prompt:
Chapter: 1st Gent.  All times are good to seek your wedded home
                   Bringing a mutual delight.

    2d Gent.                          Why, true.
                   The calendar hath not an evil day
                   For souls made one by love, and even death
                   Were sweetness, if it came like rolling waves
                   While they two clasped each other, and foresaw
                   No life apart.

Mr. and Mrs. Casaubon, returning from their wedding journey, arrived at
Lowick Manor in the middle of January.  A light snow was falling as
they descended at the door, and in the morning, when Dorothea passed
from her dressing-room avenue the blue-green boudoir that we know of,
she saw the long avenue of limes lifting their trunks from a white
earth, and spreading white branches against the dun and motionless sky.
The distant flat shrank in uniform whiteness and low-hanging uniformity
of cloud.  The very furniture in the room seemed to have shrunk since
she saw it before: the stag in the tapestry looked more like a ghost in
his ghostly blue-green world; the volumes of polite literature in the
bookcase looked more like immovable imitations of books.  The bright
fire of dry oak-boughs burning on the logs seemed an incongruous
renewal of life and glow--like the figure of Dorothea herself as she
entered carrying the red-leather cases containing the cameos for Celia.

She was glowing from her morning toilet as only healthful youth can
glow: there was gem-like brightness on her coiled hair and in her hazel
eyes; there was warm red life in her lips; her throat had a breathing
whiteness above the differing white of the fur which itself seemed to
wind about her neck and cling down her blue-gray pelisse with a
tenderness gathered from her own, a sentient commingled innocence which
kept its loveliness against the crystalline purity of the outdoor snow.
As she laid the cameo-cases on the table in the bow-window, she
unconsciously kept her hands on them, immediately absorbed in looking
out on the still, white enclosure which made her visible world.

Mr. Casaubon, who had risen early complaining of palpitation, was in
the library giving audience to his curate Mr. Tucker.  By-and-by Celia
would come in her quality of bridesmaid as well as sister, and through
the next weeks there would be wedding visits received and given; all in
continuance of that transitional life understood to correspond with the
excitement of bridal felicity, and keeping up the sense of busy
ineffectiveness, as of a dream which the dreamer begins to suspect.
The duties of her married life, contemplated as so great beforehand,
seemed to be shrinking with the furniture and the white vapor-walled
landscape.  The clear heights where she expected to walk in full
communion had become difficult to see even in her imagination; the
delicious repose of the soul on a complete superior had been shaken
into uneasy effort and alarmed with dim presentiment.  When would the
days begin of that active wifely devotion which was to strengthen her
husband's life and exalt her own?  Never perhaps, as she had
preconceived them; but somehow--still somehow.  In this solemnly
pledged union of her life, duty would present itself in some new form
of inspiration and give a new meaning to wifely love.

Meanwhile there was the snow and the low arch of dun vapor--there was
the stifling oppression of that gentlewoman's world, where everything
was done for her and none asked for her aid--where the sense of
connection with a manifold pregnant existence had to be kept up
painfully as an inward vision, instead of coming from without in claims
that would have shaped her energies.--  "What shall I do?"  "Whatever you
please, my dear:" that had been her brief history since she had left
off learning morning lessons and practising silly rhythms on the hated
piano.  Marriage, which was to bring guidance into worthy and
imperative occupation, had not yet freed her from the gentlewoman's
oppressive liberty: it had not even filled her leisure with the
ruminant joy of unchecked tenderness.  Her blooming full-pulsed youth
stood there in a moral imprisonment which made itself one with the
chill, colorless, narrowed landscape, with the shrunken furniture, the
never-read books, and the ghostly stag in a pale fantastic world that
seemed to be vanishing from the daylight.

In the first minutes when Dorothea looked out she felt nothing but the
dreary oppression; then came a keen remembrance, and turning away from
the window she walked round the room.  The ideas and hopes which were
living in her mind when she first saw this room nearly three months
before were present now only as memories: she judged them as we judge
transient and departed things.  All existence seemed to beat with a
lower pulse than her own, and her religious faith was a solitary cry,
the struggle out of a nightmare in which every object was withering and
shrinking away from her.  Each remembered thing in the room was
disenchanted, was deadened as an unlit transparency, till her wandering
gaze came to the group of miniatures, and there at last she saw
something which had gathered new breath and meaning: it was the
miniature of Mr. Casaubon's aunt Julia, who had made the unfortunate
marriage--of Will Ladislaw's grandmother.  Dorothea could fancy that
it was alive now--the delicate woman's face which yet had a headstrong
look, a peculiarity difficult to interpret.  Was it only her friends
who thought her marriage unfortunate? or did she herself find it out to
be a mistake, and taste the salt bitterness of her tears in the
merciful silence of the night?  What breadths of experience Dorothea
seemed to have passed over since she first looked at this miniature!
She felt a new companionship with it, as if it had an ear for her and
could see how she was looking at it.  Here was a woman who had known
some difficulty about marriage.  Nay, the colors deepened, the lips and
chin seemed to get larger, the hair and eyes seemed to be sending out
light, the face was masculine and beamed on her with that full gaze
which tells her on whom it falls that she is too interesting for the
slightest movement of her eyelid to pass unnoticed and uninterpreted.
The vivid presentation came like a pleasant glow to Dorothea: she felt
herself smiling, and turning from the miniature sat down and looked up
as if she were again talking to a figure in front of her.  But the
smile disappeared as she went on meditating, and at last she said
aloud--

"Oh, it was cruel to speak so!  How sad--how dreadful!"

She rose quickly and went out of the room, hurrying along the corridor,
with the irresistible impulse to go and see her husband and inquire if
she could do anything for him.  Perhaps Mr. Tucker was gone and Mr.
Casaubon was alone in the library.  She felt as if all her morning's
gloom would vanish if she could see her husband glad because of her
presence.

But when she reached the head of the dark oak there was Celia coming
up, and below there was Mr. Brooke, exchanging welcomes and
congratulations with Mr. Casaubon.

"Dodo!" said Celia, in her quiet staccato; then kissed her sister,
whose arms encircled her, and said no more.  I think they both cried a
little in a furtive manner, while Dorothea ran down-stairs to greet her
uncle.

"I need not ask how you are, my dear," said Mr. Brooke, after kissing
her forehead.  "Rome has agreed with you, I see--happiness, frescos,
the antique--that sort of thing.  Well, it's very pleasant to have you
back again, and you understand all about art now, eh?  But Casaubon is
a little pale, I tell him--a little pale, you know.  Studying hard in
his holidays is carrying it rather too far.  I overdid it at one
time"--Mr. Brooke still held Dorothea's hand, but had turned his face
to Mr. Casaubon--"about topography, ruins, temples--I thought I had a
clew, but I saw it would carry me too far, and nothing might come of
it.  You may go any length in that sort of thing, and nothing may come
of it, you know."

Dorothea's eyes also were turned up to her husband's face with some
anxiety at the idea that those who saw him afresh after absence might
be aware of signs which she had not noticed.

"Nothing to alarm you, my dear," said Mr. Brooke, observing her
expression.  "A little English beef and mutton will soon make a
difference.  It was all very well to look pale, sitting for the
portrait of Aquinas, you know--we got your letter just in time.  But
Aquinas, now--he was a little too subtle, wasn't he?  Does anybody read
Aquinas?"

"He is not indeed an author adapted to superficial minds," said Mr.
Casaubon, meeting these timely questions with dignified patience.

"You would like coffee in your own room, uncle?" said Dorothea, coming
to the rescue.

"Yes; and you must go to Celia: she has great news to tell you, you
know.  I leave it all to her."

The blue-green boudoir looked much more cheerful when Celia was seated
there in a pelisse exactly like her sister's, surveying the cameos with
a placid satisfaction, while the conversation passed on to other topics.

"Do you think it nice to go to Rome on a wedding journey?" said Celia,
with her ready delicate blush which Dorothea was used to on the
smallest occasions.

"It would not suit all--not you, dear, for example," said Dorothea,
quietly.  No one would ever know what she thought of a wedding journey
to Rome.

"Mrs. Cadwallader says it is nonsense, people going a long journey when
they are married.  She says they get tired to death of each other, and
can't quarrel comfortably, as they would at home.  And Lady Chettam
says she went to Bath."  Celia's color changed again and again--seemed

    "To come and go with tidings from the heart,
     As it a running messenger had been."

It must mean more than Celia's blushing usually did.

"Celia! has something happened?" said Dorothea, in a tone full of
sisterly feeling.  "Have you really any great news to tell me?"

"It was because you went away, Dodo.  Then there was nobody but me for
Sir James to talk to," said Celia, with a certain roguishness in her
eyes.

"I understand.  It is as I used to hope and believe," said Dorothea,
taking her sister's face between her hands, and looking at her half
anxiously.  Celia's marriage seemed more serious than it used to do.

"It was only three days ago," said Celia.  "And Lady Chettam is very
kind."

"And you are very happy?"

"Yes.  We are not going to be married yet.  Because every thing is to
be got ready.  And I don't want to be married so very soon, because I
think it is nice to be engaged.  And we shall be married all our lives
after."

"I do believe you could not marry better, Kitty.  Sir James is a good,
honorable man," said Dorothea, warmly.

"He has gone on with the cottages, Dodo.  He will tell you about them
when he comes.  Shall you be glad to see him?"

"Of course I shall.  How can you ask me?"

"Only I was afraid you would be getting so learned," said Celia,
regarding Mr. Casaubon's learning as a kind of damp which might in due
time saturate a neighboring body.

    "I found that no genius in another could please me.  My
    unfortunate paradoxes had entirely dried up that source of
    comfort."--GOLDSMITH.

One morning, some weeks after her arrival at Lowick, Dorothea--but why
always Dorothea?  Was her point of view the only possible one with
regard to this marriage?  I protest against all our interest, all our
effort at understanding being given to the young skins that look
blooming in spite of trouble; for these too will get faded, and will
know the older and more eating griefs which we are helping to neglect.
In spite of the blinking eyes and white moles objectionable to Celia,
and the want of muscular curve which was morally painful to Sir James,
Mr. Casaubon had an intense consciousness within him, and was
spiritually a-hungered like the rest of us.  He had done nothing
exceptional in marrying--nothing but what society sanctions, and
considers an occasion for wreaths and bouquets.  It had occurred to him
that he must not any longer defer his intention of matrimony, and he
had reflected that in taking a wife, a man of good position should
expect and carefully choose a blooming young lady--the younger the
better, because more educable and submissive--of a rank equal to his
own, of religious principles, virtuous disposition, and good
understanding.  On such a young lady he would make handsome
settlements, and he would neglect no arrangement for her happiness: in
return, he should receive family pleasures and leave behind him that
copy of himself which seemed so urgently required of a man--to the
sonneteers of the sixteenth century.  Times had altered since then, and
no sonneteer had insisted on Mr. Casaubon's leaving a copy of himself;
moreover, he had not yet succeeded in issuing copies of his
mythological key; but he had always intended to acquit himself by
marriage, and the sense that he was fast leaving the years behind him,
that the world was getting dimmer and that he felt lonely, was a reason
to him for losing no more time in overtaking domestic delights before
they too were left behind by the years.

