Brooke's sake I think her friend should try to use their influence. Well, Humphrey doesn't know yet, but when I tell him you may depend upon it, he will say, why not, Cazabon is a good fellow, and young, young enough. These charitable people never know vinegar from wine till they have swallowed it and got the colic. However, if I were a man, I should prefer Celia, especially when Dorothea was gone. The truth is, you have been courting one, and have won the other. I can see that she admires you almost as much as a man expects to be admired. If it were anyone but me who said so, you might think it exaggeration. Good-bye!" Sir James handed Mrs. Cadwalader to the faton, and then jumped on his horse. He was not going to renounce his ride because of his friend's unpleasant news, only to ride the faster in some other direction than that of Tipton Grange. Now why on earth should Mrs. Cadwalader have been at all busy about Miss Brooke's marriage, and why, when one match that she liked to think that she had a hand in was frustrated, should she have straight waken tribe the preliminaries of another? Was there any ingenious plot, any hide-and-seek course of action, which might be detected by a careful telescopic watch? Not at all. A telescope might have swept the parishes of Tipton and Freshett, the whole area visited by Mrs. Cadwalader and her faton, without witnessing any interview that could excite suspicion, or any scene from which she did not return, with the same unperturbed keenness of eye and the same high natural colour. In fact, if that convenient vehicle had existed in the days of the Seven Sages, one of them would doubtless have remarked that you can know little of women by following them about in their pony-fatons. Even with a microscope directed on a water-drop, we find ourselves making interpretations which turn out to be rather coarse, for whereas under a weak lens you may seem to see a creature exhibiting an act of veracity into which other smaller creatures actively play, as if they were so many animated tax-penis. A stronger lens reveals to you certain tiniest hairlets which make vortices for these victims, while the swallower waits passively at his receipt of custom. In this way, metaphorically speaking, a strong lens applied to Mrs. Cadwalader's matchmaking will show a play of minute causes producing what may be called thought-and-speech vortices to bring her the sort of food she needed. Her life was rurally simple, quite free from secrets either foul, dangerous, or otherwise important, and not consciously affected by the great affairs of the world. All the more did the affairs of the great world interest her, when communicated in the letters of high-born relations, the way in which fascinating younger sons had gone to the dogs by marrying their mistresses, the fine old-blooded idiocy of young Lord Tapir, and the furious gouty humours of old Lord Megatherium. The exact crossing of genealogies which had brought a cornet into a new branch and widened the relations of a scandal. These were topics of which she retained details with the utmost accuracy, and reproduced them in an excellent pickle of epigrams which she herself enjoyed the more because she believed as unquestionably in birth and no-birth as she did in game and vermin. She would never have disowned any one on the ground of poverty, a de Bracey reduced to take his dinner in a basin, would have seemed to her an example of pathos worth exaggerating, and I fear his aristocratic vices would not have horrified her. But her feeling towards the vulgar rich was a sort of religious hatred. They had probably made all their money out of high retail prices, and Mrs. Cadwallader detested high prices for everything that was not paid in kind at the rectory. Such people were no part of God's design in making the world, and their accent was an affliction to the ears. A town where such monsters abounded was hardly more than a sort of low comedy, which could not be taken account of in a well-bred scheme of the universe. Let any lady who was inclined to be hard on Mrs. Cadwallader inquire into the comprehensiveness of her own beautiful views, and be quite sure that they afford accommodation for all the lives which have the honour to co-exist with hers. With such a mind, active as phosphorus, biting everything that came near it into the form that suited it, how could Mrs. Cadwallader feel that the Miss Brooks and their matrimonial prospects were alien to her? Especially as it had been the habit of years for her to scold Mr. Brooke with the friendliest frankness, and let him know in confidence that she thought him a poor creature. From the first arrival of the young ladies in Tipton, she had prearranged Dorothy as marriage with Sir James, and if it had taken place, would have been quite sure that it was her doing, that it should not take place after she had preconceived it, caused her an irritation which every thinker will sympathise with. She was the diplomatist of Tipton and Freshett, and for anything to happen in spite of her was an offensive irregularity. As to freaks like this of Miss Brooks, Mrs. Cadwallader had no patience with them, and now saw that her opinion of this girl had been infected with some of her husband's weak charitableness. Those methodistical whims, that air of being more religious than the rector and cure it together, came from a deeper and more constitutional disease than she had been willing to believe. However, said Mrs. Cadwallader, first to herself and afterwards to her husband, I throw her over. There was a chance, if she had married Sir James, of her becoming a sane, sensible woman. He would never have contradicted her, and when a woman is not contradicted, she has no motive for obstinacy in her absurdities. But now I wish her joy of her hair-shirt. It followed that Mrs. Cadwallader must decide on another match for Sir James, and having made up her mind that it was to be the younger Miss Brooke, there could not have been a more skillful move towards the success of her plan than her hint to the baronet that he had made an impression on Celia's heart. For he was not one of those gentlemen who languish after the unattainable Sappho's apple that laughs from the topmost bow, the charms which, smile like the knot of cow-slips on the cliff, not to become at by the willing hand. He had no sonnets to write, and it could not strike him agreeably that he was not an object of preference to the woman whom he had preferred. Already the knowledge that Dorothea had chosen Mr. Casabon had bruised his attachment and relaxed its hold. Although Sir James was a sportsman, he had some other feelings towards women than towards Grouse and Foxes, and did not regard his future wife in the light of prey, valuable chiefly for the excitements of the chase. Neither was he so well acquainted with the habits of primitive races, as to feel that an ideal combat for her, Tomahawk in hand, so to speak, was necessary to the historical continuity of the marriage-tie. On the contrary, having the amiable vanity which knits us to those who are fond of us, and this inclines us to those who are indifferent, and also a good grateful nature, the mere idea that a woman had a kindness towards him spun little threads of tenderness from out his heart towards hers. Thus it happened that after Sir James had ridden rather fast for half an hour in a direction away from Tipton Grange, he slackened his pace, and at last turned into a road which would lead him back by a shorter cut. Various feelings wroughtened him the determination, after all, to go to the Grange today, as if nothing new had happened. He could not help rejoicing that he had never made the offer, and been rejected. Mere friendly politeness required that he should call to see Dorothea about the cottages, and now happily Mrs. Cadwalader had prepared him to offer his congratulations, if necessary, without showing too much awkwardness. He really did not like it, giving up Dorothea was very painful to him. But there was something in the resolve to make this visit forthwith, and conquer all show of feeling, which was a sort of file-biting, and counter-irritant, and without his distinctly recognizing the impulse, there certainly was, present in him, the sense that Celia would be there, and that he should pay her more attention than he had done before. We mortals, men and women, devour many a disappointment between breakfast and dinner-time. Keep back the tears and look a little pale about the lips, and an answer to inquiries say, Oh! Nothing! Pride helps us, and pride is not a bad thing, when it only urges us to hide our own hurts, not to hurt others. CHAPTER VII OF MIDDLEMARCH. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Elizabeth Klett. MIDDLEMARCH. By George Elliott. CHAPTER VII. Piacere Popone, Vo alla sua stagione. Italian Proverb. Mr. Casablan, as might be expected, spent a great deal of his time at the Grange in these weeks, and the hindrance which courtship occasioned to the progress of his great work, the key to all mythologies, naturally made him look forward the more eagerly to the happy termination of courtship. But he had deliberately incurred the hindrance, having made up his mind that it was now time for him to adorn his life with the graces of female companionship, to irradiate the gloom which fatigue was apt to hang over the intervals of studious labour, with the play of female fancy, and to secure in this, his culminating age, the solace of female tendons for his declining years. Cassie determined to abandon himself to the stream of feeling, and perhaps was surprised to find what an exceedingly shallow rill it was. As in droughty regions, baptism by immersion could only be performed symbolically, Mr. Casablan found that sprinkling was the utmost approach to a plunge which his stream would afford him, and he concluded that the poets had much exaggerated the force of masculine passion. Nevertheless, he observed with pleasure that Miss Brooks showed an ardent submissive affection which promised to fulfil his most agreeable provisions of marriage. It had once or twice crossed his mind that possibly there was some deficiency in Dorothea to account for the moderation of his abandonment, but he was unable to discern the deficiency, or to figure to himself a woman who would have pleased him better, so that there was clearly no reason to fall back upon but the exaggerations of human tradition. "'Could I knowledge be preparing myself now to be more useful?' said Dorothea to him one morning, early in the time of courtship. "'Could I not learn to read Latin and Greek aloud to you, as Milton's daughters did to their father, without understanding what they read?' "'I fear that would be weirsome to you,' said Mr. Casablan, smiling. "'And indeed, if I remember rightly, the young women you have mentioned regarded that exercise in unknown tongues as a ground for rebellion against the poet.' "'Yes, but in the first place they were very naughty girls, else they would have been proud to minister to such a father, and in the second place they might have studied privately and taught themselves to understand what they read, and then it would have been interesting. I hope you don't expect me to be naughty and stupid. I expect you to be all that an exquisite young lady can be in every possible relation of life. Certainly it might be a great advantage if you were able to copy the Greek character, and to that end it were well to begin with a little reading.' Dorothy accedes this as precious permission. She would not have asked Mr. Casablan at once to teach her the languages, dreading of all things to be tiresome instead of helpful. But it was not entirely out of devotion to her future husband that she wished to know Latin and Greek. Those provinces of masculine knowledge seemed to her a standing ground from which all truth could be seen more truly. As it was, she constantly doubted her own conclusions, because she felt her own ignorance. How could she be confident that