Chapter: "Thrice happy she that is so well assured
     Unto herself and settled so in heart
     That neither will for better be allured
     Ne fears to worse with any chance to start,
     But like a steddy ship doth strongly part
     The raging waves and keeps her course aright;
     Ne aught for tempest doth from it depart,
     Ne aught for fairer weather's false delight.
     Such self-assurance need not fear the spight
     Of grudging foes; ne favour seek of friends;
     But in the stay of her own stedfast might
     Neither to one herself nor other bends.
        Most happy she that most assured doth rest,
        But he most happy who such one loves best."
                                               --SPENSER.


The doubt hinted by Mr. Vincy whether it were only the general election
or the end of the world that was coming on, now that George the Fourth
was dead, Parliament dissolved, Wellington and Peel generally
depreciated and the new King apologetic, was a feeble type of the
uncertainties in provincial opinion at that time.  With the glow-worm
lights of country places, how could men see which were their own
thoughts in the confusion of a Tory Ministry passing Liberal measures,
of Tory nobles and electors being anxious to return Liberals rather
than friends of the recreant Ministers, and of outcries for remedies
which seemed to have a mysteriously remote bearing on private interest,
and were made suspicious by the advocacy of disagreeable neighbors?
Buyers of the Middlemarch newspapers found themselves in an anomalous
position: during the agitation on the Catholic Question many had given
up the "Pioneer"--which had a motto from Charles James Fox and was in
the van of progress--because it had taken Peel's side about the
Papists, and had thus blotted its Liberalism with a toleration of
Jesuitry and Baal; but they were ill-satisfied with the "Trumpet,"
which--since its blasts against Rome, and in the general flaccidity of
the public mind (nobody knowing who would support whom)--had become
feeble in its blowing.

It was a time, according to a noticeable article in the "Pioneer," when
the crying needs of the country might well counteract a reluctance to
public action on the part of men whose minds had from long experience
acquired breadth as well as concentration, decision of judgment as well
as tolerance, dispassionateness as well as energy--in fact, all those
qualities which in the melancholy experience of mankind have been the
least disposed to share lodgings.

Mr. Hackbutt, whose fluent speech was at that time floating more widely
than usual, and leaving much uncertainty as to its ultimate channel,
was heard to say in Mr. Hawley's office that the article in question
"emanated" from Brooke of Tipton, and that Brooke had secretly bought
the "Pioneer" some months ago.

"That means mischief, eh?" said Mr. Hawley.  "He's got the freak of
being a popular man now, after dangling about like a stray tortoise.
So much the worse for him.  I've had my eye on him for some time.  He
shall be prettily pumped upon.  He's a damned bad landlord.  What
business has an old county man to come currying favor with a low set of
dark-blue freemen?  As to his paper, I only hope he may do the writing
himself.  It would be worth our paying for."

"I understand he has got a very brilliant young fellow to edit it, who
can write the highest style of leading article, quite equal to anything
in the London papers.  And he means to take very high ground on Reform."

"Let Brooke reform his rent-roll. He's a cursed old screw, and the
buildings all over his estate are going to rack.  I suppose this young
fellow is some loose fish from London."

"His name is Ladislaw.  He is said to be of foreign extraction."

"I know the sort," said Mr. Hawley; "some emissary.  He'll begin with
flourishing about the Rights of Man and end with murdering a wench.
That's the style."

"You must concede that there are abuses, Hawley," said Mr. Hackbutt,
foreseeing some political disagreement with his family lawyer.  "I
myself should never favor immoderate views--in fact I take my stand
with Huskisson--but I cannot blind myself to the consideration that the
non-representation of large towns--"

"Large towns be damned!" said Mr. Hawley, impatient of exposition.  "I
know a little too much about Middlemarch elections.  Let 'em quash
every pocket borough to-morrow, and bring in every mushroom town in the
kingdom--they'll only increase the expense of getting into Parliament.
I go upon facts."

Mr. Hawley's disgust at the notion of the "Pioneer" being edited by an
emissary, and of Brooke becoming actively political--as if a tortoise
of desultory pursuits should protrude its small head ambitiously and
become rampant--was hardly equal to the annoyance felt by some members
of Mr. Brooke's own family.  The result had oozed forth gradually, like
the discovery that your neighbor has set up an unpleasant kind of
manufacture which will be permanently under your nostrils without legal
remedy.  The "Pioneer" had been secretly bought even before Will
Ladislaw's arrival, the expected opportunity having offered itself in
the readiness of the proprietor to part with a valuable property which
did not pay; and in the interval since Mr. Brooke had written his
invitation, those germinal ideas of making his mind tell upon the world
at large which had been present in him from his younger years, but had
hitherto lain in some obstruction, had been sprouting under cover.