And when he had seen Dorothea he believed that he had found even more
than he demanded: she might really be such a helpmate to him as would
enable him to dispense with a hired secretary, an aid which Mr.
Casaubon had never yet employed and had a suspicious dread of.  (Mr.
Casaubon was nervously conscious that he was expected to manifest a
powerful mind.)  Providence, in its kindness, had supplied him with the
wife he needed.  A wife, a modest young lady, with the purely
appreciative, unambitious abilities of her sex, is sure to think her
husband's mind powerful.  Whether Providence had taken equal care of
Miss Brooke in presenting her with Mr. Casaubon was an idea which could
hardly occur to him.  Society never made the preposterous demand that a
man should think as much about his own qualifications for making a
charming girl happy as he thinks of hers for making himself happy.  As
if a man could choose not only his wife but his wife's husband!  Or as
if he were bound to provide charms for his posterity in his own
person!--  When Dorothea accepted him with effusion, that was only
natural; and Mr. Casaubon believed that his happiness was going to
begin.

He had not had much foretaste of happiness in his previous life.  To
know intense joy without a strong bodily frame, one must have an
enthusiastic soul.  Mr. Casaubon had never had a strong bodily frame,
and his soul was sensitive without being enthusiastic: it was too
languid to thrill out of self-consciousness into passionate delight; it
went on fluttering in the swampy ground where it was hatched, thinking
of its wings and never flying.  His experience was of that pitiable
kind which shrinks from pity, and fears most of all that it should be
known: it was that proud narrow sensitiveness which has not mass enough
to spare for transformation into sympathy, and quivers thread-like in
small currents of self-preoccupation or at best of an egoistic
scrupulosity.  And Mr. Casaubon had many scruples: he was capable of a
severe self-restraint; he was resolute in being a man of honor
according to the code; he would be unimpeachable by any recognized
opinion.  In conduct these ends had been attained; but the difficulty
of making his Key to all Mythologies unimpeachable weighed like lead
upon his mind; and the pamphlets--or "Parerga" as he called them--by
which he tested his public and deposited small monumental records of
his march, were far from having been seen in all their significance.
He suspected the Archdeacon of not having read them; he was in painful
doubt as to what was really thought of them by the leading minds of
Brasenose, and bitterly convinced that his old acquaintance Carp had
been the writer of that depreciatory recension which was kept locked in
a small drawer of Mr. Casaubon's desk, and also in a dark closet of his
verbal memory.  These were heavy impressions to struggle against, and
brought that melancholy embitterment which is the consequence of all
excessive claim: even his religious faith wavered with his wavering
trust in his own authorship, and the consolations of the Christian hope
in immortality seemed to lean on the immortality of the still unwritten
Key to all Mythologies.  For my part I am very sorry for him.  It is an
uneasy lot at best, to be what we call highly taught and yet not to
enjoy: to be present at this great spectacle of life and never to be
liberated from a small hungry shivering self--never to be fully
possessed by the glory we behold, never to have our consciousness
rapturously transformed into the vividness of a thought, the ardor of a
passion, the energy of an action, but always to be scholarly and
uninspired, ambitious and timid, scrupulous and dim-sighted. Becoming a
dean or even a bishop would make little difference, I fear, to Mr.
Casaubon's uneasiness.  Doubtless some ancient Greek has observed that
behind the big mask and the speaking-trumpet, there must always be our
poor little eyes peeping as usual and our timorous lips more or less
under anxious control.

To this mental estate mapped out a quarter of a century before, to
sensibilities thus fenced in, Mr. Casaubon had thought of annexing
happiness with a lovely young bride; but even before marriage, as we
have seen, he found himself under a new depression in the consciousness
that the new bliss was not blissful to him.  Inclination yearned back
to its old, easier custom.  And the deeper he went in domesticity the
more did the sense of acquitting himself and acting with propriety
predominate over any other satisfaction.  Marriage, like religion and
erudition, nay, like authorship itself, was fated to become an outward
requirement, and Edward Casaubon was bent on fulfilling unimpeachably
all requirements.  Even drawing Dorothea into use in his study,
according to his own intention before marriage, was an effort which he
was always tempted to defer, and but for her pleading insistence it
might never have begun.  But she had succeeded in making it a matter of
course that she should take her place at an early hour in the library
and have work either of reading aloud or copying assigned her.  The
work had been easier to define because Mr. Casaubon had adopted an
immediate intention: there was to be a new Parergon, a small monograph
on some lately traced indications concerning the Egyptian mysteries
whereby certain assertions of Warburton's could be corrected.
References were extensive even here, but not altogether shoreless; and
sentences were actually to be written in the shape wherein they would
be scanned by Brasenose and a less formidable posterity.  These minor
monumental productions were always exciting to Mr. Casaubon; digestion
was made difficult by the interference of citations, or by the rivalry
of dialectical phrases ringing against each other in his brain.  And
from the first there was to be a Latin dedication about which
everything was uncertain except that it was not to be addressed to
Carp: it was a poisonous regret to Mr. Casaubon that he had once
addressed a dedication to Carp in which he had numbered that member of
the animal kingdom among the viros nullo aevo perituros, a mistake
which would infallibly lay the dedicator open to ridicule in the next
age, and might even be chuckled over by Pike and Tench in the present.

Thus Mr. Casaubon was in one of his busiest epochs, and as I began to
say a little while ago, Dorothea joined him early in the library where
he had breakfasted alone.  Celia at this time was on a second visit to
Lowick, probably the last before her marriage, and was in the
drawing-room expecting Sir James.

Dorothea had learned to read the signs of her husband's mood, and she
saw that the morning had become more foggy there during the last hour.
She was going silently to her desk when he said, in that distant tone
which implied that he was discharging a disagreeable duty--

"Dorothea, here is a letter for you, which was enclosed in one
addressed to me."

It was a letter of two pages, and she immediately looked at the
signature.

"Mr. Ladislaw!  What can he have to say to me?" she exclaimed, in a
tone of pleased surprise.  "But," she added, looking at Mr. Casaubon,
"I can imagine what he has written to you about."

"You can, if you please, read the letter," said Mr. Casaubon, severely
pointing to it with his pen, and not looking at her.  "But I may as
well say beforehand, that I must decline the proposal it contains to
pay a visit here.  I trust I may be excused for desiring an interval of
complete freedom from such distractions as have been hitherto
inevitable, and especially from guests whose desultory vivacity makes
their presence a fatigue."

There had been no clashing of temper between Dorothea and her husband
since that little explosion in Rome, which had left such strong traces
in her mind that it had been easier ever since to quell emotion than to
incur the consequence of venting it.  But this ill-tempered
anticipation that she could desire visits which might be disagreeable
to her husband, this gratuitous defence of himself against selfish
complaint on her part, was too sharp a sting to be meditated on until
after it had been resented.  Dorothea had thought that she could have
been patient with John Milton, but she had never imagined him behaving
in this way; and for a moment Mr. Casaubon seemed to be stupidly
undiscerning and odiously unjust.  Pity, that "new-born babe" which was
by-and-by to rule many a storm within her, did not "stride the blast"
on this occasion.  With her first words, uttered in a tone that shook
him, she startled Mr. Casaubon into looking at her, and meeting the
flash of her eyes.

"Why do you attribute to me a wish for anything that would annoy you?
You speak to me as if I were something you had to contend against.
Wait at least till I appear to consult my own pleasure apart from
yours."

"Dorothea, you are hasty," answered Mr. Casaubon, nervously.

Decidedly, this woman was too young to be on the formidable level of
wifehood--unless she had been pale and featureless and taken
everything for granted.

"I think it was you who were first hasty in your false suppositions
about my feeling," said Dorothea, in the same tone.  The fire was not
dissipated yet, and she thought it was ignoble in her husband not to
apologize to her.

"We will, if you please, say no more on this subject, Dorothea.  I have
neither leisure nor energy for this kind of debate."

Here Mr. Casaubon dipped his pen and made as if he would return to his
writing, though his hand trembled so much that the words seemed to be
written in an unknown character.  There are answers which, in turning
away wrath, only send it to the other end of the room, and to have a
discussion coolly waived when you feel that justice is all on your own
side is even more exasperating in marriage than in philosophy.

Dorothea left Ladislaw's two letters unread on her husband's
writing-table and went to her own place, the scorn and indignation
within her rejecting the reading of these letters, just as we hurl away
any trash towards which we seem to have been suspected of mean
cupidity.  She did not in the least divine the subtle sources of her
husband's bad temper about these letters: she only knew that they had
caused him to offend her.  She began to work at once, and her hand did
not tremble; on the contrary, in writing out the quotations which had
been given to her the day before, she felt that she was forming her
letters beautifully, and it seemed to her that she saw the construction
of the Latin she was copying, and which she was beginning to
understand, more clearly than usual.  In her indignation there was a
sense of superiority, but it went out for the present in firmness of
stroke, and did not compress itself into an inward articulate voice
pronouncing the once "affable archangel" a poor creature.

There had been this apparent quiet for half an hour, and Dorothea had
not looked away from her own table, when she heard the loud bang of a
book on the floor, and turning quickly saw Mr. Casaubon on the library
steps clinging forward as if he were in some bodily distress.  She
started up and bounded towards him in an instant: he was evidently in
great straits for breath.  Jumping on a stool she got close to his
elbow and said with her whole soul melted into tender alarm--

"Can you lean on me, dear?"

He was still for two or three minutes, which seemed endless to her,
unable to speak or move, gasping for breath.  When at last he descended
the three steps and fell backward in the large chair which Dorothea had
drawn close to the foot of the ladder, he no longer gasped but seemed
helpless and about to faint.  Dorothea rang the bell violently, and
presently Mr. Casaubon was helped to the couch: he did not faint, and
was gradually reviving, when Sir James Chettam came in, having been met
in the hall with the news that Mr. Casaubon had "had a fit in the
library."

"Good God! this is just what might have been expected," was his
immediate thought.  If his prophetic soul had been urged to
particularize, it seemed to him that "fits" would have been the
definite expression alighted upon.  He asked his informant, the butler,
whether the doctor had been sent for.  The butler never knew his master
to want the doctor before; but would it not be right to send for a
physician?

When Sir James entered the library, however, Mr. Casaubon could make
some signs of his usual politeness, and Dorothea, who in the reaction
from her first terror had been kneeling and sobbing by his side now
rose and herself proposed that some one should ride off for a medical
man.

"I recommend you to send for Lydgate," said Sir James.  "My mother has
called him in, and she has found him uncommonly clever.  She has had a
poor opinion of the physicians since my father's death."

Dorothea appealed to her husband, and he made a silent sign of
approval.  So Mr. Lydgate was sent for and he came wonderfully soon,
for the messenger, who was Sir James Chettam's man and knew Mr.
Lydgate, met him leading his horse along the Lowick road and giving his
arm to Miss Vincy.

Celia, in the drawing-room, had known nothing of the trouble till Sir
James told her of it.  After Dorothea's account, he no longer
considered the illness a fit, but still something "of that nature."

"Poor dear Dodo--how dreadful!" said Celia, feeling as much grieved as
her own perfect happiness would allow.  Her little hands were clasped,
and enclosed by Sir James's as a bud is enfolded by a liberal calyx.
"It is very shocking that Mr. Casaubon should be ill; but I never did
like him.  And I think he is not half fond enough of Dorothea; and he
ought to be, for I am sure no one else would have had him--do you
think they would?"