one-roomed cottages were not for the glory of God, when men who knew the classics appeared to conciliate indifference to the cottages with zeal for the glory? Perhaps even Hebrew might be necessary, at least the alphabet in a few roots, in order to arrive at the core of things, and judge soundly on the social duties of the Christian. And she had not reached that point of renunciation at which she would have been satisfied with having a wise husband. She wished, poor child, to be wise herself. This brook was certainly very naive with all her alleged cleverness. Celia, whose mind had never been thought too powerful, saw the emptiness of other people's pretensions much more readily. To have in general but little feeling seems to be the only security against feeling too much on any particular occasion. However, Mr. Kazabon consented to listen and teach for an hour together, like a schoolmaster of little boys, or rather like a lover, to whom a mistress's elementary ignorance and difficulties have a touching fitness. Two scholars would have disliked teaching the alphabet under such circumstances. But Dorothea herself was a little shocked and discouraged at her own stupidity, and the answer she got to some timid questions about the value of the Greek accents gave her a painful suspicion that here indeed there might be secrets not capable of explanation to a woman's reason. Mr. brook had no doubt on that point, and expressed himself with his usual strength upon it, one day that he came into the library while the reading was going forward. Well, but now Kazabon such deep studies, classics, mathematics, that kind of thing, are too taxing for a woman, too taxing, you know. Dorothea is learning to read the characters simply, said Mr. Kazabon, evading the question. She had very considerate thought of saving my eyes. Ah, well, without understanding, you know, that may not be so bad. But there is a likeness about the feminine mind, a touch and go, music, the fine arts, that kind of thing. We should study those up to a certain point, women should, but in a light way, you know. A woman should be able to sit down and play you or sing you a good old English tune, that is what I like, though I have heard most things, been at the opera in Vienna, Gluck, Mozart, everything of that sort, but I am a conservative in music, it's not like ideas, you know, I stick to the good old tunes. Mr. Kazabon is not fond of the piano, and I am very glad he is not," said Dorothea, whose slight regard for domestic music and feminine fine art must be forgiven her, considering the small tinkling and smearing in which they chiefly consisted at that dark period. She smiled and looked up at her betrothed with grateful eyes. If he had always been asking her to play the last Rose of Summer, she would have required much resignation. He says there is only an old harpsichord at Loic, and it is covered with books. Ha, there you are behind Celia, my dear. Celia now plays very prettily, and is always ready to play. However, since Kazabon does not like it, you are all right. But it's a pity you should not have little recreations of that sort, Kazabon. The bow, always strung, that kind of thing you know, will not do. I never could look on it in the light of a recreation to have my ears teased with measured noises," said Mr. Kazabon. A tune much iterated has the ridiculous effect of making the words in my mind perform a sort of minuet to keep time, an effect hardly tolerable, I imagine, after boyhood. As to the grander forms of music, worthy to accompany solemn celebrations, and even to serve as an educating influence according to the ancient conception, I say nothing, for with these we are not immediately concerned. No, but music of that sort I should enjoy, said Dorothea. When we were coming home from Lausanne my uncle took us to hear the great organ at Freiburg, and it made me sob. That kind of thing is not healthy, my dear," said Mr. Brooke. Kazabon, she will be in your hands now. You must teach my niece to take things more quietly. Eh, Dorothea? He ended with a smile, not wishing to hurt his niece, but really thinking that it was perhaps better for her to be early married to so sober a fellow as Kazabon, since she would not hear of Chetam. It is wonderful, though," he said to himself as he shuffled out of the room. It is wonderful that she should have liked him. However, the match is good. I should have been travelling out of my brief to have hindered it. Let Mrs. Cadwalader say what she will. He is pretty certain to be a bishop, is Kazabon. That was a very seasonable pamphlet of his on the Catholic question—a denary, at least. They owe him a denary. And here I must vindicate a claim to philosophical reflectiveness, by remarking that Mr. Brooke on this occasion little thought of the radical speech, which, at a later period, he was led to make on the income of the bishops. What elegant historian would neglect a striking opportunity for pointing out that his heroes did not foresee the history of the world or even their own actions? For example, that Henry of Navarre, when a Protestant baby, little thought of being a Catholic monarch, or that Alfred the Great, when he measured his laborious knights with burning candles, had no idea a future gentleman measuring their idle days with watches. Here is a mind of truth, which, however vigorously it might be worked, is likely to outlast our coal. Out of Mr. Brooke I make a further remark perhaps less warranted by precedent. Namely, that if he had foreknown his speech, it might not have made any great difference. To think with pleasure of his niece's husband having a large ecclesiastical income was one thing, to make a liberal speech was another thing, and it is a narrow mind which cannot look at a subject from various points of view. CHAPTER VIII. I am her brother now, and you her father. Every gentle maid should have a guardian in each gentleman. It was wonderful to Sir James Chetam how well he continued to like going to the Grange after he had once encountered the difficulty of seeing Dorothea for the first time in the light of a woman who was engaged to another man. Of course the forked lightning seemed to pass through him when he first approached her, and he remained conscious throughout the interview of hiding uneasiness. But good as he was, it must be owned that his uneasiness was less than it would have been if he had thought his rival a brilliant and desirable match. He had no sense of being eclipsed by Mr. Kazabon. He was only shocked that Dorothea was under a melancholy illusion, and his mortification lost some of its bitterness by being mingled with compassion. Nevertheless, while Sir James said to himself that he had completely resigned her, since with the perversity of a desdemona she had not affected a proposed match that was clearly suitable in according to nature, he could not yet be quite passive under the idea of her engagement to Mr. Kazabon. On the day when he first saw them together in the light of his present knowledge, it seemed to him that he had not taken the affair seriously enough. Brooke was really culpable. He ought to have hindered it. Who could speak to him? Something might be done perhaps even now, at least, to defer the marriage. On his way home he turned into the rectory and asked for Mr. Cadwallader. Happily the rector was at home, and his visitor was shown into the study, where all the fishing tackle hung. But he himself was in a little room adjoining, at work with his turning apparatus, and he called to the baronet to join him there. The two were better friends than any other land-holder and clergyman in the county, a significant fact which was an agreement with the amiable expression of their faces. Mr. Cadwallader was a large man, with full lips and a sweet smile, very plain and rough in his exterior, but with that solid, imperturbable ease and good humour which is infectious, and like great grassy hills in the sunshine, quiets even an irritated egoism, and makes it rather ashamed of itself. "'Well, how are you?' he said, showing a hand not quite fit to be grasped. Sorry I missed you before. Is there anything particular? You look vexed.' Sir James's brow had a little crease in it, a little depression of the eyebrow, which he seemed purposely to exaggerate as he answered. "'It is only this conduct of Brooks. I really think somebody should speak to him.' "'What? Meaning to stand?' said Mr. Cadwallader, going on with the arrangement of the reels which he had just been turning. I hardly think he means it. But where's the harm if he likes it? Anyone who objects to wiggory should be glad when the wigs don't put up the strongest pillow. They won't have returned the constitution with our friend Brooks-head for a battering-ram.' "'Oh, I don't mean that,' said Sir James, who, after putting down his hat and throwing himself into a chair, had begun to nurse his leg and examine the sole of his boot with much bitterness. I mean this marriage. I mean his letting that blooming young girl marry Casabon. What is the matter with Casabon? I see no harm in him, if the girl likes him. She is too young to know what she likes. Her guardian ought to interfere. He ought not to allow the thing to be done in this headlong manner. I wonder a man like you, Cadwallader, a man with daughters, can look at the affair with indifference, and with such a heart as yours. Do think seriously about it.' "'I am not joking. I am as serious as possible,' said the rector, with a provoking little inward laugh. "'You are as bad as Eleanor. She has been wanting me to go and lecture Brooke, and I have reminded her that her friends had a very poor opinion of the match she made when she married me.' "'But look at Casabon,' said Sir James indignantly. He must be fifty, and I don't believe he could ever have been much more than the shadow of a man. Look at his legs!' "'Confound you handsome young fellows! You think of having it all your own way in the world. You don't understand women. They don't admire you half so much as you admire yourselves. Eleanor used to tell her sisters that she married me for my ugliness. It was so various and amusing that it had quite conquered her prudence. "'You! It was easy enough for a woman to love you. But this is no question of beauty. I don't like Casabon.'" This was Sir James' strongest way of implying that he thought ill of a man's character. "'Why? What do you know against him?' said the rector. Laying down his reels, and putting his thumbs into his arm-holes with an air of attention. Sir James paused. He did not usually find it easy to give his reasons. It seemed to him strange that people should not know them without being told, since he only felt what was reasonable. At last he said, "'Now, Cadwallader, has he got any heart?' "'Well, yes. I don't mean of the melting sort, but a sound colonel that you may be sure of. He is very good to his poor relations, pensions several of the women, and is educating a young fellow at a good deal of expense. Casabon acts up to his sense of justice. His mother's sister made a bad match—a pole, I think—lost herself, at any rate was disowned by her family. If it had not been for that, Casabon would not have had so much money by half. I believe he went himself to find out his cousins, and to see what he could do for them. Every man would not ring so well as that, if you tried his metal. You would, Chetum, but not every man." "'I don't know,' said Sir James, colouring. I am not so sure of myself.' He paused a moment, and then added, "'That was a right thing for Casabon to do. But a man may wish to do what is right, and yet be a sort of parchment-code. A woman may not be happy with him. And I think when a girl is so young as Miss Brook is, her friends ought to interfere a little to hinder her from doing anything foolish. You laugh, because you fancy I have some feeling on my own account, but upon my honour it is not that. I should feel just the same if I were Miss Brook's brother or uncle.' "'Well, but