The development was much furthered by a delight in his guest which
proved greater even than he had anticipated.  For it seemed that Will
was not only at home in all those artistic and literary subjects which
Mr. Brooke had gone into at one time, but that he was strikingly ready
at seizing the points of the political situation, and dealing with them
in that large spirit which, aided by adequate memory, lends itself to
quotation and general effectiveness of treatment.

"He seems to me a kind of Shelley, you know," Mr. Brooke took an
opportunity of saying, for the gratification of Mr. Casaubon.  "I don't
mean as to anything objectionable--laxities or atheism, or anything of
that kind, you know--Ladislaw's sentiments in every way I am sure are
good--indeed, we were talking a great deal together last night.  But he
has the same sort of enthusiasm for liberty, freedom, emancipation--a
fine thing under guidance--under guidance, you know.  I think I shall
be able to put him on the right tack; and I am the more pleased because
he is a relation of yours, Casaubon."

If the right tack implied anything more precise than the rest of Mr.
Brooke's speech, Mr. Casaubon silently hoped that it referred to some
occupation at a great distance from Lowick.  He had disliked Will while
he helped him, but he had begun to dislike him still more now that Will
had declined his help.  That is the way with us when we have any uneasy
jealousy in our disposition: if our talents are chiefly of the
burrowing kind, our honey-sipping cousin (whom we have grave reasons
for objecting to) is likely to have a secret contempt for us, and any
one who admires him passes an oblique criticism on ourselves.  Having
the scruples of rectitude in our souls, we are above the meanness of
injuring him--rather we meet all his claims on us by active benefits;
and the drawing of cheques for him, being a superiority which he must
recognize, gives our bitterness a milder infusion.  Now Mr. Casaubon
had been deprived of that superiority (as anything more than a
remembrance) in a sudden, capricious manner.  His antipathy to Will did
not spring from the common jealousy of a winter-worn husband: it was
something deeper, bred by his lifelong claims and discontents; but
Dorothea, now that she was present--Dorothea, as a young wife who
herself had shown an offensive capability of criticism, necessarily
gave concentration to the uneasiness which had before been vague.

Will Ladislaw on his side felt that his dislike was flourishing at the
expense of his gratitude, and spent much inward discourse in justifying
the dislike.  Casaubon hated him--he knew that very well; on his first
entrance he could discern a bitterness in the mouth and a venom in the
glance which would almost justify declaring war in spite of past
benefits.  He was much obliged to Casaubon in the past, but really the
act of marrying this wife was a set-off against the obligation.  It was
a question whether gratitude which refers to what is done for one's
self ought not to give way to indignation at what is done against
another.  And Casaubon had done a wrong to Dorothea in marrying her.  A
man was bound to know himself better than that, and if he chose to grow
gray crunching bones in a cavern, he had no business to be luring a
girl into his companionship.  "It is the most horrible of
virgin-sacrifices," said Will; and he painted to himself what were
Dorothea's inward sorrows as if he had been writing a choric wail.  But
he would never lose sight of her: he would watch over her--if he gave
up everything else in life he would watch over her, and she should know
that she had one slave in the world, Will had--to use Sir Thomas
Browne's phrase--a "passionate prodigality" of statement both to
himself and others.  The simple truth was that nothing then invited him
so strongly as the presence of Dorothea.

Invitations of the formal kind had been wanting, however, for Will had
never been asked to go to Lowick.  Mr. Brooke, indeed, confident of
doing everything agreeable which Casaubon, poor fellow, was too much
absorbed to think of, had arranged to bring Ladislaw to Lowick several
times (not neglecting meanwhile to introduce him elsewhere on every
opportunity as "a young relative of Casaubon's"). And though Will had
not seen Dorothea alone, their interviews had been enough to restore
her former sense of young companionship with one who was cleverer than
herself, yet seemed ready to be swayed by her.  Poor Dorothea before
her marriage had never found much room in other minds for what she
cared most to say; and she had not, as we know, enjoyed her husband's
superior instruction so much as she had expected.  If she spoke with
any keenness of interest to Mr. Casaubon, he heard her with an air of
patience as if she had given a quotation from the Delectus familiar to
him from his tender years, and sometimes mentioned curtly what ancient
sects or personages had held similar ideas, as if there were too much
of that sort in stock already; at other times he would inform her that
she was mistaken, and reassert what her remark had questioned.

But Will Ladislaw always seemed to see more in what she said than she
herself saw.  Dorothea had little vanity, but she had the ardent
woman's need to rule beneficently by making the joy of another soul.
Hence the mere chance of seeing Will occasionally was like a lunette
opened in the wall of her prison, giving her a glimpse of the sunny
air; and this pleasure began to nullify her original alarm at what her
husband might think about the introduction of Will as her uncle's
guest.  On this subject Mr. Casaubon had remained dumb.