"I always thought it a horrible sacrifice of your sister," said Sir
James.

"Yes.  But poor Dodo never did do what other people do, and I think she
never will."

"She is a noble creature," said the loyal-hearted Sir James.  He had
just had a fresh impression of this kind, as he had seen Dorothea
stretching her tender arm under her husband's neck and looking at him
with unspeakable sorrow.  He did not know how much penitence there was
in the sorrow.

"Yes," said Celia, thinking it was very well for Sir James to say so,
but _he_ would not have been comfortable with Dodo.  "Shall I go to
her?  Could I help her, do you think?"

"I think it would be well for you just to go and see her before Lydgate
comes," said Sir James, magnanimously.  "Only don't stay long."

While Celia was gone he walked up and down remembering what he had
originally felt about Dorothea's engagement, and feeling a revival of
his disgust at Mr. Brooke's indifference.  If Cadwallader--if every
one else had regarded the affair as he, Sir James, had done, the
marriage might have been hindered.  It was wicked to let a young girl
blindly decide her fate in that way, without any effort to save her.
Sir James had long ceased to have any regrets on his own account: his
heart was satisfied with his engagement to Celia.  But he had a
chivalrous nature (was not the disinterested service of woman among the
ideal glories of old chivalry?): his disregarded love had not turned to
bitterness; its death had made sweet odors--floating memories that
clung with a consecrating effect to Dorothea.  He could remain her
brotherly friend, interpreting her actions with generous trustfulness.

    "Qui veut delasser hors de propos, lasse."--PASCAL.

Mr. Casaubon had no second attack of equal severity with the first, and
in a few days began to recover his usual condition.  But Lydgate seemed
to think the case worth a great deal of attention.  He not only used
his stethoscope (which had not become a matter of course in practice at
that time), but sat quietly by his patient and watched him.  To Mr.
Casaubon's questions about himself, he replied that the source of the
illness was the common error of intellectual men--a too eager and
monotonous application: the remedy was, to be satisfied with moderate
work, and to seek variety of relaxation.  Mr. Brooke, who sat by on one
occasion, suggested that Mr. Casaubon should go fishing, as Cadwallader
did, and have a turning-room, make toys, table-legs, and that kind of
thing.

"In short, you recommend me to anticipate the arrival of my second
childhood," said poor Mr. Casaubon, with some bitterness.  "These
things," he added, looking at Lydgate, "would be to me such relaxation
as tow-picking is to prisoners in a house of correction."

"I confess," said Lydgate, smiling, "amusement is rather an
unsatisfactory prescription.  It is something like telling people to
keep up their spirits.  Perhaps I had better say, that you must submit
to be mildly bored rather than to go on working."

"Yes, yes," said Mr. Brooke.  "Get Dorothea to play backgammon with you
in the evenings.  And shuttlecock, now--I don't know a finer game than
shuttlecock for the daytime.  I remember it all the fashion.  To be
sure, your eyes might not stand that, Casaubon.  But you must unbend,
you know.  Why, you might take to some light study: conchology, now: I
always think that must be a light study.  Or get Dorothea to read you
light things, Smollett--'Roderick Random,' 'Humphrey Clinker:'  they
are a little broad, but she may read anything now she's married, you
know.  I remember they made me laugh uncommonly--there's a droll bit
about a postilion's breeches.  We have no such humor now.  I have gone
through all these things, but they might be rather new to you."

"As new as eating thistles," would have been an answer to represent Mr.
Casaubon's feelings.  But he only bowed resignedly, with due respect to
his wife's uncle, and observed that doubtless the works he mentioned
had "served as a resource to a certain order of minds."

"You see," said the able magistrate to Lydgate, when they were outside
the door, "Casaubon has been a little narrow: it leaves him rather at a
loss when you forbid him his particular work, which I believe is
something very deep indeed--in the line of research, you know.  I would
never give way to that; I was always versatile.  But a clergyman is
tied a little tight.  If they would make him a bishop, now!--he did a
very good pamphlet for Peel.  He would have more movement then, more
show; he might get a little flesh.  But I recommend you to talk to Mrs.
Casaubon.  She is clever enough for anything, is my niece.  Tell her,
her husband wants liveliness, diversion: put her on amusing tactics."

Without Mr. Brooke's advice, Lydgate had determined on speaking to
Dorothea.  She had not been present while her uncle was throwing out
his pleasant suggestions as to the mode in which life at Lowick might
be enlivened, but she was usually by her husband's side, and the
unaffected signs of intense anxiety in her face and voice about
whatever touched his mind or health, made a drama which Lydgate was
inclined to watch.  He said to himself that he was only doing right in
telling her the truth about her husband's probable future, but he
certainly thought also that it would be interesting to talk
confidentially with her.  A medical man likes to make psychological
observations, and sometimes in the pursuit of such studies is too
easily tempted into momentous prophecy which life and death easily set
at nought.  Lydgate had often been satirical on this gratuitous
prediction, and he meant now to be guarded.

He asked for Mrs. Casaubon, but being told that she was out walking, he
was going away, when Dorothea and Celia appeared, both glowing from
their struggle with the March wind.  When Lydgate begged to speak with
her alone, Dorothea opened the library door which happened to be the
nearest, thinking of nothing at the moment but what he might have to
say about Mr. Casaubon.  It was the first time she had entered this
room since her husband had been taken ill, and the servant had chosen
not to open the shutters.  But there was light enough to read by from
the narrow upper panes of the windows.

"You will not mind this sombre light," said Dorothea, standing in the
middle of the room.  "Since you forbade books, the library has been out
of the question.  But Mr. Casaubon will soon be here again, I hope.  Is
he not making progress?"

"Yes, much more rapid progress than I at first expected.  Indeed, he is
already nearly in his usual state of health."

"You do not fear that the illness will return?" said Dorothea, whose
quick ear had detected some significance in Lydgate's tone.

"Such cases are peculiarly difficult to pronounce upon," said Lydgate.
"The only point on which I can be confident is that it will be
desirable to be very watchful on Mr. Casaubon's account, lest he should
in any way strain his nervous power."

"I beseech you to speak quite plainly," said Dorothea, in an imploring
tone.  "I cannot bear to think that there might be something which I
did not know, and which, if I had known it, would have made me act
differently."  The words came out like a cry: it was evident that they
were the voice of some mental experience which lay not very far off.

"Sit down," she added, placing herself on the nearest chair, and
throwing off her bonnet and gloves, with an instinctive discarding of
formality where a great question of destiny was concerned.

"What you say now justifies my own view," said Lydgate.  "I think it is
one's function as a medical man to hinder regrets of that sort as far
as possible.  But I beg you to observe that Mr. Casaubon's case is
precisely of the kind in which the issue is most difficult to pronounce
upon.  He may possibly live for fifteen years or more, without much
worse health than he has had hitherto."

Dorothea had turned very pale, and when Lydgate paused she said in a
low voice, "You mean if we are very careful."

"Yes--careful against mental agitation of all kinds, and against
excessive application."

"He would be miserable, if he had to give up his work," said Dorothea,
with a quick prevision of that wretchedness.

"I am aware of that.  The only course is to try by all means, direct
and indirect, to moderate and vary his occupations.  With a happy
concurrence of circumstances, there is, as I said, no immediate danger
from that affection of the heart, which I believe to have been the
cause of his late attack.  On the other hand, it is possible that the
disease may develop itself more rapidly: it is one of those cases in
which death is sometimes sudden.  Nothing should be neglected which
might be affected by such an issue."

There was silence for a few moments, while Dorothea sat as if she had
been turned to marble, though the life within her was so intense that
her mind had never before swept in brief time over an equal range of
scenes and motives.

"Help me, pray," she said, at last, in the same low voice as before.
"Tell me what I can do."

"What do you think of foreign travel?  You have been lately in Rome, I
think."

The memories which made this resource utterly hopeless were a new
current that shook Dorothea out of her pallid immobility.

"Oh, that would not do--that would be worse than anything," she said
with a more childlike despondency, while the tears rolled down.
"Nothing will be of any use that he does not enjoy."

"I wish that I could have spared you this pain," said Lydgate, deeply
touched, yet wondering about her marriage.  Women just like Dorothea
had not entered into his traditions.

"It was right of you to tell me.  I thank you for telling me the truth."

"I wish you to understand that I shall not say anything to enlighten
Mr. Casaubon himself.  I think it desirable for him to know nothing
more than that he must not overwork himself, and must observe certain
rules.  Anxiety of any kind would be precisely the most unfavorable
condition for him."

Lydgate rose, and Dorothea mechanically rose at the same time,
unclasping her cloak and throwing it off as if it stifled her.  He was
bowing and quitting her, when an impulse which if she had been alone
would have turned into a prayer, made her say with a sob in her voice--

"Oh, you are a wise man, are you not?  You know all about life and
death.  Advise me.  Think what I can do.  He has been laboring all his
life and looking forward.  He minds about nothing else.--  And I mind
about nothing else--"

For years after Lydgate remembered the impression produced in him by
this involuntary appeal--this cry from soul to soul, without other
consciousness than their moving with kindred natures in the same
embroiled medium, the same troublous fitfully illuminated life.  But
what could he say now except that he should see Mr. Casaubon again
to-morrow?

When he was gone, Dorothea's tears gushed forth, and relieved her
stifling oppression.  Then she dried her eyes, reminded that her
distress must not be betrayed to her husband; and looked round the room
thinking that she must order the servant to attend to it as usual,
since Mr. Casaubon might now at any moment wish to enter.  On his
writing-table there were letters which had lain untouched since the
morning when he was taken ill, and among them, as Dorothea well
remembered, there were young Ladislaw's letters, the one addressed to
her still unopened.  The associations of these letters had been made
the more painful by that sudden attack of illness which she felt that
the agitation caused by her anger might have helped to bring on: it
would be time enough to read them when they were again thrust upon her,
and she had had no inclination to fetch them from the library.  But now
it occurred to her that they should be put out of her husband's sight:
whatever might have been the sources of his annoyance about them, he
must, if possible, not be annoyed again; and she ran her eyes first
over the letter addressed to him to assure herself whether or not it
would be necessary to write in order to hinder the offensive visit.

Will wrote from Rome, and began by saying that his obligations to Mr.
Casaubon were too deep for all thanks not to seem impertinent.  It was
plain that if he were not grateful, he must be the poorest-spirited
rascal who had ever found a generous friend.  To expand in wordy thanks
would be like saying, "I am honest." But Will had come to perceive that
his defects--defects which Mr. Casaubon had himself often pointed
to--needed for their correction that more strenuous position which his
relative's generosity had hitherto prevented from being inevitable.  He
trusted that he should make the best return, if return were possible,
by showing the effectiveness of the education for which he was
indebted, and by ceasing in future to need any diversion towards
himself of funds on which others might have a better claim.  He was
coming to England, to try his fortune, as many other young men were
obliged to do whose only capital was in their brains.  His friend
Naumann had desired him to take charge of the "Dispute"--the picture
painted for Mr. Casaubon, with whose permission, and Mrs. Casaubon's,
Will would convey it to Lowick in person.  A letter addressed to the
Poste Restante in Paris within the fortnight would hinder him, if
necessary, from arriving at an inconvenient moment.  He enclosed a
letter to Mrs. Casaubon in which he continued a discussion about art,
begun with her in Rome.