what should you do?' "'I should say that the marriage must not be decided on until she was of age, and depend upon it in that case it would never come off. I wish you saw it as I do. I wish you would talk to Brook about it.' Sir James rose as he was finishing his sentence, for he saw Mrs. Cadwallader entering from the study. She held by the hand her youngest girl, about five years old, who immediately ran to Papa, and was made comfortable on his knee. "'I hear what you are talking about,' said the wife, "'but you will make no impression on Humphrey. As long as the fish rise to his bait, everybody is what he ought to be. Bless you, Casabon has got a trout-stream, and does not care about fishing in it himself. Could there be a better fellow?' "'Well, there is something in that,' said the rector, with his quiet inward laugh. It is a very good quality in a man to have a trout-stream.' "'But seriously,' said Sir James, whose vexation had not yet spent itself, "'don't you think the rector might do some good by speaking?' "'Oh, I told you beforehand what he would say,' answered Mrs. Cadwallader, lifting up her eyebrows. "'I have done what I could. I wash my hands of the marriage.' "'In the first place,' said the rector, looking rather grave, "'it would be nonsensical to expect that I could convince Brooke, and make him act accordingly. Brooke is a very good fellow. But, pulpy! He will run into any mould, but he won't keep shape.' "'He might keep shape long enough to defer the marriage,' said Sir James. "'But, my dear Chetam, why should I use my influence to Casabon's disadvantage? Unless I were much sure than I am that I should be acting for the advantage of Miss Brooke. I know no harm of Casabon. I don't care about his Zisuthrus, and Phephophum, and the rest. But then he doesn't care about my fishing tackle. As to the line he took on the Catholic question, that was unexpected, but he has always been civil to me, and I don't see why I should spoil his sport. For anything I can tell, Miss Brooke may be happier with him than she would be with any other man.' "'Humphrey, I have no patience with you. You know you would rather dine under the hedge than with Casabon alone. You have nothing to say to each other.' "'What is that to do with Miss Brooke's marrying him? She does not do it for my amusement.' "'He has got no good red blood in his body,' said Sir James. "'No, somebody put a drop under a magnifying glass, and it was all semicolons and parentheses,' said Mrs. Cadwalader. "'Why does he not bring out his book, instead of marrying?' said Sir James, with a disgust which he held warranted by the sound feeling of an English layman. "'Oh, he dreams footnotes, and they run away with all his brains. They say when he was a little boy he made an abstract of hop on my thumb, and has been making abstracts ever since. Urgh! And that, as the man Humphrey goes on saying, that a woman may be happy with. "'Well, he is what Miss Brooke likes,' said the Ractor. "'I don't profess to understand every young lady's taste.' "'But if she were your own daughter,' said Sir James. "'That would be a different affair. She is not my daughter, and I don't feel called upon to interfere. Casabon is as good as most of us. He is a scholarly clergyman and creditable to the cloth. Some radical fellow speechifying at Middlemarch said Casabon was the learned, straw-chopping incumbent, and Freak was the brick-and-mortar incumbent, and I was the angling incumbent. And upon my word I don't see that one is worse or better than the other.' The Ractor ended with his silent laugh. He always saw the joke of any satire against himself. His conscience was large and easy, like the rest of him. It did only what it could do without any trouble. Clearly there would be no interference with Miss Brooke's marriage through Mr. Cadwallader. Mr. James felt with some sadness that she was to have perfect liberty of misjudgment. It was a sign of his good disposition that he did not slacken at all in his intention of carrying outdoor Thea's design of the cottages. Doubtless this persistence was the best course for his own dignity. But pride only helps us to be generous. It never makes us so. Any more than vanity makes us witty. She was now enough aware of Sir James's position with regard to her, to appreciate the rectitude of his perseverance in a landlord's duty, to which he had at first been urged by a lover's complacence, and her pleasure in it was great enough to count for something, even in her present happiness. Perhaps she gave to Sir James Chetam's cottages all the interest she could spare for Mr. Casabon, or rather from the symphony of hopeful dreams, admiring trust, and passionate self-devotion which that learned gentleman had set playing in her soul. Hence it happened that in the good baronet succeeding visits, while he was beginning to pay small attentions to Celia, he found himself talking with more and more pleasure to Dorothea. She was perfectly unconstrained and without irritation towards him now, and he was gradually discovering the delight there is in frank kindness and companionship between a man and a woman who have no passion to hide or confess. CHAPTER IX An ancient land and ancient oracles is called law-thirsty. All the struggle there was after order and a perfect rule. Pray, where lie such lands now? Second gentleman, why where they lay of old, in human souls? Mr. Casabon's behaviour about settlements was highly satisfactory to Mr. Brook, and the preliminaries of marriage rolled smoothly along, shortening the weeks of courtship. The betrothed bride must see her future home, and dictate any changes that she would like to have made there. A woman dictates before marriage in order that she may have an appetite for submission afterwards, and certainly the mistakes that we male and female mortals make when we have our own way might fairly raise some wonder that we are so fond of it. On a grey but dry November morning Dorothea drove to Lowick in company with her uncle and Celia. Mr. Casabon's home was the manor house. Most by, visible from some parts of the garden, was the little church, with the old personage opposite. In the beginning of his career Mr. Casabon had only held the living, but the death of his brother had put him in possession of the manor also. It had a small park, with a fine old oak here and there, and an avenue of limes towards the south-west front, with a sunk fence between park and pleasure-ground. So that, from the drawing-room windows, the glance swept uninterruptedly along a slope of greensward, till the limes ended in a level of corn and pastures, which often seemed to melt into a lake under the setting sun. This was the happy side of the house, for the south and east looked rather melancholy, even under the brightest morning. The grounds here were more confined, the flower beds showed no very careful tendons, and large clumps of trees, chiefly of somber use, had risen high, not ten yards from the windows. The building, of greenish stone, was in the old English style, not ugly, but small windowed and melancholy-looking, the sort of house that must have children, many flowers, open windows, and little vistas of bright things, to make it seem a joyous home. In this latter end of autumn, with the sparse remnant of yellow leaves falling slowly at thwart the dark evergreens in a stillness without sunshine, the house, too, had an air of autumnal decline, and Mr. Kazabon, when he presented himself, had no bloom that could be thrown into relief by that background. Oh, dear, Celia said to herself, I am sure fresh at Hall would have been pleasanter than this. She thought of the white freestone, the pillared portico, and the terrace full of flowers, Sir James smiling above them like a prince issuing from his enchantment in a rose-bush, with a handkerchief swiftly metamorphosed from the most delicately odorous petals. Sir James, who talked so agreeably, always about things which had common sense in them, and not about learning. Celia had those light-young feminine tastes which grave and weather-worn gentlemen sometimes prefer in a wife, but happily Mr. Kazabon's bias had been different, for he would have had no chance with Celia. Dorothea, on the contrary, found the house and grounds all that she could wish, the dark book-shelves in the long library, the carpets and curtains with colours subdued by time, the curious old maps and bird's-eye views on the walls of the corridor, with here and there an old vase below, had no oppression for her, and seemed more cheerful than the estes and pictures at the Grange, which her uncle had long ago brought home from his travels, they being probably among the ideas that he had taken in at one time. To poor Dorothea these severe classical nudities and smirking renaissance-corregeosities were painfully inexplicable, staring into the midst of her puritanic conceptions, she had never been taught how she could bring them into any sort of relevance with her life. But the owners of Loaq apparently had not been travellers, and Mr. Kazabon's studies of the past were not carried on by means of such aids. Dorothea walked about the house with delightful emotion. Everything seemed hallowed to her. This was to be the home of her wifehood. And she looked up with eyes full of confidence to Mr. Kazabon, when he drew her attention specially to some actual arrangement, and asked her if she would like an alteration. All appeals to her taste she met gratefully, but saw nothing to alter. His efforts at exact courtesy and formal tenderness had no defect for her. She filled up all blanks with unmanifested perfections, interpreting him as she interpreted the works of Providence, and accounting for seeming discords by her own deafness to the higher harmonies. And there are many blanks left in the weeks of courtship which a loving faith fills with happy assurance. Now, my dear Dorothea, I wish you to favour me by pointing out which room you would like to have as your boudoir," said Mr. Kazabon, showing that his views of the womanly nature were sufficiently large to include that requirement. It is very kind of you to think of that," said Dorothea, but I assure you I would rather have all those matters decided for me. I shall be much happier to take everything as it is, just as you have been used to have it, or as you will yourself choose it to be. I have no motive for wishing anything else." "'Oh, do-do," said Celia, "'will you not have the bow window to room upstairs?' Mr. Kazabon led the way thither. The bow window looked down the avenue of Limes. The furniture was all of a faded blue, and there were miniatures of ladies and gentlemen with powdered hair hanging in a group. A piece of tapestry over a door also showed a blue-green world with a pale stag in it. The chairs and tables were thin-legged and easy to upset. It was a room where one might fancy the ghost of a tight-laced lady revisiting the scene of her embroidery. A light-book case contained deodesimo volumes of polite literature and calf, completing the furniture. "'Yes,' said Mr. Brook, this would be a pretty room with some new hangings, sofas, and that sort of thing. A little bare now." "'No, uncle,' said Dorothea eagerly, "'prey, do not speak of altering anything. There are so many other things in the world that want altering. I like to take these things as they are. And you like them as they are, don't you?' she added, looking at Mr. Kazabon. Perhaps this was your mother's room when she was young.' "'It was,' he said, with his slow bend of the head. "'This is your mother,' said Dorothea, who had turned to examine the group of miniatures. "'It is like the tiny one you brought me. Only I should think a better portrait. And this one opposite, who is this?' Her elder sister—they were, like you and your sister, the only two children of their parents, who hang above them, you see. "'The sister is pretty,' said Celia, implying that she thought less favorably of Mr. Kazabon's mother. It was a new opening to Celia's