Opening her own letter Dorothea saw that it was a lively continuation
of his remonstrance with her fanatical sympathy and her want of sturdy
neutral delight in things as they were--an outpouring of his young
vivacity which it was impossible to read just now.  She had immediately
to consider what was to be done about the other letter: there was still
time perhaps to prevent Will from coming to Lowick.  Dorothea ended by
giving the letter to her uncle, who was still in the house, and begging
him to let Will know that Mr. Casaubon had been ill, and that his
health would not allow the reception of any visitors.

No one more ready than Mr. Brooke to write a letter: his only
difficulty was to write a short one, and his ideas in this case
expanded over the three large pages and the inward foldings.  He had
simply said to Dorothea--

"To be sure, I will write, my dear.  He's a very clever young
fellow--this young Ladislaw--I dare say will be a rising young man.
It's a good letter--marks his sense of things, you know.  However, I
will tell him about Casaubon."

But the end of Mr. Brooke's pen was a thinking organ, evolving
sentences, especially of a benevolent kind, before the rest of his mind
could well overtake them.  It expressed regrets and proposed remedies,
which, when Mr. Brooke read them, seemed felicitously
worded--surprisingly the right thing, and determined a sequel which he
had never before thought of.  In this case, his pen found it such a pity
young Ladislaw should not have come into the neighborhood just at
that time, in order that Mr. Brooke might make his acquaintance more
fully, and that they might go over the long-neglected Italian drawings
together--it also felt such an interest in a young man who was starting
in life with a stock of ideas--that by the end of the second page it
had persuaded Mr. Brooke to invite young Ladislaw, since he could not
be received at Lowick, to come to Tipton Grange.  Why not?  They could
find a great many things to do together, and this was a period of
peculiar growth--the political horizon was expanding, and--in short,
Mr. Brooke's pen went off into a little speech which it had lately
reported for that imperfectly edited organ the "Middlemarch Pioneer."
While Mr. Brooke was sealing this letter, he felt elated with an influx
of dim projects:--a young man capable of putting ideas into form, the
"Pioneer" purchased to clear the pathway for a new candidate, documents
utilized--who knew what might come of it all?  Since Celia was going to
marry immediately, it would be very pleasant to have a young fellow at
table with him, at least for a time.

But he went away without telling Dorothea what he had put into the
letter, for she was engaged with her husband, and--in fact, these
things were of no importance to her.

    How will you know the pitch of that great bell
    Too large for you to stir?  Let but a flute
    Play 'neath the fine-mixed metal listen close
    Till the right note flows forth, a silvery rill.
    Then shall the huge bell tremble--then the mass
    With myriad waves concurrent shall respond
    In low soft unison.

Lydgate that evening spoke to Miss Vincy of Mrs. Casaubon, and laid
some emphasis on the strong feeling she appeared to have for that
formal studious man thirty years older than herself.

"Of course she is devoted to her husband," said Rosamond, implying a
notion of necessary sequence which the scientific man regarded as the
prettiest possible for a woman; but she was thinking at the same time
that it was not so very melancholy to be mistress of Lowick Manor with
a husband likely to die soon.  "Do you think her very handsome?"

"She certainly is handsome, but I have not thought about it," said
Lydgate.

"I suppose it would be unprofessional," said Rosamond, dimpling.  "But
how your practice is spreading!  You were called in before to the
Chettams, I think; and now, the Casaubons."

"Yes," said Lydgate, in a tone of compulsory admission.  "But I don't
really like attending such people so well as the poor.  The cases are
more monotonous, and one has to go through more fuss and listen more
deferentially to nonsense."

"Not more than in Middlemarch," said Rosamond.  "And at least you go
through wide corridors and have the scent of rose-leaves everywhere."

"That is true, Mademoiselle de Montmorenci," said Lydgate, just bending
his head to the table and lifting with his fourth finger her delicate
handkerchief which lay at the mouth of her reticule, as if to enjoy its
scent, while he looked at her with a smile.

But this agreeable holiday freedom with which Lydgate hovered about the
flower of Middlemarch, could not continue indefinitely.  It was not
more possible to find social isolation in that town than elsewhere, and
two people persistently flirting could by no means escape from "the
various entanglements, weights, blows, clashings, motions, by which
things severally go on." Whatever Miss Vincy did must be remarked, and
she was perhaps the more conspicuous to admirers and critics because
just now Mrs. Vincy, after some struggle, had gone with Fred to stay a
little while at Stone Court, there being no other way of at once
gratifying old Featherstone and keeping watch against Mary Garth, who
appeared a less tolerable daughter-in-law in proportion as Fred's
illness disappeared.

Aunt Bulstrode, for example, came a little oftener into Lowick Gate to
see Rosamond, now she was alone.  For Mrs. Bulstrode had a true
sisterly feeling for her brother; always thinking that he might have
married better, but wishing well to the children.  Now Mrs. Bulstrode
had a long-standing intimacy with Mrs. Plymdale.  They had nearly the
same preferences in silks, patterns for underclothing, china-ware, and
clergymen; they confided their little troubles of health and household
management to each other, and various little points of superiority on
Mrs. Bulstrode's side, namely, more decided seriousness, more
admiration for mind, and a house outside the town, sometimes served to
give color to their conversation without dividing them--well-meaning
women both, knowing very little of their own motives.

Mrs. Bulstrode, paying a morning visit to Mrs. Plymdale, happened to
say that she could not stay longer, because she was going to see poor
Rosamond.

"Why do you say 'poor Rosamond'?" said Mrs. Plymdale, a round-eyed
sharp little woman, like a tamed falcon.

"She is so pretty, and has been brought up in such thoughtlessness.
The mother, you know, had always that levity about her, which makes me
anxious for the children."

"Well, Harriet, if I am to speak my mind," said Mrs. Plymdale, with
emphasis, "I must say, anybody would suppose you and Mr. Bulstrode
would be delighted with what has happened, for you have done everything
to put Mr. Lydgate forward."

"Selina, what do you mean?" said Mrs. Bulstrode, in genuine surprise.

"Not but what I am truly thankful for Ned's sake," said Mrs. Plymdale.
"He could certainly better afford to keep such a wife than some people
can; but I should wish him to look elsewhere.  Still a mother has
anxieties, and some young men would take to a bad life in consequence.
Besides, if I was obliged to speak, I should say I was not fond of
strangers coming into a town."

"I don't know, Selina," said Mrs. Bulstrode, with a little emphasis in
her turn.  "Mr. Bulstrode was a stranger here at one time.  Abraham and
Moses were strangers in the land, and we are told to entertain
strangers.  And especially," she added, after a slight pause, "when
they are unexceptionable."

"I was not speaking in a religious sense, Harriet.  I spoke as a
mother."

"Selina, I am sure you have never heard me say anything against a niece
of mine marrying your son."

"Oh, it is pride in Miss Vincy--I am sure it is nothing else," said
Mrs. Plymdale, who had never before given all her confidence to
"Harriet" on this subject.  "No young man in Middlemarch was good
enough for her: I have heard her mother say as much.  That is not a
Christian spirit, I think.  But now, from all I hear, she has found a
man as proud as herself."

"You don't mean that there is anything between Rosamond and Mr.
Lydgate?" said Mrs. Bulstrode, rather mortified at finding out her own
ignorance.

"Is it possible you don't know, Harriet?"

"Oh, I go about so little; and I am not fond of gossip; I really never
hear any.  You see so many people that I don't see.  Your circle is
rather different from ours."

"Well, but your own niece and Mr. Bulstrode's great favorite--and
yours too, I am sure, Harriet!  I thought, at one time, you meant him
for Kate, when she is a little older."

"I don't believe there can be anything serious at present," said Mrs.
Bulstrode.  "My brother would certainly have told me."

"Well, people have different ways, but I understand that nobody can see
Miss Vincy and Mr. Lydgate together without taking them to be engaged.
However, it is not my business.  Shall I put up the pattern of mittens?"

After this Mrs. Bulstrode drove to her niece with a mind newly
weighted.  She was herself handsomely dressed, but she noticed with a
little more regret than usual that Rosamond, who was just come in and
met her in walking-dress, was almost as expensively equipped.  Mrs.
Bulstrode was a feminine smaller edition of her brother, and had none
of her husband's low-toned pallor.  She had a good honest glance and
used no circumlocution.

"You are alone, I see, my dear," she said, as they entered the
drawing-room together, looking round gravely.  Rosamond felt sure that
her aunt had something particular to say, and they sat down near each
other.  Nevertheless, the quilling inside Rosamond's bonnet was so
charming that it was impossible not to desire the same kind of thing
for Kate, and Mrs. Bulstrode's eyes, which were rather fine, rolled
round that ample quilled circuit, while she spoke.

"I have just heard something about you that has surprised me very much,
Rosamond."

"What is that, aunt?"  Rosamond's eyes also were roaming over her
aunt's large embroidered collar.

"I can hardly believe it--that you should be engaged without my knowing
it--without your father's telling me."  Here Mrs. Bulstrode's eyes
finally rested on Rosamond's, who blushed deeply, and said--

"I am not engaged, aunt."

"How is it that every one says so, then--that it is the town's talk?"

"The town's talk is of very little consequence, I think," said
Rosamond, inwardly gratified.

"Oh, my dear, be more thoughtful; don't despise your neighbors so.
Remember you are turned twenty-two now, and you will have no fortune:
your father, I am sure, will not be able to spare you anything.  Mr.
Lydgate is very intellectual and clever; I know there is an attraction
in that.  I like talking to such men myself; and your uncle finds him
very useful.  But the profession is a poor one here.  To be sure, this
life is not everything; but it is seldom a medical man has true
religious views--there is too much pride of intellect.  And you are not
fit to marry a poor man.

"Mr. Lydgate is not a poor man, aunt.  He has very high connections."

"He told me himself he was poor."

"That is because he is used to people who have a high style of living."

"My dear Rosamond, _you_ must not think of living in high style."

Rosamond looked down and played with her reticule.  She was not a fiery
young lady and had no sharp answers, but she meant to live as she
pleased.

"Then it is really true?" said Mrs. Bulstrode, looking very earnestly
at her niece.  "You are thinking of Mr. Lydgate--there is some
understanding between you, though your father doesn't know.  Be open,
my dear Rosamond: Mr. Lydgate has really made you an offer?"

Poor Rosamond's feelings were very unpleasant.  She had been quite easy
as to Lydgate's feeling and intention, but now when her aunt put this
question she did not like being unable to say Yes.  Her pride was hurt,
but her habitual control of manner helped her.

"Pray excuse me, aunt.  I would rather not speak on the subject."

"You would not give your heart to a man without a decided prospect, I
trust, my dear.  And think of the two excellent offers I know of that
you have refused!--and one still within your reach, if you will not
throw it away.  I knew a very great beauty who married badly at last,
by doing so.  Mr. Ned Plymdale is a nice young man--some might think
good-looking; and an only son; and a large business of that kind is
better than a profession.  Not that marrying is everything. I would
have you seek first the kingdom of God.  But a girl should keep her
heart within her own power."

"I should never give it to Mr. Ned Plymdale, if it were.  I have
already refused him.  If I loved, I should love at once and without
change," said Rosamond, with a great sense of being a romantic heroine,
and playing the part prettily.

"I see how it is, my dear," said Mrs. Bulstrode, in a melancholy voice,
rising to go.  "You have allowed your affections to be engaged without
return."

"No, indeed, aunt," said Rosamond, with emphasis.

"Then you are quite confident that Mr. Lydgate has a serious attachment
to you?"

Rosamond's cheeks by this time were persistently burning, and she felt
much mortification.  She chose to be silent, and her aunt went away all
the more convinced.

Mr. Bulstrode in things worldly and indifferent was disposed to do what
his wife bade him, and she now, without telling her reasons, desired
him on the next opportunity to find out in conversation with Mr.
Lydgate whether he had any intention of marrying soon.  The result was
a decided negative.  Mr. Bulstrode, on being cross-questioned, showed
that Lydgate had spoken as no man would who had any attachment that
could issue in matrimony.  Mrs. Bulstrode now felt that she had a
serious duty before her, and she soon managed to arrange a tete-a-tete
with Lydgate, in which she passed from inquiries about Fred Vincy's
health, and expressions of her sincere anxiety for her brother's large
family, to general remarks on the dangers which lay before young people
with regard to their settlement in life.  Young men were often wild and
disappointing, making little return for the money spent on them, and a
girl was exposed to many circumstances which might interfere with her
prospects.

"Especially when she has great attractions, and her parents see much
company," said Mrs. Bulstrode "Gentlemen pay her attention, and engross
her all to themselves, for the mere pleasure of the moment, and that
drives off others.  I think it is a heavy responsibility, Mr. Lydgate,
to interfere with the prospects of any girl." Here Mrs. Bulstrode fixed
her eyes on him, with an unmistakable purpose of warning, if not of
rebuke.

"Clearly," said Lydgate, looking at her--perhaps even staring a little
in return.  "On the other hand, a man must be a great coxcomb to go
about with a notion that he must not pay attention to a young lady lest
she should fall in love with him, or lest others should think she must."

"Oh, Mr. Lydgate, you know well what your advantages are.  You know
that our young men here cannot cope with you.  Where you frequent a
house it may militate very much against a girl's making a desirable
settlement in life, and prevent her from accepting offers even if they
are made."

Lydgate was less flattered by his advantage over the Middlemarch
Orlandos than he was annoyed by the perception of Mrs. Bulstrode's
meaning.  She felt that she had spoken as impressively as it was
necessary to do, and that in using the superior word "militate" she had
thrown a noble drapery over a mass of particulars which were still
evident enough.

Lydgate was fuming a little, pushed his hair back with one hand, felt
curiously in his waistcoat-pocket with the other, and then stooped to
beckon the tiny black spaniel, which had the insight to decline his
hollow caresses.  It would not have been decent to go away, because he
had been dining with other guests, and had just taken tea.  But Mrs.
Bulstrode, having no doubt that she had been understood, turned the
conversation.

Solomon's Proverbs, I think, have omitted to say, that as the sore
palate findeth grit, so an uneasy consciousness heareth innuendoes.
The next day Mr. Farebrother, parting from Lydgate in the street,
supposed that they should meet at Vincy's in the evening.  Lydgate
answered curtly, no--he had work to do--he must give up going out in
the evening.

"What! you are going to get lashed to the mast, eh, and are stopping
your ears?" said the Vicar.  "Well, if you don't mean to be won by the
sirens, you are right to take precautions in time."

A few days before, Lydgate would have taken no notice of these words as
anything more than the Vicar's usual way of putting things.  They
seemed now to convey an innuendo which confirmed the impression that he
had been making a fool of himself and behaving so as to be
misunderstood: not, he believed, by Rosamond herself; she, he felt
sure, took everything as lightly as he intended it.  She had an
exquisite tact and insight in relation to all points of manners; but
the people she lived among were blunderers and busybodies.  However,
the mistake should go no farther.  He resolved--and kept his
resolution--that he would not go to Mr. Vincy's except on business.

Rosamond became very unhappy.  The uneasiness first stirred by her
aunt's questions grew and grew till at the end of ten days that she had
not seen Lydgate, it grew into terror at the blank that might possibly
come--into foreboding of that ready, fatal sponge which so cheaply
wipes out the hopes of mortals.  The world would have a new dreariness
for her, as a wilderness that a magician's spells had turned for a
little while into a garden.  She felt that she was beginning to know
the pang of disappointed love, and that no other man could be the
occasion of such delightful aerial building as she had been enjoying
for the last six months.  Poor Rosamond lost her appetite and felt as
forlorn as Ariadne--as a charming stage Ariadne left behind with all
her boxes full of costumes and no hope of a coach.

There are many wonderful mixtures in the world which are all alike
called love, and claim the privileges of a sublime rage which is an
apology for everything (in literature and the drama).  Happily Rosamond
did not think of committing any desperate act: she plaited her fair
hair as beautifully as usual, and kept herself proudly calm.  Her most
cheerful supposition was that her aunt Bulstrode had interfered in some
way to hinder Lydgate's visits: everything was better than a
spontaneous indifference in him.  Any one who imagines ten days too
short a time--not for falling into leanness, lightness, or other
measurable effects of passion, but--for the whole spiritual circuit of
alarmed conjecture and disappointment, is ignorant of what can go on in
the elegant leisure of a young lady's mind.

On the eleventh day, however, Lydgate when leaving Stone Court was
requested by Mrs. Vincy to let her husband know that there was a marked
change in Mr. Featherstone's health, and that she wished him to come to
Stone Court on that day.  Now Lydgate might have called at the
warehouse, or might have written a message on a leaf of his pocket-book
and left it at the door.  Yet these simple devices apparently did not
occur to him, from which we may conclude that he had no strong
objection to calling at the house at an hour when Mr. Vincy was not at
home, and leaving the message with Miss Vincy.  A man may, from various
motives, decline to give his company, but perhaps not even a sage would
be gratified that nobody missed him.  It would be a graceful, easy way
of piecing on the new habits to the old, to have a few playful words
with Rosamond about his resistance to dissipation, and his firm resolve
to take long fasts even from sweet sounds.  It must be confessed, also,
that momentary speculations as to all the possible grounds for Mrs.
Bulstrode's hints had managed to get woven like slight clinging hairs
into the more substantial web of his thoughts.

Miss Vincy was alone, and blushed so deeply when Lydgate came in that
he felt a corresponding embarrassment, and instead of any playfulness,
he began at once to speak of his reason for calling, and to beg her,
almost formally, to deliver the message to her father.  Rosamond, who
at the first moment felt as if her happiness were returning, was keenly
hurt by Lydgate's manner; her blush had departed, and she assented
coldly, without adding an unnecessary word, some trivial chain-work
which she had in her hands enabling her to avoid looking at Lydgate
higher than his chin.  In all failures, the beginning is certainly the
half of the whole.  After sitting two long moments while he moved his
whip and could say nothing, Lydgate rose to go, and Rosamond, made
nervous by her struggle between mortification and the wish not to
betray it, dropped her chain as if startled, and rose too,
mechanically.  Lydgate instantaneously stooped to pick up the chain.
When he rose he was very near to a lovely little face set on a fair
long neck which he had been used to see turning about under the most
perfect management of self-contented grace.  But as he raised his eyes
now he saw a certain helpless quivering which touched him quite newly,
and made him look at Rosamond with a questioning flash.  At this moment
she was as natural as she had ever been when she was five years old:
she felt that her tears had risen, and it was no use to try to do
anything else than let them stay like water on a blue flower or let
them fall over her cheeks, even as they would.

That moment of naturalness was the crystallizing feather-touch: it
shook flirtation into love.  Remember that the ambitious man who was
looking at those Forget-me-nots under the water was very warm-hearted
and rash.  He did not know where the chain went; an idea had thrilled
through the recesses within him which had a miraculous effect in
raising the power of passionate love lying buried there in no sealed
sepulchre, but under the lightest, easily pierced mould.  His words
were quite abrupt and awkward; but the tone made them sound like an
ardent, appealing avowal.

"What is the matter? you are distressed.  Tell me, pray."

Rosamond had never been spoken to in such tones before.  I am not sure
that she knew what the words were: but she looked at Lydgate and the
tears fell over her cheeks.  There could have been no more complete
answer than that silence, and Lydgate, forgetting everything else,
completely mastered by the outrush of tenderness at the sudden belief
that this sweet young creature depended on him for her joy, actually
put his arms round her, folding her gently and protectingly--he was
used to being gentle with the weak and suffering--and kissed each of
the two large tears.  This was a strange way of arriving at an
understanding, but it was a short way.  Rosamond was not angry, but she
moved backward a little in timid happiness, and Lydgate could now sit
near her and speak less incompletely.  Rosamond had to make her little
confession, and he poured out words of gratitude and tenderness with
impulsive lavishment.  In half an hour he left the house an engaged
man, whose soul was not his own, but the woman's to whom he had bound
himself.

He came again in the evening to speak with Mr. Vincy, who, just
returned from Stone Court, was feeling sure that it would not be long
before he heard of Mr. Featherstone's demise.  The felicitous word
"demise," which had seasonably occurred to him, had raised his spirits
even above their usual evening pitch.  The right word is always a
power, and communicates its definiteness to our action.  Considered as
a demise, old Featherstone's death assumed a merely legal aspect, so
that Mr. Vincy could tap his snuff-box over it and be jovial, without
even an intermittent affectation of solemnity; and Mr. Vincy hated both
solemnity and affectation.  Who was ever awe struck about a testator,
or sang a hymn on the title to real property?  Mr. Vincy was inclined
to take a jovial view of all things that evening: he even observed to
Lydgate that Fred had got the family constitution after all, and would
soon be as fine a fellow as ever again; and when his approbation of
Rosamond's engagement was asked for, he gave it with astonishing
facility, passing at once to general remarks on the desirableness of
matrimony for young men and maidens, and apparently deducing from the
whole the appropriateness of a little more punch.

    "They'll take suggestion as a cat laps milk."
                                --SHAKESPEARE: Tempest.

The triumphant confidence of the Mayor founded on Mr. Featherstone's
insistent demand that Fred and his mother should not leave him, was a
feeble emotion compared with all that was agitating the breasts of the
old man's blood-relations, who naturally manifested more their sense of
the family tie and were more visibly numerous now that he had become
bedridden.  Naturally: for when "poor Peter" had occupied his arm-chair
in the wainscoted parlor, no assiduous beetles for whom the cook
prepares boiling water could have been less welcome on a hearth which
they had reasons for preferring, than those persons whose Featherstone
blood was ill-nourished, not from penuriousness on their part, but from
poverty.  Brother Solomon and Sister Jane were rich, and the family
candor and total abstinence from false politeness with which they were
always received seemed to them no argument that their brother in the
solemn act of making his will would overlook the superior claims of
wealth.  Themselves at least he had never been unnatural enough to
banish from his house, and it seemed hardly eccentric that he should
have kept away Brother Jonah, Sister Martha, and the rest, who had no
shadow of such claims.  They knew Peter's maxim, that money was a good
egg, and should be laid in a warm nest.