imagination, that he came of a family who would all been young in their time, the ladies wearing necklaces. "'It is a peculiar face,' said Dorothea, looking closely. Those deep gray eyes rather near together, and the delicate, irregular nose with a sort of ripple in it, and all the powdered curls hanging backward. All together it seems to me peculiar rather than pretty. There is not even a family likeness between her and your mother.' "'No, and they were not alike in their lot.' "'You did not mention her to me,' said Dorothea. "'My aunt made an unfortunate marriage. I never saw her.' Dorothea wondered a little, but felt that it would be indelicate just then to ask for any information which Mr. Kazabon did not proffer, and she turned to the window to admire the view. The sun had lately pierced the gray, and the avenue of limes cast shadows. "'Shall we not walk in the garden now?' said Dorothea. "'And you would like to see the church, you know,' said Mr. Brooke. "'It is a droll little church, and the village. It all lies in a nutshell. By the way it will suture Dorothea, for the cottages are like a row of alms-houses, little gardens, jilly-flowers, that sort of thing.' "'Yes, please,' said Dorothea, looking at Mr. Kazabon. "'I should like to see all that.' She had got nothing from him more graphic about the lower cottages than that they were not bad. They were soon on a gravel walk which led chiefly between grassy borders and clumps of trees, this being the nearest way to the church,' Mr. Kazabon said. At the little gate leading into the church-yard, there was a pause while Mr. Kazabon went to the parsonage close by to fetch a key. Celia, who had been hanging a little in the rear, came up presently when she saw that Mr. Kazabon was gone away, and said in her easy staccato, which always seemed to contradict the suspicion of any malicious intent, "'Do you know Dorothea? I saw someone quite young coming up one of the walks.' "'Is that astonishing, Celia?' "'There may be a young gardener, you know. Why not?' said Mr. Book. I told Kazabon he should change his gardener.' "'No, not a gardener,' said Celia, a gentleman with a sketchbook. He had light brown curls. I only saw his back. But he was quite young.' "'The cured son, perhaps,' said Mr. Book. "'Ah, there is Kazabon again, and Tucker with him. He is going to introduce Tucker. You don't know Tucker yet.'" Mr. Tucker was the middle-aged cured, one of the inferior clergy, who are usually not wanting and sons. But after the introduction, the conversation did not lead to any question about his family, and the startling apparition of youthfulness was forgotten by everyone but Celia. She inwardly declined to believe that the light brown curls and slim figure could have any relationship to Mr. Tucker, who was just as old and musty-looking as she would have expected Mr. Kazabon's curate to be—doubtless an excellent man who would go to heaven, for Celia wished not to be unprincipled, but the corners of his mouth were so unpleasant. Celia thought with some dismalness of the time she should have to spend as bridesmaid at Lowick, while the curate had probably no pretty little children whom she could like, irrespective of principle. Mr. Tucker was invaluable in their walk, and perhaps Mr. Kazabon had not been without foresight on this head, the curate being able to answer all dorthiest questions about the villagers and the other parishioners. Everybody, he assured her, was well off in Lowick, not a cottager in those double cottages at a low rent but kept a pig, and the strips of garden at the back were well tended. The small boys wore excellent corduroy, the girls went out as tidy servants, or did a little straw-plating at home. No looms here, no descent, and though the public disposition was rather towards laying by money than towards spirituality, there was not much vice. The speckled fowls were so numerous that Mr. Brook observed, your farmers leave some barley for the women to glean, I see. The poor folks here might have a fowl in their pot, as the good French king used to wish for all his people. The French had a good many fowls, skinny fowls, you know. I think it was a very cheap wish of his, said Dorothea indignantly. Are kings such monsters that a wish like that must be reckoned a royal virtue? And if he wished them a skinny fowl, said Celia, that would not be nice, but perhaps he wished them to have fat fowls. Yes, but the word has dropped out of the text, or perhaps was suboditum, that is, present in the king's mind, but not uttered. said Mr. Casabon, smiling and bending his head towards Celia, who immediately dropped backward a little, because she could not bear Mr. Casabon to blink at her. Dorothea sank into silence on the way back to the house. She felt some disappointment, of which she was yet ashamed, that there was nothing for her to do in Loewek, and in the next few minutes her mind had glanced over the possibility, which she would have preferred, a finding that her home would be in a parish which had a larger share of the world's misery, so that she might have had a more active duties in it. Then, recurring to the future actually before her, she made a picture of more complete devotion to Mr. Casabon's aims, in which she would await new duties. Many such might reveal themselves to the higher knowledge gained by her in that companionship. Mr. Tucker soon left them, having some clerical work which would not allow them to lunch at the hall, and as they were re-entering the garden through the little gate, Mr. Casabon said, You seem a little sad, Dorothea. I trust you are pleased with what you have seen. I am feeling something which is perhaps foolish and wrong," answered Dorothea, with her usual openness, almost wishing that the people wanted more to be done for them here. I have known so few ways of making my life good for anything. Of course my notions of usefulness must be narrow. I must learn new ways of helping people. Doubtless, said Mr. Casabon, each position has its corresponding duties. Yours I trust as the mistress of Loick will not leave any yearning unfulfilled. Indeed, I believe that," said Dorothea earnestly, do not suppose that I am sad. That is well. But if you are not tired, we will take another way to the house than that by which we came. Dorothea was not at all tired, and a little circuit was made towards a fine uteri, the chief hereditary glory of the grounds on this side of the house. As they approached it, a figure, conspicuous on a dark background of evergreens, was seated on a bench sketching the old tree. Mr. Brook, who was walking in front with Celia, turned his head and said, "'Who is that youngster, Casabon?' They had come very near when Mr. Casabon answered. "'That is a young relative of mine, a second cousin. The grandson, in fact,' he added, looking at Dorothea, of the lady whose portrait you have been noticing, my Aunt Julia." The young man had laid down his sketchbook and risen. His bushy light-brown curls, as well as his youthfulness, identified him at once with Celia's apparition. "'Dorothea, let me introduce you to my cousin, Mr. Ladislaw. Will, this is Miss Brook.' The cousin was so close now, that, when he lifted his hat, Dorothea could see a pair of gray eyes rather near together, a delicate, irregular nose with a little ripple in it, and hair falling backward. But there was a mouth and chin of a more prominent, threatening aspect, than belonged to the type of the grandmother's miniature. Young Ladislaw did not feel it necessary to smile, as if he were charmed with this introduction to his future second cousin and her relatives, but wore rather a pouting air of discontent. "'You are an artist, I see,' said Mr. Brook, taking up the sketchbook and turning it over in his unceremonious fashion. "'No, I only sketch a little. There is nothing fit to be seen there,' said Young Ladislaw, colouring, perhaps with temper rather than modesty. "'Oh, come! This is a nice bit now. I did a little in this way myself at one time, you know. Look here now. This is what I call a nice thing, done with what we used to call brio.' Mr. Brook held out towards the two girls a large-coloured sketch of a stony ground and trees with a pool. "'I am no judge of these things,' said Dorothea, not coldly, but with an eager deprecation of the appeal to her. "'You know, uncle, I never see the beauty of those pictures which you say are so much praised. They are a language I do not understand. I suppose there is some relation between pictures and nature which I am too ignorant to feel, just as you see what a Greek sentence stands for which means nothing to me.' Dorothea looked up at Mr. Kazabon, who bowed his head towards her, while Mr. Brook said, smiling nonchalantly, "'Bless me now how different people are. But you had a bad style of teaching, you know. Else this is just the thing for girls—sketching, fine art, and so on. But you took to drawing plans. You don't understand more bedate, sir, and that kind of thing. You will come to my house, I hope, and I will show you what I did in this way.' He continued, turning to young Ladislaw, who had to be recalled from his preoccupation and observing Dorothea. Ladislaw had made up his mind that she must be an unpleasant girl, since she was going to marry Kazabon, and what she said of her stupidity about pictures would have confirmed that opinion, even if he had believed her. As it was, he took her words for a covert judgment, and was certain that she thought his sketch detestable. There was too much cleverness in her apology. She was laughing both at her uncle and himself. But what a voice! It was like the voice of a soul that had once lived in a Neolian harp. This must be one of nature's inconsistencies. There could be no sort of passion in a girl who would marry Kazabon. But he turned from her, and bowed his thanks to Mr. Book's invitation. "'We will turn over my Italian engravings together,' continued that good-natured man. "'I have no end of those things, that I have laid by for years. One gets rusty in this part of the country, you know. Not you, Kazabon, you stick to your studies. But my best ideas get undermost, out of use, you know. You clever young men must guard against indolence. I was too indolent, you know, else I might have been anywhere at one time.' "'That is a seasonable admonition,' said Mr. Kazabon, "'but now we will pass on to the house, lest the young lady should be tired of standing.' When their backs returned, young Ladislaw sat down to go on with his sketching, and as he did so his face broke into an expression of amusement, which increased as he went on drawing, till at last he threw back his head and laughed aloud. Only it was the reception of his own artistic production that tickled him—partly the notion of his grave cousin as the lover of that girl, and partly Mr. Brook's definition of the place he might have held, but for the impediment of indolence. Mr. Will Ladislaw's sense of the ludicrous lit up his features very agreeably. It was the pure enjoyment of comicality, and had no mixture of sneering and self-accultation. "'What is your nephew going to do with himself, Kazabon?' said Mr. Brook, as they went on. "'My cousin, you mean? Not my nephew.'" "'Yes, yes, cousin, but in the way of a career, you know?' The answer to that question is painfully doubtful. Unleaving rugby he declined to go to an English university, where I would gladly have placed him, and chose what I must consider the anomalous course of studying at Heidelberg. And now he wants to go abroad again, without any special object, save the vague purpose of what he calls culture, preparation for he knows not what. He declined to choose a profession. "'He has no means but what you furnish, I suppose. I have always given him and his friends reason to understand that I would furnish in moderation what was necessary for providing him with a scholarly education, and launching him respectively. I am therefore bound to fulfil the expectations so raised,' said Mr. Kazabon, putting