But Brother Jonah, Sister Martha, and all the needy exiles, held a
different point of view.  Probabilities are as various as the faces to
be seen at will in fretwork or paper-hangings: every form is there,
from Jupiter to Judy, if you only look with creative inclination.  To
the poorer and least favored it seemed likely that since Peter had done
nothing for them in his life, he would remember them at the last.
Jonah argued that men liked to make a surprise of their wills, while
Martha said that nobody need be surprised if he left the best part of
his money to those who least expected it.  Also it was not to be
thought but that an own brother "lying there" with dropsy in his legs
must come to feel that blood was thicker than water, and if he didn't
alter his will, he might have money by him.  At any rate some
blood-relations should be on the premises and on the watch against
those who were hardly relations at all.  Such things had been known as
forged wills and disputed wills, which seemed to have the golden-hazy
advantage of somehow enabling non-legatees to live out of them.  Again,
those who were no blood-relations might be caught making away with
things--and poor Peter "lying there" helpless!  Somebody should be on
the watch.  But in this conclusion they were at one with Solomon and
Jane; also, some nephews, nieces, and cousins, arguing with still
greater subtilty as to what might be done by a man able to "will away"
his property and give himself large treats of oddity, felt in a
handsome sort of way that there was a family interest to be attended
to, and thought of Stone Court as a place which it would be nothing but
right for them to visit.  Sister Martha, otherwise Mrs. Cranch, living
with some wheeziness in the Chalky Flats, could not undertake the
journey; but her son, as being poor Peter's own nephew, could represent
her advantageously, and watch lest his uncle Jonah should make an
unfair use of the improbable things which seemed likely to happen.  In
fact there was a general sense running in the Featherstone blood that
everybody must watch everybody else, and that it would be well for
everybody else to reflect that the Almighty was watching him.

Thus Stone Court continually saw one or other blood-relation alighting
or departing, and Mary Garth had the unpleasant task of carrying their
messages to Mr. Featherstone, who would see none of them, and sent her
down with the still more unpleasant task of telling them so.  As
manager of the household she felt bound to ask them in good provincial
fashion to stay and eat; but she chose to consult Mrs. Vincy on the
point of extra down-stairs consumption now that Mr. Featherstone was
laid up.

"Oh, my dear, you must do things handsomely where there's last illness
and a property.  God knows, I don't grudge them every ham in the
house--only, save the best for the funeral.  Have some stuffed veal
always, and a fine cheese in cut.  You must expect to keep open house
in these last illnesses," said liberal Mrs. Vincy, once more of
cheerful note and bright plumage.

But some of the visitors alighted and did not depart after the handsome
treating to veal and ham.  Brother Jonah, for example (there are such
unpleasant people in most families; perhaps even in the highest
aristocracy there are Brobdingnag specimens, gigantically in debt and
bloated at greater expense)--Brother Jonah, I say, having come down in
the world, was mainly supported by a calling which he was modest enough
not to boast of, though it was much better than swindling either on
exchange or turf, but which did not require his presence at Brassing so
long as he had a good corner to sit in and a supply of food.  He chose
the kitchen-corner, partly because he liked it best, and partly because
he did not want to sit with Solomon, concerning whom he had a strong
brotherly opinion.  Seated in a famous arm-chair and in his best suit,
constantly within sight of good cheer, he had a comfortable
consciousness of being on the premises, mingled with fleeting
suggestions of Sunday and the bar at the Green Man; and he informed
Mary Garth that he should not go out of reach of his brother Peter
while that poor fellow was above ground.  The troublesome ones in a
family are usually either the wits or the idiots.  Jonah was the wit
among the Featherstones, and joked with the maid-servants when they
came about the hearth, but seemed to consider Miss Garth a suspicious
character, and followed her with cold eyes.

Mary would have borne this one pair of eyes with comparative ease, but
unfortunately there was young Cranch, who, having come all the way from
the Chalky Flats to represent his mother and watch his uncle Jonah,
also felt it his duty to stay and to sit chiefly in the kitchen to give
his uncle company.  Young Cranch was not exactly the balancing point
between the wit and the idiot,--verging slightly towards the latter
type, and squinting so as to leave everything in doubt about his
sentiments except that they were not of a forcible character.  When
Mary Garth entered the kitchen and Mr. Jonah Featherstone began to
follow her with his cold detective eyes, young Cranch turning his head
in the same direction seemed to insist on it that she should remark how
he was squinting, as if he did it with design, like the gypsies when
Borrow read the New Testament to them.  This was rather too much for
poor Mary; sometimes it made her bilious, sometimes it upset her
gravity.  One day that she had an opportunity she could not resist
describing the kitchen scene to Fred, who would not be hindered from
immediately going to see it, affecting simply to pass through.  But no
sooner did he face the four eyes than he had to rush through the
nearest door which happened to lead to the dairy, and there under the
high roof and among the pans he gave way to laughter which made a
hollow resonance perfectly audible in the kitchen.  He fled by another
doorway, but Mr. Jonah, who had not before seen Fred's white
complexion, long legs, and pinched delicacy of face, prepared many
sarcasms in which these points of appearance were wittily combined with
the lowest moral attributes.

"Why, Tom, _you_ don't wear such gentlemanly trousers--you haven't got
half such fine long legs," said Jonah to his nephew, winking at the
same time, to imply that there was something more in these statements
than their undeniableness.  Tom looked at his legs, but left it
uncertain whether he preferred his moral advantages to a more vicious
length of limb and reprehensible gentility of trouser.

In the large wainscoted parlor too there were constantly pairs of eyes
on the watch, and own relatives eager to be "sitters-up." Many came,
lunched, and departed, but Brother Solomon and the lady who had been
Jane Featherstone for twenty-five years before she was Mrs. Waule found
it good to be there every day for hours, without other calculable
occupation than that of observing the cunning Mary Garth (who was so
deep that she could be found out in nothing) and giving occasional dry
wrinkly indications of crying--as if capable of torrents in a wetter
season--at the thought that they were not allowed to go into Mr.
Featherstone's room.  For the old man's dislike of his own family
seemed to get stronger as he got less able to amuse himself by saying
biting things to them.  Too languid to sting, he had the more venom
refluent in his blood.

Not fully believing the message sent through Mary Garth, they had
presented themselves together within the door of the bedroom, both in
black--Mrs. Waule having a white handkerchief partially unfolded in her
hand--and both with faces in a sort of half-mourning purple; while Mrs.
Vincy with her pink cheeks and pink ribbons flying was actually
administering a cordial to their own brother, and the
light-complexioned Fred, his short hair curling as might be expected in
a gambler's, was lolling at his ease in a large chair.

Old Featherstone no sooner caught sight of these funereal figures
appearing in spite of his orders than rage came to strengthen him more
successfully than the cordial.  He was propped up on a bed-rest, and
always had his gold-headed stick lying by him.  He seized it now and
swept it backwards and forwards in as large an area as he could,
apparently to ban these ugly spectres, crying in a hoarse sort of
screech--

"Back, back, Mrs. Waule!  Back, Solomon!"

"Oh, Brother.  Peter," Mrs. Waule began--but Solomon put his hand
before her repressingly.  He was a large-cheeked man, nearly seventy,
with small furtive eyes, and was not only of much blander temper but
thought himself much deeper than his brother Peter; indeed not likely
to be deceived in any of his fellow-men, inasmuch as they could not
well be more greedy and deceitful than he suspected them of being.
Even the invisible powers, he thought, were likely to be soothed by a
bland parenthesis here and there--coming from a man of property, who
might have been as impious as others.

"Brother Peter," he said, in a wheedling yet gravely official tone,
"It's nothing but right I should speak to you about the Three Crofts
and the Manganese.  The Almighty knows what I've got on my mind--"

"Then he knows more than I want to know," said Peter, laying down his
stick with a show of truce which had a threat in it too, for he
reversed the stick so as to make the gold handle a club in case of
closer fighting, and looked hard at Solomon's bald head.

"There's things you might repent of, Brother, for want of speaking to
me," said Solomon, not advancing, however.  "I could sit up with you
to-night, and Jane with me, willingly, and you might take your own time
to speak, or let me speak."

"Yes, I shall take my own time--you needn't offer me yours," said Peter.

"But you can't take your own time to die in, Brother," began Mrs.
Waule, with her usual woolly tone.  "And when you lie speechless you
may be tired of having strangers about you, and you may think of me and
my children"--but here her voice broke under the touching thought which
she was attributing to her speechless brother; the mention of ourselves
being naturally affecting.

"No, I shan't," said old Featherstone, contradictiously.  "I shan't
think of any of you.  I've made my will, I tell you, I've made my
will."  Here he turned his head towards Mrs. Vincy, and swallowed some
more of his cordial.

"Some people would be ashamed to fill up a place belonging by rights to
others," said Mrs. Waule, turning her narrow eyes in the same direction.

"Oh, sister," said Solomon, with ironical softness, "you and me are not
fine, and handsome, and clever enough: we must be humble and let smart
people push themselves before us."

Fred's spirit could not bear this: rising and looking at Mr.
Featherstone, he said, "Shall my mother and I leave the room, sir, that
you may be alone with your friends?"

"Sit down, I tell you," said old Featherstone, snappishly.  "Stop where
you are.  Good-by, Solomon," he added, trying to wield his stick again,
but failing now that he had reversed the handle.  "Good-by, Mrs. Waule.
Don't you come again."

"I shall be down-stairs, Brother, whether or no," said Solomon.  "I
shall do my duty, and it remains to be seen what the Almighty will
allow."

"Yes, in property going out of families," said Mrs. Waule, in
continuation,--"and where there's steady young men to carry on.  But I
pity them who are not such, and I pity their mothers.  Good-by, Brother
Peter."

"Remember, I'm the eldest after you, Brother, and prospered from the
first, just as you did, and have got land already by the name of
Featherstone," said Solomon, relying much on that reflection, as one
which might be suggested in the watches of the night.  "But I bid you
good-by for the present."

Their exit was hastened by their seeing old Mr. Featherstone pull his
wig on each side and shut his eyes with his mouth-widening grimace, as
if he were determined to be deaf and blind.

None the less they came to Stone Court daily and sat below at the post
of duty, sometimes carrying on a slow dialogue in an undertone in which
the observation and response were so far apart, that any one hearing
them might have imagined himself listening to speaking automata, in
some doubt whether the ingenious mechanism would really work, or wind
itself up for a long time in order to stick and be silent.  Solomon and
Jane would have been sorry to be quick: what that led to might be seen
on the other side of the wall in the person of Brother Jonah.

But their watch in the wainscoted parlor was sometimes varied by the
presence of other guests from far or near.  Now that Peter Featherstone
was up-stairs, his property could be discussed with all that local
enlightenment to be found on the spot: some rural and Middlemarch
neighbors expressed much agreement with the family and sympathy with
their interest against the Vincys, and feminine visitors were even
moved to tears, in conversation with Mrs. Waule, when they recalled the
fact that they themselves had been disappointed in times past by
codicils and marriages for spite on the part of ungrateful elderly
gentlemen, who, it might have been supposed, had been spared for
something better.  Such conversation paused suddenly, like an organ
when the bellows are let drop, if Mary Garth came into the room; and
all eyes were turned on her as a possible legatee, or one who might get
access to iron chests.

But the younger men who were relatives or connections of the family,
were disposed to admire her in this problematic light, as a girl who
showed much conduct, and who among all the chances that were flying
might turn out to be at least a moderate prize.  Hence she had her
share of compliments and polite attentions.

Especially from Mr. Borthrop Trumbull, a distinguished bachelor and
auctioneer of those parts, much concerned in the sale of land and
cattle: a public character, indeed, whose name was seen on widely
distributed placards, and who might reasonably be sorry for those who
did not know of him.  He was second cousin to Peter Featherstone, and
had been treated by him with more amenity than any other relative,
being useful in matters of business; and in that programme of his
funeral which the old man had himself dictated, he had been named as a
Bearer.  There was no odious cupidity in Mr. Borthrop Trumbull--nothing
more than a sincere sense of his own merit, which, he was aware, in
case of rivalry might tell against competitors; so that if Peter
Featherstone, who so far as he, Trumbull, was concerned, had
behaved like as good a soul as ever breathed, should have done anything
handsome by him, all he could say was, that he had never fished and
fawned, but had advised him to the best of his experience, which now
extended over twenty years from the time of his apprenticeship at
fifteen, and was likely to yield a knowledge of no surreptitious kind.
His admiration was far from being confined to himself, but was
accustomed professionally as well as privately to delight in estimating
things at a high rate.  He was an amateur of superior phrases, and
never used poor language without immediately correcting himself--which
was fortunate, as he was rather loud, and given to predominate,
standing or walking about frequently, pulling down his waistcoat with
the air of a man who is very much of his own opinion, trimming himself
rapidly with his fore-finger, and marking each new series in these
movements by a busy play with his large seals.  There was occasionally
a little fierceness in his demeanor, but it was directed chiefly
against false opinion, of which there is so much to correct in the
world that a man of some reading and experience necessarily has his
patience tried.  He felt that the Featherstone family generally was of
limited understanding, but being a man of the world and a public
character, took everything as a matter of course, and even went to
converse with Mr. Jonah and young Cranch in the kitchen, not doubting
that he had impressed the latter greatly by his leading questions
concerning the Chalky Flats.  If anybody had observed that Mr. Borthrop
Trumbull, being an auctioneer, was bound to know the nature of
everything, he would have smiled and trimmed himself silently with the
sense that he came pretty near that.  On the whole, in an auctioneering
way, he was an honorable man, not ashamed of his business, and feeling
that "the celebrated Peel, now Sir Robert," if introduced to him, would
not fail to recognize his importance.

"I don't mind if I have a slice of that ham, and a glass of that ale,
Miss Garth, if you will allow me," he said, coming into the parlor at
half-past eleven, after having had the exceptional privilege of seeing
old Featherstone, and standing with his back to the fire between Mrs.
Waule and Solomon.

"It's not necessary for you to go out;--let me ring the bell."

"Thank you," said Mary, "I have an errand."

"Well, Mr. Trumbull, you're highly favored," said Mrs. Waule.

"What! seeing the old man?" said the auctioneer, playing with his seals
dispassionately. "Ah, you see he has relied on me considerably." Here
he pressed his lips together, and frowned meditatively.

"Might anybody ask what their brother has been saying?" said Solomon,
in a soft tone of humility, in which he had a sense of luxurious
cunning, he being a rich man and not in need of it.

"Oh yes, anybody may ask," said Mr. Trumbull, with loud and
good-humored though cutting sarcasm.  "Anybody may interrogate.  Any
one may give their remarks an interrogative turn," he continued, his
sonorousness rising with his style.  "This is constantly done by good
speakers, even when they anticipate no answer.  It is what we call a
figure of speech--speech at a high figure, as one may say." The
eloquent auctioneer smiled at his own ingenuity.

"I shouldn't be sorry to hear he'd remembered you, Mr. Trumbull," said
Solomon.  "I never was against the deserving.  It's the undeserving I'm
against."

"Ah, there it is, you see, there it is," said Mr. Trumbull,
significantly.  "It can't be denied that undeserving people have been
legatees, and even residuary legatees.  It is so, with testamentary
dispositions."  Again he pursed up his lips and frowned a little.

"Do you mean to say for certain, Mr. Trumbull, that my brother has left
his land away from our family?" said Mrs. Waule, on whom, as an
unhopeful woman, those long words had a depressing effect.

"A man might as well turn his land into charity land at once as leave
it to some people," observed Solomon, his sister's question having
drawn no answer.

"What, Blue-Coat land?" said Mrs. Waule, again.  "Oh, Mr. Trumbull, you
never can mean to say that.  It would be flying in the face of the
Almighty that's prospered him."

While Mrs. Waule was speaking, Mr. Borthrop Trumbull walked away from
the fireplace towards the window, patrolling with his fore-finger round
the inside of his stock, then along his whiskers and the curves of his
hair.  He now walked to Miss Garth's work-table, opened a book which
lay there and read the title aloud with pompous emphasis as if he were
offering it for sale:

"'Anne of Geierstein' (pronounced Jeersteen) or the 'Maiden of the
Mist, by the author of Waverley.'"  Then turning the page, he began
sonorously--"The course of four centuries has well-nigh elapsed since
the series of events which are related in the following chapters took
place on the Continent."  He pronounced the last truly admirable word
with the accent on the last syllable, not as unaware of vulgar usage,
but feeling that this novel delivery enhanced the sonorous beauty which
his reading had given to the whole.

And now the servant came in with the tray, so that the moments for
answering Mrs. Waule's question had gone by safely, while she and
Solomon, watching Mr. Trumbull's movements, were thinking that high
learning interfered sadly with serious affairs.  Mr. Borthrop Trumbull
really knew nothing about old Featherstone's will; but he could hardly
have been brought to declare any ignorance unless he had been arrested
for misprision of treason.

"I shall take a mere mouthful of ham and a glass of ale," he said,
reassuringly.  "As a man with public business, I take a snack when I
can.  I will back this ham," he added, after swallowing some morsels
with alarming haste, "against any ham in the three kingdoms.  In my
opinion it is better than the hams at Freshitt Hall--and I think I am
a tolerable judge."

"Some don't like so much sugar in their hams," said Mrs. Waule.  "But
my poor brother would always have sugar."

"If any person demands better, he is at liberty to do so; but, God
bless me, what an aroma!  I should be glad to buy in that quality, I
know.  There is some gratification to a gentleman"--here Mr.
Trumbull's voice conveyed an emotional remonstrance--"in having this
kind of ham set on his table."

He pushed aside his plate, poured out his glass of ale and drew his
chair a little forward, profiting by the occasion to look at the inner
side of his legs, which he stroked approvingly--Mr. Trumbull having
all those less frivolous airs and gestures which distinguish the
predominant races of the north.

"You have an interesting work there, I see, Miss Garth," he observed,
when Mary re-entered. "It is by the author of 'Waverley': that is Sir
Walter Scott.  I have bought one of his works myself--a very nice
thing, a very superior publication, entitled 'Ivanhoe.' You will not
get any writer to beat him in a hurry, I think--he will not, in my
opinion, be speedily surpassed.  I have just been reading a portion at
the commencement of 'Anne of Jeersteen.' It commences well."  (Things
never began with Mr. Borthrop Trumbull: they always commenced, both in
private life and on his handbills.) "You are a reader, I see.  Do you
subscribe to our Middlemarch library?"

"No," said Mary.  "Mr. Fred Vincy brought this book."

"I am a great bookman myself," returned Mr. Trumbull.  "I have no less
than two hundred volumes in calf, and I flatter myself they are well
selected.  Also pictures by Murillo, Rubens, Teniers, Titian, Vandyck,
and others.  I shall be happy to lend you any work you like to mention,
Miss Garth."

"I am much obliged," said Mary, hastening away again, "but I have
little time for reading."

"I should say my brother has done something for _her_ in his will,"
said Mr. Solomon, in a very low undertone, when she had shut the door
behind her, pointing with his head towards the absent Mary.

"His first wife was a poor match for him, though," said Mrs. Waule.
"She brought him nothing: and this young woman is only her niece,--and
very proud.  And my brother has always paid her wage."

"A sensible girl though, in my opinion," said Mr. Trumbull, finishing
his ale and starting up with an emphatic adjustment of his waistcoat.
"I have observed her when she has been mixing medicine in drops.  She
minds what she is doing, sir.  That is a great point in a woman, and a
great point for our friend up-stairs, poor dear old soul.  A man whose
life is of any value should think of his wife as a nurse: that is what
I should do, if I married; and I believe I have lived single long
enough not to make a mistake in that line.  Some men must marry to
elevate themselves a little, but when I am in need of that, I hope some
one will tell me so--I hope some individual will apprise me of the
fact.  I wish you good morning, Mrs. Waule.  Good morning, Mr. Solomon.
I trust we shall meet under less melancholy auspices."

When Mr. Trumbull had departed with a fine bow, Solomon, leaning
forward, observed to his sister, "You may depend, Jane, my brother has
left that girl a lumping sum."

"Anybody would think so, from the way Mr. Trumbull talks," said Jane.
Then, after a pause, "He talks as if my daughters wasn't to be trusted
to give drops."

"Auctioneers talk wild," said Solomon.  "Not but what Trumbull has made
money."

    "Close up his eyes and draw the curtain close;
     And let us all to meditation."
                              --2 Henry VI.

That night after twelve o'clock Mary Garth relieved the watch in Mr.
Featherstone's room, and sat there alone through the small hours.  She
often chose this task, in which she found some pleasure,
notwithstanding the old man's testiness whenever he demanded her
attentions.  There were intervals in which she could sit perfectly
still, enjoying the outer stillness and the subdued light.  The red
fire with its gently audible movement seemed like a solemn existence
calmly independent of the petty passions, the imbecile desires, the
straining after worthless uncertainties, which were daily moving her
contempt.  Mary was fond of her own thoughts, and could amuse herself
well sitting in twilight with her hands in her lap; for, having early
had strong reason to believe that things were not likely to be arranged
for her peculiar satisfaction, she wasted no time in astonishment and
annoyance at that fact.  And she had already come to take life very
much as a comedy in which she had a proud, nay, a generous resolution
not to act the mean or treacherous part.  Mary might have become
cynical if she had not had parents whom she honored, and a well of
affectionate gratitude within her, which was all the fuller because she
had learned to make no unreasonable claims.

She sat to-night revolving, as she was wont, the scenes of the day, her
lips often curling with amusement at the oddities to which her fancy
added fresh drollery: people were so ridiculous with their illusions,
carrying their fool's caps unawares, thinking their own lies opaque
while everybody else's were transparent, making themselves exceptions
to everything, as if when all the world looked yellow under a lamp they
alone were rosy.  Yet there were some illusions under Mary's eyes which
were not quite comic to her.  She was secretly convinced, though she
had no other grounds than her close observation of old Featherstone's
nature, that in spite of his fondness for having the Vincys about him,
they were as likely to be disappointed as any of the relations whom he
kept at a distance.  She had a good deal of disdain for Mrs. Vincy's
evident alarm lest she and Fred should be alone together, but it did
not hinder her from thinking anxiously of the way in which Fred would
be affected, if it should turn out that his uncle had left him as poor
as ever.  She could make a butt of Fred when he was present, but she
did not enjoy his follies when he was absent.