his conduct in the light of mere rectitude, a trait of delicacy which Dorothy noted with admiration. "'He has a thirst for travelling. Perhaps he may turn out a bruise or a mongo-park,' said Mr. Book. "'I had a notion of that myself at one time.' "'No. He has no bent towards exploration, or the enlargement of our geonosis. That would be a special purpose which I could recognise with some approbation, though without felicitating him on a career which so often ends in premature and violent death. But so far is he from having any desire for a more accurate knowledge of the earth's greatness, that he said he should prefer not to know the sources of the Nile, and that there should be some unknown regions preserved as hunting grounds for the poetic imagination.' "'Well, there is something in that, you know,' said Mr. Book, who had certainly an impartial mind. "'It is, I fear, nothing more than a part of his general inaccuracy and in this position to thoroughness of all kinds, which would be a bad augury for him in any profession, civil or sacred, even were he so far submissive to ordinary wool as to choose one. Perhaps he has conscientious scruples founded on his own unfitness,' said Dorothea, who was interesting herself in finding a favourable explanation. "'Because the law and medicine should be very serious professions to undertake, should they not? People's lives and fortunes depend on them.' "'Doubtless. But I fear that my young relative Will Ladislaw is chiefly determined in his aversion to these callings by a dislike to steady application, and through that kind of acquirement which is needful instrumentally, but is not charming or immediately inviting to self-indulgent taste. I have insisted to him on what Aristotle has stated with admirable brevity, that for the achievement of any work regarded as an end, there must be a prior exercise of many energies or acquired facilities of a secondary order, demanding patience. I have pointed to my own manuscript volumes, which represent the toil of years preparatory to a work not yet accomplished, but in vain. To careful reasoning of this kind he replies by calling himself Pegasus, and every form of prescribed work, Harness." Celia laughed. She was surprised to find that Mr. Casabon could say something quite amusing. "'Well, you know, he may turn out a Byron, a Chatterton, a Churchill—that sort of thing. There is no telling,' said Mr. Brooke. "'Shall you let him go to Italy, or wherever else he wants to go?' "'Yes. I have agreed to furnish him with moderate supplies for a year or so. He asks no more. I shall let him be tried by the test of freedom.' "'That is very kind of you,' said Dorothea, looking up at Mr. Casabon with delight. "'It is noble. After all, people may really have in them some vocation which is not quite plain to themselves. May they not? They may seem idle and weak because they are growing. We should be very patient with each other, I think.' "'I suppose it is being engaged to be married that has made you think patience good,' said Celia, as soon as she and Dorothea were alone together, taking off their wrappings. "'You mean that I am very impatient, Celia?' "'Yes. When people don't do and say just what you like.'" Celia had become less afraid of saying things to Dorothea since this engagement. Cleverness seemed to her more pitiable than ever. CHAPTER X He had catched a great cold, had he had no other clothes to wear than the skin of a bear not yet killed. FULLER Young Ladislaw did not pay that visit to which Mr. Brook had invited him, and only six days afterwards Mr. Casabon mentioned that his young relative had started for the Continent, seeming by this cold vagueness to waive inquiry. Indeed Will had declined to fix on any more precise destination than the entire area of Europe. Genius, he held, is necessarily intolerant of fetters. On the one hand it must have the utmost play for its spontaneity, on the other it may confidently await those messages from the universe which summon it to its peculiar work, only placing itself in an attitude of receptivity towards all sublime chances. The attitudes of receptivity are various, and Will had sincerely tried many of them. He was not excessively fond of wine, but he had several times taken too much, simply as an experiment in that form of ecstasy. He had fasted till he was faint, and then supped on lobster. He had made himself ill with doses of opium. Nothing greatly original had resulted from these measures, and the effects of the opium had convinced him that there was an entire dissimilarity between his constitution and Quincy's. The super-added circumstance which would evolve the genius had not yet come, the universe had not yet beckoned. Even Caesar's fortune at one time was but a grand presentiment. We know what a masquerade all development is, and what effective shapes may be disguised in helpless embryos. In fact, the world is full of hopeful analogies and handsome dubious eggs called possibilities. Will saw clearly enough the pitiful instances of long incubation producing no chick, and but for gratitude would have laughed at Casabon, whose plodding application, rows of notebooks, and small taper of learned theory exploring the tossed ruins of the world, seemed to enforce a moral entirely encouraging to Will's generous reliance on the intentions of a universe with regard to himself. He held that reliance to be a mark of genius, and certainly it is no mark to the contrary. Genius consisting neither in self-conceit nor in humility, but in a power to make or do, not anything in general, but something in particular. Let him start for the continent, then, without our pronouncing on his future. Among all forms of mistake, prophecy is the most gratuitous. But at present, this caution against a too hasty judgment interests me more in relation to Mr. Casabon than to his young cousin. If to Dorothea Mr. Casabon had been the mere occasion which had set alight the fine, inflammable material of her youthful illusions, does it follow that he was fairly represented in the minds of those less impassioned personages, who have hitherto delivered their judgments concerning him? I protest against any absolute conclusion, any prejudice derived from Mrs. Cadwalader's contempt for neighbouring clergyman's alleged greatness of soul, or Sir James Chetam's poor opinion of his rival's legs, from Mr. Brook's failure to elicit a companion's ideas, or from Celia's criticism of a middle-aged scholar's personal appearance. I am not sure that the greatest man of his age, if ever that solitary superlative existed, could escape these unfavourable reflections of himself in various small mirrors, and even Milton, looking for his portrait in a spoon, must submit to have the facial angle of a bumpkin. Moreover, if Mr. Casabon, speaking for himself, has rather a chilling rhetoric, it is not therefore certain that there is no good work or fine feeling in him. Did not an immortal physicist, an interpreter of hieroglyphs, write detestable verses? Has the theory of the solar system been advanced by graceful manners and conversational tact? Suppose we turn from outside estimates of a man, to wonder, with keener interest, what is the report of his own consciousness about his doings or capacity, with what hindrances he is carrying on his daily labours, what fading of hopes, or what deeper fixity of self-delusion the years are marking off within him, and with what spirit he wrestles against universal pressure, which will one day be too heavy for him, and bring his heart to its final pause. Notice his lot is important in his own eyes, and the chief reason that we think he asks too large a place in our consideration, must be our want of room for him, since we refer him to the divine regard with perfect confidence. Nay, it is even held sublime for our neighbour to expect the utmost there, however little he may have got from us. Mr. Casabon, too, was the centre of his own world, if he was liable to think that others were providentially made for him, and especially to consider them in the light of their fitness for the author of a key to all mythologies, this trait is not quite alien to us, and, like the other mendicant hopes of mortals, claims some of our pity. Certainly this affair of his marriage with Miss Brooke touched him more nearly than it did any one of the persons who have hitherto shown their disapproval of it, and in the present stage of things I feel more tenderly towards his experience of success than towards the disappointment of the amiable Sir James. For in truth, as the day fixed for his marriage came nearer, Mr. Casabon did not find his spirit's rising, nor did the contemplation of that matrimonial garden scene, where, as all experience showed, the path was to be bordered with flowers, proved persistently more enchanting to him than the accustomed vaults where he walked taper in hand. He did not confess to himself, still less could he have breathed to another, his surprise that though he had won a lovely and noble-hearted girl, he had not won delight, which he had also regarded as an object to be found by search. It is true that he knew all the classical passages implying the contrary, but knowing classical passages we find, is a mode of motion, which explains why they leave so little extra force for their personal application. Poor Mr. Casabon had imagined that his long, studious bachelorhood had stored up for him a compound interest of enjoyment, and that large drafts on his affections would not fail to be honoured. For we all of us, grave or light, get our thoughts entangled in metaphors, and act fatally on the strength of them. And now he was in danger of being saddened by the very conviction that his circumstances were unusually happy. There was nothing external by which he could account for a certain blankness of sensibility, which came over him just when his expectant gladness should have been most lively, just when he exchanged the accustomed dullness of his lowic library for his visits to the Grange. Here was a weary experience in which he was as utterly condemned to loneliness, as in the despair which sometimes threatened him while toiling in the morass of authorship, without seeming nearer to the goal. And this was that worst loneliness which would shrink from sympathy. He could not but wish that Dorothea should think him not less happy than the world would expect her successful suitor to be, and in relation to his authorship he leaned on her young trust and veneration. He liked to draw forth her fresh interest in listening, as a means of encouragement to himself. In talking to her, he presented all his performance and intention with the reflected confidence of the pedagogue, and read himself for the time of that chilling ideal audience which crowded his laborious, uncreative hours with the vaporous pressure of tartarian shades. For Dorothea, after that toy-box history of the world adapted to young ladies which had made the chief part of her education, Mr. Kazabon's talk about his great book was full of new vistas, and this sense of revelation—this surprise of a near introduction to Stoics and Alexandrians, as people who had ideas not totally unlike her own—kept in abeyance for the time, her usual eagerness for a binding theory which could bring her own life and doctrine, into a strict connection with that amazing past, and give the remotest sources of knowledge some bearing on her actions. That more complete teaching would come. Mr. Kazabon would tell her all that. She was looking forward to higher initiation and ideas, as she was looking forward to marriage, and blending her dim conceptions of both. It would be a great mistake to suppose that Dorothea would have cared about any share in Mr. Kazabon's learning, as mere accomplishment, for though opinion in the neighborhood of Freshett and Tipton had pronounced her clever, that epithet would not have described her to circles in whose more precise vocabulary cleverness implies mere aptitude for knowing and doing, apart from character. All her eagerness for acquirement lay within that full current of sympathetic motive in which her ideas and impulses were habitually swept along. She did not want to deck herself with knowledge, to wear it loose from the nerves and blood that fed her action, and if she had written a book she must have done it as St. Teresa did, under the command of an authority that constrained her conscience. But some things she yearned for by which her life might be filled with action at once rational and ardent, and since the time was gone by for guiding visions and spiritual directors, since prayer heightened yearning, but not instruction, what lamp was there but knowledge? Surely learned men kept the only oil, and whom more learned than Mr. Kazabon. Thus in these brief weeks Dorothea's joyous, grateful expectation was unbroken, and however her lover might occasionally be conscious of flatness, he could never refer it to any slackening of her affectionate interest. The season was mild enough to encourage the project of extending the wedding journey as far as Rome, and Mr. Kazabon was anxious for this, because he wished to inspect some manuscripts in the Vatican. "'I still regret that your sister is not to accompany us,' he said one morning, some time after it had been ascertained that Celia objected to go, and that Dorothea did not wish for her companionship. "'You will have many lonely hours, Dorothea, for I shall be constrained to make the utmost use of my time during our stay in Rome, and I should feel more at liberty if you had a companion.' "'The words, I should feel more at liberty,' grated on Dorothea. For the first time in speaking to Mr. Kazabon, she coloured from annoyance. "'You must have misunderstood me very much,' she said, "'if you think I should not enter into the value of your time, if you think that I should not willingly give up whatever interfered with your using it to the best purpose.' "'That is very amiable in you, my dear Dorothea,' said Mr. Kazabon, not in the least noticing that she was hurt. "'But if you had a lady as your companion, I could put you both under the care of a Ciceroan, and we could thus achieve two purposes in the same space of time.' "'I beg you will not refer to this again,' said Dorothea, rather hotly. But immediately she feared that she was wrong, and turning towards him she laid her hand on his, adding in a different tone. "'Pray do not be anxious about me. I shall have so much to think of when I am alone, and Tantrip will be a sufficient companion just to take care of me. I could not bear to have Celia. She would be miserable.' It was time to dress. There was to be a dinner-party that day, the last of the parties which were held at the Grange as proper preliminaries to the wedding, and Dorothea was glad of a reason for moving away at once on the sound of the bell, as if she needed more than her usual amount of preparation. She was ashamed of being irritated from some cause she could not define even to herself, for though she had no intention to be untruthful, her reply had not touched the real hurt within her. Mr. Casabon's words had been quite reasonable, yet they had brought a vague instantaneous sense of aloofness on his part. "'Surely I am in a strangely selfish, weak state of mind,' she said to herself. "'How can I have a husband who is so much above me, without knowing that he needs me less than I need him?' Having convinced herself that Mr. Casabon was altogether right, she recovered her equanimity, and was an agreeable image of serene dignity, when she came into the drawing-room in her silver-gray dress. The simple lines of her dark brown hair parted over her brow and coiled massively behind, in keeping with the entire absence from her manner and expression of all search after mere effect. Sometimes when Dorothea was in company, there seemed to be as complete an air of repose about her, as if she had been a picture of Santa Barbara, looking out from her tower into the clear air. But these intervals of quietude made the energy of her speech and emotion the more remarked when some outward appeal had touched her. She was naturally the subject of many observations this evening. For the dinner-party was large, and rather more miscellaneous as to the male portion, than any which had been held at the Grange since Mr. Brooks' nieces had resided with him, so that the talking was done in duos and trios more or less inharmonious. Here was the newly elected mayor of Middlemarche, who happened to be a manufacturer, the philanthropic banker, his brother-in-law, who predominated so much in the town that some called him a Methodist, others a hypocrite, according to the resources of their vocabulary, and there were various professional men. In fact Mrs. Cadwallader said that Brooke was beginning to treat the Middlemarchers, and that she preferred the farmers at the tithe dinner, who drank her health unpretentiously, and were not ashamed of their grandfather's furniture. For in that part of the country, before reform had done its notable part in developing the political consciousness, there was a clear distinction of ranks and a dimmer distinction of parties, so that Mr. Brooks' miscellaneous invitations seemed to belong to that general laxity which came from his inordinate travel and habit of talking too much in the form of ideas. Already as Miss Brooke passed out of the dining-room, opportunity was found for some interjectional asides. A fine woman, Miss Brooke, an uncommonly fine woman by God, said Mr. Standish, the old lawyer, who had been so long concerned with the landed gentry, that he had become landed himself, and used that oath in a deep-mouthed manner as a sort of armorial bearings, stamping the speech of a man who held a good position. Mr. Bolsteroed, the banker, seemed to be addressed, but that gentleman disliked coarseness and profanity, and merely bowed. The remark was taken up by Mr. Chichely, a middle-aged bachelor and coursing celebrity, who had a complexion something like an Easter egg, a few hairs carefully arranged, and a carriage implying the consciousness of a distinguished appearance. Yes, but not my style of woman, I like a woman who lays herself out a little more to please us. There should be a little filigree about a woman, something of the coquette. A man likes a sort of challenge. The more of a dead set she makes at you the better. There's some truth in that, said Mr. Standish, disposed to be genial, and by God it's usually the way with them. I suppose it answers some wise end. Providence made them so, eh, Bolsteroed? I should be disposed to refer coquetry to another source, said Mr. Bolsteroed. I should rather refer it to the devil. I, to be sure, there should be a little devil in a woman, said Mr. Chichely, who's study of the fair sex seemed to have been detrimental to his theology. And I like them blonde, with a certain gait, and a swan neck. Between ourselves the mayor's daughter is more to my taste than Miss Brooke or Miss Celia either. If I were a marrying man, I should choose Miss Vincy before either of them. Well, make up, make up, said Mr. Standish, jacosely. You see the middle-aged fellows early the day. Mr. Chichely shook his head with much meaning. He was not going to incur the certainty of being accepted by the woman he would choose. The Miss Vincy who had the honor of being Mr. Chichely's ideal was, of course, not present. For Mr. Brooke, always objecting to go too far, would not have chosen that his nieces should meet the daughter of a middle-march manufacturer, unless it were on a public occasion. The feminine part of the company included none whom Lady Chetum, or Mrs. Cadwalader, could object to. For Mrs. Renfrew, the Colonel's widow, was not only unexceptionable in point of breeding, but also interesting on the ground of her complaint, which puzzled the doctors, and seemed clearly a case wherein the fullness of professional knowledge might need the supplement of quackery. Lady Chetum, who attributed her own remarkable health to home-made bitters united with constant medical attendance, entered with much exercise of the imagination into Mrs. Renfrew's account of symptoms, and into the amazing futility in her case of all, strengthening medicines. Where can all the strength of those medicines go, my dear? Said the mild but stately dowager, turning to Mrs. Cadwalader reflectively, when Mrs. Renfrew's attention was called away. It strengthens the disease, said the rector's wife, much too well bore not to be an amateur in medicine. Everything depends on the constitution. Some people make fat, some blood, and some bile. That's my view of the matter, and whatever they take is a sort of grist to the mill. Then she ought to take medicines that would reduce—reduce the disease, you know, if you are right, my dear, and I think what you say is reasonable. Certainly it is reasonable. You have two sorts of potatoes, fed on the same soil. One of them grows more and more watery. Ah! Like this poor Mrs. Renfrew, that is what I think. Dropsy! There is no swelling yet. It is inward. I should say she ought to take drying medicines, shouldn't you? Or a dry hot-air bath? Many things might be tried of a drying nature. Let her try a certain person's pamphlets, said Mrs. Cadwalader in an undertone, seeing the gentleman enter. He does not want drying. Who, my dear? said Lady Chetam, a charming woman, not so quick as to nullify the pleasure of explanation. The bridegroom—Casabon—he has certainly been drying up faster since the engagement. The flame of passion, I suppose. I should think he is far from having a good constitution, said Lady Chetam, with a still deeper undertone. And then his studies, so very dry, as you say. Really by the side of Sir James he looks like a death's head skinned over for the occasion. Mark my words. In a year from this time that girl will hate him. She looks up to him as an oracle now, and by and by she will be at the other extreme. All flightiness. How very shocking! I fear she is headstrong. But tell me, you know all about him. Is there anything very bad? What is the truth? The truth! He is as bad as the wrong physics, nasty to take, and sure to disagree. There could not be anything worse than that, said Lady Chetam, with so vivid a conception of the physics that she seemed to have learned something exact about Mr. Casabon's disadvantages. However, James will hear nothing against Miss Brooke. He says she is the mirror of women still. That is a generous make-believe of his. Depend upon it he likes little Celia better, and she appreciates him. I hope you like my little Celia. Certainly she is fonder of geraniums, and seems more docile, though not so fine a figure. But we were talking of physics. Tell me about this new young surgeon, Mr. Litgate. I am told he is wonderfully clever. He certainly looks it—a fine brow, indeed. He is a gentleman. I heard him talking to Humphrey. He talks well. Yes, Mr. Brooke says he is one of the Litgates of Northumberland, really well connected. One does not expect it in a practitioner of that kind. For my own part, I like a medical man more on a footing with the servants. They are often all the cleverer. I assure you I found poor Hicks's judgment unfailing. I never knew him wrong. He was coarse and butcher-like, but he knew my constitution. It was a loss to me his going off so suddenly. Dear me! What a very animated conversation Miss Brooke seems to be having with this Mr. Litgate! She is talking cottages and hospitals with him," said Mrs. Cadwalader, whose ears and power of interpretation were quick. I believe he is a sort of philanthropist, so Brooke is sure to take him up. James," said Lady Chatham, when her son came near, bring Mr. Litgate and introduce him to me. I want to test him." The affable Dowager declared herself delighted with this opportunity of making Mr. Litgate's acquaintance, having heard of his success in treating fever on a new plan. Mr. Litgate had the medical accomplishment of looking perfectly grave