Yet she liked her thoughts: a vigorous young mind not overbalanced by
passion, finds a good in making acquaintance with life, and watches its
own powers with interest.  Mary had plenty of merriment within.

Her thought was not veined by any solemnity or pathos about the old man
on the bed: such sentiments are easier to affect than to feel about an
aged creature whose life is not visibly anything but a remnant of
vices.  She had always seen the most disagreeable side of Mr.
Featherstone: he was not proud of her, and she was only useful to him.
To be anxious about a soul that is always snapping at you must be left
to the saints of the earth; and Mary was not one of them.  She had
never returned him a harsh word, and had waited on him faithfully: that
was her utmost.  Old Featherstone himself was not in the least anxious
about his soul, and had declined to see Mr. Tucker on the subject.

To-night he had not snapped, and for the first hour or two he lay
remarkably still, until at last Mary heard him rattling his bunch of
keys against the tin box which he always kept in the bed beside him.
About three o'clock he said, with remarkable distinctness, "Missy, come
here!"

Mary obeyed, and found that he had already drawn the tin box from under
the clothes, though he usually asked to have this done for him; and he
had selected the key.  He now unlocked the box, and, drawing from it
another key, looked straight at her with eyes that seemed to have
recovered all their sharpness and said, "How many of 'em are in the
house?"

"You mean of your own relations, sir," said Mary, well used to the old
man's way of speech.  He nodded slightly and she went on.

"Mr. Jonah Featherstone and young Cranch are sleeping here."

"Oh ay, they stick, do they? and the rest--they come every day, I'll
warrant--Solomon and Jane, and all the young uns?  They come peeping,
and counting and casting up?"

"Not all of them every day.  Mr. Solomon and Mrs. Waule are here every
day, and the others come often."

The old man listened with a grimace while she spoke, and then said,
relaxing his face, "The more fools they.  You hearken, missy.  It's
three o'clock in the morning, and I've got all my faculties as well as
ever I had in my life.  I know all my property, and where the money's
put out, and everything.  And I've made everything ready to change my
mind, and do as I like at the last.  Do you hear, missy?  I've got my
faculties."

"Well, sir?" said Mary, quietly.

He now lowered his tone with an air of deeper cunning.  "I've made two
wills, and I'm going to burn one.  Now you do as I tell you.  This is
the key of my iron chest, in the closet there.  You push well at the
side of the brass plate at the top, till it goes like a bolt: then you
can put the key in the front lock and turn it.  See and do that; and
take out the topmost paper--Last Will and Testament--big printed."

"No, sir," said Mary, in a firm voice, "I cannot do that."

"Not do it?  I tell you, you must," said the old man, his voice
beginning to shake under the shock of this resistance.

"I cannot touch your iron chest or your will.  I must refuse to do
anything that might lay me open to suspicion."

"I tell you, I'm in my right mind.  Shan't I do as I like at the last?
I made two wills on purpose.  Take the key, I say."

"No, sir, I will not," said Mary, more resolutely still.  Her repulsion
was getting stronger.

"I tell you, there's no time to lose."

"I cannot help that, sir.  I will not let the close of your life soil
the beginning of mine.  I will not touch your iron chest or your will."
She moved to a little distance from the bedside.

The old man paused with a blank stare for a little while, holding the
one key erect on the ring; then with an agitated jerk he began to work
with his bony left hand at emptying the tin box before him.

"Missy," he began to say, hurriedly, "look here! take the money--the
notes and gold--look here--take it--you shall have it all--do as I
tell you."

He made an effort to stretch out the key towards her as far as
possible, and Mary again retreated.

"I will not touch your key or your money, sir.  Pray don't ask me to do
it again.  If you do, I must go and call your brother."

He let his hand fall, and for the first time in her life Mary saw old
Peter Featherstone begin to cry childishly.  She said, in as gentle a
tone as she could command, "Pray put up your money, sir;" and then went
away to her seat by the fire, hoping this would help to convince him
that it was useless to say more.  Presently he rallied and said
eagerly--

"Look here, then.  Call the young chap.  Call Fred Vincy."

Mary's heart began to beat more quickly.  Various ideas rushed through
her mind as to what the burning of a second will might imply.  She had
to make a difficult decision in a hurry.

"I will call him, if you will let me call Mr. Jonah and others with
him."

"Nobody else, I say.  The young chap.  I shall do as I like."

"Wait till broad daylight, sir, when every one is stirring.  Or let me
call Simmons now, to go and fetch the lawyer?  He can be here in less
than two hours."

"Lawyer?  What do I want with the lawyer?  Nobody shall know--I say,
nobody shall know.  I shall do as I like."

"Let me call some one else, sir," said Mary, persuasively.  She did not
like her position--alone with the old man, who seemed to show a strange
flaring of nervous energy which enabled him to speak again and again
without falling into his usual cough; yet she desired not to push
unnecessarily the contradiction which agitated him.  "Let me, pray,
call some one else."

"You let me alone, I say.  Look here, missy.  Take the money.  You'll
never have the chance again.  It's pretty nigh two hundred--there's
more in the box, and nobody knows how much there was.  Take it and do
as I tell you."

Mary, standing by the fire, saw its red light falling on the old man,
propped up on his pillows and bed-rest, with his bony hand holding out
the key, and the money lying on the quilt before him.  She never forgot
that vision of a man wanting to do as he liked at the last.  But the
way in which he had put the offer of the money urged her to speak with
harder resolution than ever.

"It is of no use, sir.  I will not do it.  Put up your money.  I will
not touch your money.  I will do anything else I can to comfort you;
but I will not touch your keys or your money."

"Anything else anything else!" said old Featherstone, with hoarse rage,
which, as if in a nightmare, tried to be loud, and yet was only just
audible.  "I want nothing else.  You come here--you come here."

Mary approached him cautiously, knowing him too well.  She saw him
dropping his keys and trying to grasp his stick, while he looked at her
like an aged hyena, the muscles of his face getting distorted with the
effort of his hand.  She paused at a safe distance.

"Let me give you some cordial," she said, quietly, "and try to compose
yourself.  You will perhaps go to sleep.  And to-morrow by daylight you
can do as you like."

He lifted the stick, in spite of her being beyond his reach, and threw
it with a hard effort which was but impotence.  It fell, slipping over
the foot of the bed.  Mary let it lie, and retreated to her chair by
the fire.  By-and-by she would go to him with the cordial.  Fatigue
would make him passive.  It was getting towards the chillest moment of
the morning, the fire had got low, and she could see through the chink
between the moreen window-curtains the light whitened by the blind.
Having put some wood on the fire and thrown a shawl over her, she sat
down, hoping that Mr. Featherstone might now fall asleep.  If she went
near him the irritation might be kept up.  He had said nothing after
throwing the stick, but she had seen him taking his keys again and
laying his right hand on the money.  He did not put it up, however, and
she thought that he was dropping off to sleep.

But Mary herself began to be more agitated by the remembrance of what
she had gone through, than she had been by the reality--questioning
those acts of hers which had come imperatively and excluded all
question in the critical moment.

Presently the dry wood sent out a flame which illuminated every
crevice, and Mary saw that the old man was lying quietly with his head
turned a little on one side.  She went towards him with inaudible
steps, and thought that his face looked strangely motionless; but the
next moment the movement of the flame communicating itself to all
objects made her uncertain.  The violent beating of her heart rendered
her perceptions so doubtful that even when she touched him and listened
for his breathing, she could not trust her conclusions.  She went to
the window and gently propped aside the curtain and blind, so that the
still light of the sky fell on the bed.

The next moment she ran to the bell and rang it energetically.  In a
very little while there was no longer any doubt that Peter Featherstone
was dead, with his right hand clasping the keys, and his left hand
lying on the heap of notes and gold.

BOOK IV.

THREE LOVE PROBLEMS.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: After returning home from Rome, Dorothea contemplates the portrait of Casaubon's ill-fated aunt and feels a reluctant kinship with her because she experienced marriage difficulties. Brooke comments to her that Casaubon looks pale. Celia tells Dorothea that she is engaged to Sir James Chettam. Casaubon thought he had found everything he wanted and more in Dorothea: a ready helpmate with "the purely appreciative, unambitious abilities of her sex." He wanted a wife who would admire him uncritically, but he doesn't experience the bliss he expected. Two letters from Ladislaw arrive, and Casaubon reports that Ladislaw suggests that he would like to visit Lowick Manor. Casaubon tells her he must decline because Will's presence would distract him from work. Irritated, Dorothea responds that she could not take pleasure in anything that would displease him. Her evident headstrong nature makes Casaubon nervous. Casaubon begs her to drop the subject. They work for a short while until Casaubon collapses with some kind of fit. They send for Sir James, who suggests that they have Lydgate examine Casaubon. Sir James regrets anew that Dorothea married herself to such an elderly man. Lydgate advises Casaubon to be satisfied with moderate work and frequent relaxation. In private, Dorothea begs him to tell her if she is to blame for Casaubon's heart attack. He tells her that she is not guilty. He states that Casaubon could live another fifteen years only if he is careful to follow Lydgate's advice. Dorothea reads Ladislaw's letters. He writes that he plans to return to England. He wants to deliver Naumann's painting of Casaubon in person. She requests that Mr. Brooke write Will and tell him not to come to Lowick because Casaubon is ill. Brooke invites Will to come and stay at Tipton Grange without telling Dorothea. Selina Plymdale, Ned Plymdale's mother, tells Mrs. Bulstrode that she believes Rosamond and Lydgate are secretly engaged. She is annoyed that Rosamond rejected Ned in favor of a newcomer in Middlemarch. Mrs. Bulstrode visits Rosamond to ask her about her secret engagement. Rosamond informs her that she has not become secretly engaged to Lydgate. Mrs. Bulstrode warns Rosamond that Lydgate is not wealthy and that the medical profession is not likely to make him wealthy. Rosamond tells her that she is sure Lydgate has good connections, so he must not be poor. Mrs. Bulstrode questions her husband and learns that Lydgate has said nothing indicating plans to marry soon. Mrs. Bulstrode hints to Lydgate that Rosamond has gotten the wrong idea. Lydgate resolves to stay away from the Vincy household. Rosamond becomes very unhappy. However, one day he has to go see Mr. Vincy because Featherstone's health is beginning to fail. Vincy is not home, but Lydgate sees Rosamond, whose obvious heartache touches him. She begins to cry, and he kisses her tears away. He leaves the Vincy household as an engaged man. He asks Mr. Vincy's permission to marry Rosamond. Vincy is so delighted that Featherstone is on the brink of death--he hopes Fred will inherit his estate--that he gives his blessings. The news of Featherstone's imminent demise brings all of his relatives to Stone Court. They all watch one another suspiciously and quarrel over who deserves to get Featherstone's money and land. Featherstone refuses to see any of them. One night, Featherstone tells Mary that he has written two wills, and he plans to burn one of them. He asks her to open his iron chest and take out the will inside it. She refuses. He is too weak to do it himself, so he tries to bribe her. Mary says she won't compromise her reputation. Featherstone dies that night clasping his would-be bribe money and the key to his iron chest.