whatever nonsense was talked to him, and his dark, steady eyes gave him impressiveness as a listener. He was as little as possible like the lamented Hicks, especially in a certain careless refinement about his toilet and utterance. Yet Lady Chatham gathered much confidence in him. He confirmed her view of her own constitution as being peculiar, by admitting that all constitutions might be called peculiar, and he did not deny that hers might be more peculiar than others. He did not approve of a too lowering system, including reckless cupping, nor, on the other hand, of incessant port wine and bark. He said, I think so, with an air of so much deference accompanying the insight of agreement, that she formed the most cordial opinion of his talents. I am quite pleased with your protégé, she said to Mr. Brook before going away. My protégé? Dear me! Who is that? said Mr. Brook. This young Litgate, the new doctor, he seems to me to understand his profession admirably. Oh, Litgate, he is not my protégé, you know, only I knew an uncle of his who sent me a letter about him. However, I think he is likely to be first-rate, has studied in Paris, knew Bruce, has ideas, you know, wants to raise the profession. Litgate has lots of ideas, quite new about ventilation and diet, that sort of thing, resumed Mr. Brook, after he had handed out Lady Chatham, and had returned to be civil to a group of middle-marchers. Hang it! do you think that is quite sound, upsetting the old treatment which has made Englishmen what they are? said Mr. Standish. Medical knowledge is, at a low ebb among us, said Mr. Balstrode, who spoke in a subdued tone and had rather a sickly air. I, for my part, hailed the advent of Mr. Litgate. I hope to find good reason for confiding the new hospital to his management. That is all very fine, replied Mr. Standish, who is not fond of Mr. Balstrode. If you like him to try experiments on your hospital patients, and kill a few people for charity, I have no objection. But I am not going to hand money out of my purse to have experiments tried on me. I like treatment that has been tested a little. Well, you know, Standish, every dose you take is an experiment, an experiment you know," said Mr. Brook, nodding towards the lawyer. Oh, if you talk in that sense, said Mr. Standish, with as much disgust at such non-legal quibbling as a man can well betray towards a valuable client. I should be glad of any treatment that would cure me without reducing me to a skeleton, like poor Granger, said Mr. Vincy, the mayor, a floored man, who would have served for a study of flesh and striking contrast with the Franciscan tints of Mr. Balstrode. It's an uncommonly dangerous thing to be left without any padding against the shafts of disease, as somebody said, and I think it a very good expression myself. Mr. Lidgate, of course, was out of hearing. He had quitted the party early, and would have thought it altogether tedious but for the novelty of certain introductions, especially the introduction to Miss Brook, whose youthful bloom, with her approaching marriage to that faded scholar, and her interest in matters socially useful, gave her the pecancy of an unusual combination. Lidgate is a good creature, that fine girl, but a little too earnest, he thought. It is troublesome to talk to such women. They are always wanting reasons, yet they are too ignorant to understand the merits of any question, and usually fall back on their moral sense to settle things after their own taste. Evidently Miss Brook was not Mr. Lidgate's style of woman any more than Mr. Titchely's. Considered indeed in relation to the latter, whose mead was matured, she was altogether a mistake, and calculated to shock his trust in final causes, including the adaptation of fine young women to purple-faced bachelors. But Lidgate was less ripe, and might possibly have experienced before him, which would modify his opinion as to the most excellent things in woman. Miss Brook, however, was not again seen by either of these gentlemen under her maiden name. Not long after that dinner-party, she had become Mrs. Kazabon, and was on her way to Rome. CHAPTER X But deeds and language such as men do use, and persons such as comedy would choose, when she would show an image of the times, and sport with human follies, not with crimes. BEN JOHNSON Lidgate, in fact, was already conscious of being fascinated by a woman strikingly different from Miss Brook. He did not in the least suppose that he had lost his balance and fallen in love, but he had said of that particular woman, "'She is grace itself. She is perfectly lovely and accomplished. That is what a woman ought to be. She ought to produce the effect of exquisite music.'" Plain women he regarded as he did the other severe facts of life, to be faced with philosophy and investigated by science. But Rosamund Vincy seemed to have the true melodic charm. And when a man has seen the woman whom he would have chosen, if he had intended to marry speedily, his remaining a bachelor will usually depend on her resolution rather than on his. Lidgate believed that he should not marry for several years. Not marry until he had trodden out a good, clear path for himself away from the broad road which was quite ready-made. He had seen Miss Vincy above his horizon, almost as long as it had taken Mr. Casabon to become engaged and married. But this learned gentleman was possessed of a fortune. He had assembled his voluminous notes, and had made that sort of reputation which precedes performance, often the larger part of a man's fame. He took a wife, as we have seen, to adorn the remaining quadrant of his course, and be a little moon that would cause hardly a calculable perturbation. But Lidgate was young, poor, ambitious. He had his half-century before him instead of behind him, and he had come to middle-march bent on doing many things that were not directly fitted to make his fortune, or even secure him a good income. To a man under such circumstances, taking a wife is something more than a question of adornment, however highly he may rate this, and Lidgate was disposed to give it the first place among wifely functions. To his taste, guided by a single conversation, here was the point on which Miss Brooke would be found wanting, notwithstanding her undeniable beauty. She did not look at things from the proper feminine angle. The society of such women was about as relaxing as going from your work to teach the second form, instead of reclining in a paradise with sweet laughs for bird-notes, and blue eyes for a heaven. Certainly nothing at present could seem much less important to Lidgate than the turn of Miss Brooke's mind, or to Miss Brooke than the qualities of the woman who had attracted this young surgeon. But anyone watching keenly the stealthy convergence of human lots sees a slow preparation of effects from one life on another, which tells like a calculated irony on the indifference or the frozen stare with which we look at our unintroduced neighbor. Destiny stands by sarcastic, with our dramatic personae folded in her hand. Old provincial society had its share of this subtle movement, had not only its striking downfalls, its brilliant young professional dandies, who ended by living up an entry with a drab and six children for their establishment, but also those less marked vicissitudes which are constantly shifting the boundaries of social intercourse, and begetting new consciousness of interdependence. Some slipped a little downward, some got higher footing, people denied aspirates, gained wealth, and fastidious gentlemen stood for boroughs. Some were caught in political currents, some in ecclesiastical, and perhaps found themselves surprisingly grouped in consequence, while a few personages or families that stood with rocky firmness amid all this fluctuation were slowly presenting new aspect in spite of solidity, and altering with the double change of self and beholder. Municipal town and rural parish gradually made fresh threads of connection, gradually as the old stocking gave way to the Savings Bank, and the worship of the solar guinea became extinct, while squires and baronets, and even lords would once lived blamelessly afar from the civic mind, gathered the faultiness of closer acquaintanceship. Settlers, too, came from distant counties, some with an alarming novelty of skill, others with an offensive advantage in cunning. In fact much the same sort of movement and mixture went on in old England as we find in older Herodotus, who also, in telling what had been, thought it well to take a woman's lot for his starting point, though Io, as a maiden apparently beguiled by attractive merchandise, was the reverse of Miss Brooke, and in this respect perhaps bore more resemblance to Rosamond Vincy, who had excellent taste in costume, with that nymph-like figure, and pure blindness which gave the largest range to choice in the flow and colour of drapery. But these things made only part of her charm. She was admitted to be the flower of Mrs. Lemon's school, the chief school in the county, where the teaching included all that was demanded in the accomplished female, even to extras, such as the getting in and out of a carriage. Mrs. Lemon herself had always held up Miss Vincy as an example. No pupil, she said, exceeded that young lady from mental acquisition and propriety of speech, while her musical execution was quite exceptional. We cannot help the way in which people speak of us, and probably if Mrs. Lemon had undertaken to describe Juliet or Imogen, these heroines would not have seemed poetical. The first vision of Rosamond would have been enough with most judges to dispel any prejudice excited by Mrs. Lemon's praise. Lidgate could not be long in Middlemarch without having that agreeable vision, or even without making the acquaintance of the Vincy family, for though Mr. Peacock, whose practice he had paid something to enter on, had not been their doctor—Mrs. Vincy not liking the lowering system adopted by him. He had many patients among their connections and acquaintances. For who of any consequence in Middlemarch was not connected, or at least acquainted with the Vincies? They were old manufacturers, and had kept a good house for three generations, in which there had naturally been much intermarrying with neighbors more or less decidedly genteel. Mr. Vincy's sister had made a wealthy match in accepting Mr. Bolstrode. Who, however, as a man not born in the town, and altogether of dimly known origin, was considered to have done well in uniting himself with the real Middlemarch family? On the other hand, Mr. Vincy had descended a little, having taken an innkeeper's daughter. But on this side, too, there was a cheering sense of money. For Mrs. Vincy's sister had been second wife to rich old Mr. Featherstone, and had died childless years ago, so that her nephews and nieces might be supposed to touch the affections of the widower. But it happened that Mr. Bolstrode and Mr. Featherstone, two of Peacock's most important patients, had, from different causes, given an especially good reception to his successor, who had raised some partisanship as well as discussion. Mr. Wrench, medical attendant to the Vincy family, very early had grounds for thinking lightly of Litgate's professional discretion, and there was no report about him which was not retailed at the Vincies, where visitors were frequent. Mr. Vincy was more inclined to general good fellowship than to taking sides, but there was no need for him to be hasty in making any new man acquaintance. Rosamund silently wished that her father would invite Mr. Litgate. She was tired of the faces and figures she had always been used to, the various irregular profiles and gates and turns of phrase distinguishing those Middlemarch young men whom she had known as boys. She had been at school with girls of higher position, whose brother she had felt sure, it would have been possible for her to be more interested in, than in these inevitable Middlemarch companions. But she would not have chosen to mention her wish to her father, and he, for his part, was in no hurry on the subject. An alderman about to be mayor must buy and buy enlarge his dinner-parties, but at present there were plenty of guests at his well-spread table. That table often remained covered with the relics of the family breakfast long after Mr. Vincy had gone with his second son to the warehouse, and when Miss Morgan was already far on in mourning lessons with the younger girls in the schoolroom. It awaited the family laggard, who found any sort of inconvenience, to others, lest disagreeable than getting up when he was called. This was the case one morning of the October in which we have lately seen Mr. Kazabon visiting the Grange, and though the room was a little overheated with the fire, which had sent the spaniel panting to her moat corner, Rosamond, for some reason, continued to sit at her embroidery longer than usual, now and then giving herself a little shake, and laying her work on her knee to contemplate it, with an air of hesitating weariness. Sir Mamma, who had returned from an excursion to the kitchen, sat on the other side of the small work-table with an air of more entire placidity, until the clock again giving notice that it was going to strike, she looked up from the lace mending which was occupying her plump fingers, and rang the bell. Knock at Mr. Fred's door again, pritchard, and tell him it has struck half-past ten. This was said without any change in the radiant good humour of Mrs. Fred's face, in which forty-five years had delved neither angles nor parallels, and pushing back her pink cap-strings, she let her work rest on her lap, while she looked admiringly at her daughter. Mamma! said Rosamond, when Fred comes down I wish she would not let him have red herrings, I cannot bear the smell of them all over the house at this hour of the morning. Oh, my dear, you are so hard on your brothers! It is the only fault I have to find with you. You are the sweetest temper in the world, but you are so touchy with your brothers. Not touchy, mamma, you never hear me speak in an un-ladylike way. Well, but you want to deny them things. Brothers are so unpleasant. Oh, my dear, you must allow for young men. Be thankful if they have good hearts. A woman must learn to put up with little things. You will be married some day. Not to anyone who is like Fred. You should decry your own brother, my dear. Few young men have less against them, although he couldn't take his degree. I am sure I can't understand why, for he seems to me most clever. Had you know yourself, he was thought equal to the best society at college. So particular as you are, my dear, I wonder you are not glad to have such a gentlemanly young man for a brother. You are always finding fault with Bob because he is not Fred. Oh, no, mamma, only because he is Bob. Well, my dear, you will not find any middle-march young man who has not something against him. But—here Rosamund's face broke into a smile, which suddenly revealed two dimples. She herself thought unfavorably of these dimples, and smiled little in general society. But I shall not marry any middle-march young man. So it seems, my love, for you have as good as refused the pick of them, and if there is better to be had, I am sure there is no girl better deserves it. Excuse me, mamma, I wish you would not say the pick of them. Why? What else are they? I mean, mamma, it is rather a vulgar expression. Very likely, my dear, I never was a good speaker. What should I say? The best of them. Why, that seems just as plain and common. If I had had time to think, I should have said, the most superior young men. But with your education you must know. What must Rosie know, mother? said Mr. Fred, who had slid in unobserved through the half-open door while the ladies were bending over their work, and now, going up to the fire, stood with his back towards it, warming the soles of his slippers. Whether it's right to say superior young men, said Mrs. Vincy, ringing the bell. Oh! There are so many superior teas and sugars now. Superior is getting to be shopkeeper's slang. Are you beginning to dislike slang, then? said Rosamond, with mild gravity. Only the wrong sort. All choice of words is slang. It marks a class. There is correct English. That is not slang. I beg your pardon. Correct English is the slang of prigs who write history and essays, and the strongest slang of all is the slang of poets. Oh! You will say anything, Fred, to gain your point. Well, tell me whether it is slang or poetry, to call an ox a leg-plater. Of course, you can call it poetry, if you like. Ah! Miss Rosie, you don't know Homer from slang. I shall invent a new game. I shall write bits of slang and poetry on slips, and give them to you to separate. Dear me, how amusing it is to hear young people talk, said Mrs. Vincy, with cheerful admiration. Have you got nothing else for my breakfast, Pritchard? said Fred, to the servant who brought in coffee and buttered toast, while he walked round the table surveying the ham, potted beef, and other cold remnants, with an air of silent rejection and polite forbearance from signs of disgust. Should you like eggs, sir? Eggs! No! Bring me a grilled bone. Really, Fred? said Rosamond, when the servant had left the room, if you must have hot things for breakfast, I wish you would come down earlier. You can get up at six o'clock to go out hunting. I cannot understand why you find it so difficult to get up on other mornings. That is your want of understanding, Rosie. I can get up to go hunting, because I like it. What would you think of me if I came down two hours after everyone else, and ordered grilled bone? I should think you were an uncommonly fast young lady, said Fred, eating his toast with the utmost composure. I cannot see why brothers are to make themselves disagreeable any more than sisters. I don't make myself disagreeable. It is you who find me so. Disagreeable is a word that describes your feelings and not my actions. I think it describes the smell of grilled bone. Not at all. It describes a sensation in your little nose associated with certain finicking notions which are the classics of Mrs. Lemon's school. Look at my mother. You don't see her objecting to everything except what she does herself. She is my notion of a pleasant woman. Bless you both, my dears, and don't quarrel," said Mrs. Vincy, with motherly cordiality. Come, Fred, tell us all about the new doctor. How is your uncle pleased with him? Pretty well, I think. He asked Lydgate all sorts of questions, and then screws up his face while he hears the answers, as if they were pinching his toes. That's his way. Ah, here comes my grilled bone. But how came you to stay out so late, my dear? You only said you were going to your uncle's. Oh! I dined at Plymdale's. We had whist. Lydgate was there, too. And what do you think of him? He is very gentlemanly, I suppose. They say he is of excellent family. His relations quite county people. Yes, said Fred. There was a Lydgate at John's who spent no end of money. I find this man as a second cousin of his. But rich men may have very poor devils for second cousins. It always makes a difference, though, to be of good family, said Rosamond, with a tone of decision which showed that she had thought on this subject. Rosamond felt that she might have been happier if she had not been the daughter of a Middle March manufacturer. She disliked anything which reminded her that her mother's father had been an innkeeper. Certainly, any one remembering the fact might think that Mrs. Vincy had the air of a very handsome, good-humored landlady accustomed to the most capricious orders of gentlemen. I thought it was odd his name was Tertius, said the bright-faced matron. But of course it's a name in the family. But now tell us exactly what sort of man he is. No. Tallish. Dark. Clever. Talks well. Rather a prig, I think. I never can make out what you mean by a prig, said Rosamond. A fellow who wants to show that he has opinions. Why, my dear, doctors must have opinions, said Mrs. Vincy. What are they there for, else? Yes, mother, the opinions they are paid for, but a prig is a fellow who is always making you a present of his opinions. I suppose Mary Garth admires Mr. Litgate, said Rosamond, not without a touch of innuendo. Really, I can't say, said Fred rather glumly, as he left the table and taking up a novel which he had brought down with him, threw himself into an arm-chair. If you are jealous of her, go often her to Stone Court herself and eclipse her. I wish she would not be so vulgar, Fred. If you have finished, pray ring the bell. It is true, though, what your brother says, Rosamond, Mrs. Vincy began when the servant had cleared the table. It is a thousand pities that you haven't the patience to go and see your uncle more, so proud of you as he is, and wanted you to live with him. There's no knowing what he might have done for you as well as for Fred. God knows I'm fond of having you at home with me, but I can part with my children for their good, and now it stands to reason that your uncle Featherstone will do something for Mary Garth. Mary Garth can bear being at Stone Court, because she likes that better than being a governess, said Rosamond, folding up her work. I would rather not have anything left to me if I must earn it by enduring much of my uncle's cough and his ugly relations. He can't be long for this world, my dear. I wouldn't hasten his end. But what with Asma and that inward complaint? Let us hope there is something better for him and another. And I have no ill will towards Mary Garth, but there is justice to be thought of. And Mr. Featherstone's first wife brought him no money as my sister did. Her nieces and nephews can't have so much claim as my sisters. And I must say, I think Mary Garth a dreadful, plain girl, more fit for a governess. One would not agree with you there, mother, said Fred, who seemed to be able to read and listen to. Well, my dear, said Mrs. Vincy, wheeling skillfully. If she had some fortune left her, a man marries his wife's relations, and the Garth's are so poor, and live in such a small way. But I shall leave you to your studies, my dear, for I must go and do some shopping. Fred's studies are not very deep, said Rosamond, rising with her mama. He is only reading a novel. Well, well, by and by he'll go to his Latin and things, said Mrs. Vincy soothingly, stroking her son's head. There's a fire in the smoking-room on purpose. It's your father's wish, you know. Fred, my dear, and I always tell him you will be good and go to college again to take your degree. Fred drew his mother's hand down to his lips, but said nothing. I suppose you are not going out riding to-day, said Rosamond, lingering a little after her mama was gone. No, why? Papa says I may have the chestnut to ride now. You can go with me to-morrow, if you like. Only I am going to Stonecourt, remember. I want to ride so much. It is indifferent to me where we go. Rosamond really wished to go to Stonecourt, of all other places. Oh, I say Rosie, said Fred, as she was passing out of the room. If you are going to the piano, let me come and play some mares with you. Pray do not ask me this morning. Why not this morning? Really, Fred, I wish you would leave off playing the flute. A man looks very silly playing the flute, and you play so out of tune. When next anyone makes love to you, Miss Rosamond, I will tell him how obliging you are. Why should you expect me to oblige you by hearing you play the flute any more than I should expect you to oblige me by not playing it? And why should you expect me to take you out riding?" This question led to an adjustment, for Rosamond had set her mind on that particular ride. So Fred was gratified with nearly an hour's practice of our hidey nose, ye banks and braze, and other favorite heirs from his instructor on the flute, a wheezy performance into which he threw much ambition and an irrepressible hopefulness.