But Will wanted to talk with Dorothea alone, and was impatient of slow
circumstance.  However slight the terrestrial intercourse between Dante
and Beatrice or Petrarch and Laura, time changes the proportion of
things, and in later days it is preferable to have fewer sonnets and
more conversation.  Necessity excused stratagem, but stratagem was
limited by the dread of offending Dorothea.  He found out at last that
he wanted to take a particular sketch at Lowick; and one morning when
Mr. Brooke had to drive along the Lowick road on his way to the county
town, Will asked to be set down with his sketch-book and camp-stool at
Lowick, and without announcing himself at the Manor settled himself to
sketch in a position where he must see Dorothea if she came out to
walk--and he knew that she usually walked an hour in the morning.

But the stratagem was defeated by the weather.  Clouds gathered with
treacherous quickness, the rain came down, and Will was obliged to take
shelter in the house.  He intended, on the strength of relationship, to
go into the drawing-room and wait there without being announced; and
seeing his old acquaintance the butler in the hall, he said, "Don't
mention that I am here, Pratt; I will wait till luncheon; I know Mr.
Casaubon does not like to be disturbed when he is in the library."

"Master is out, sir; there's only Mrs. Casaubon in the library.  I'd
better tell her you're here, sir," said Pratt, a red-cheeked man given
to lively converse with Tantripp, and often agreeing with her that it
must be dull for Madam.

"Oh, very well; this confounded rain has hindered me from sketching,"
said Will, feeling so happy that he affected indifference with
delightful ease.

In another minute he was in the library, and Dorothea was meeting him
with her sweet unconstrained smile.

"Mr. Casaubon has gone to the Archdeacon's," she said, at once.  "I
don't know whether he will be at home again long before dinner.  He was
uncertain how long he should be.  Did you want to say anything
particular to him?"

"No; I came to sketch, but the rain drove me in.  Else I would not have
disturbed you yet.  I supposed that Mr. Casaubon was here, and I know
he dislikes interruption at this hour."

"I am indebted to the rain, then.  I am so glad to see you." Dorothea
uttered these common words with the simple sincerity of an unhappy
child, visited at school.

"I really came for the chance of seeing you alone," said Will,
mysteriously forced to be just as simple as she was.  He could not stay
to ask himself, why not?  "I wanted to talk about things, as we did in
Rome.  It always makes a difference when other people are present."

"Yes," said Dorothea, in her clear full tone of assent.  "Sit down."
She seated herself on a dark ottoman with the brown books behind her,
looking in her plain dress of some thin woollen-white material, without
a single ornament on her besides her wedding-ring, as if she were under
a vow to be different from all other women; and Will sat down opposite
her at two yards' distance, the light falling on his bright curls and
delicate but rather petulant profile, with its defiant curves of lip
and chin.  Each looked at the other as if they had been two flowers
which had opened then and there.  Dorothea for the moment forgot her
husband's mysterious irritation against Will: it seemed fresh water at
her thirsty lips to speak without fear to the one person whom she had
found receptive; for in looking backward through sadness she
exaggerated a past solace.

"I have often thought that I should like to talk to you again," she
said, immediately.  "It seems strange to me how many things I said to
you."

"I remember them all," said Will, with the unspeakable content in his
soul of feeling that he was in the presence of a creature worthy to be
perfectly loved.  I think his own feelings at that moment were perfect,
for we mortals have our divine moments, when love is satisfied in the
completeness of the beloved object.

"I have tried to learn a great deal since we were in Rome," said
Dorothea.  "I can read Latin a little, and I am beginning to understand
just a little Greek.  I can help Mr. Casaubon better now.  I can find
out references for him and save his eyes in many ways.  But it is very
difficult to be learned; it seems as if people were worn out on the way
to great thoughts, and can never enjoy them because they are too tired."

"If a man has a capacity for great thoughts, he is likely to overtake
them before he is decrepit," said Will, with irrepressible quickness.
But through certain sensibilities Dorothea was as quick as he, and
seeing her face change, he added, immediately, "But it is quite true
that the best minds have been sometimes overstrained in working out
their ideas."

"You correct me," said Dorothea.  "I expressed myself ill.  I should
have said that those who have great thoughts get too much worn in
working them out.  I used to feel about that, even when I was a little
girl; and it always seemed to me that the use I should like to make of
my life would be to help some one who did great works, so that his
burthen might be lighter."

Dorothea was led on to this bit of autobiography without any sense of
making a revelation.  But she had never before said anything to Will
which threw so strong a light on her marriage.  He did not shrug his
shoulders; and for want of that muscular outlet he thought the more
irritably of beautiful lips kissing holy skulls and other emptinesses
ecclesiastically enshrined.  Also he had to take care that his speech
should not betray that thought.

"But you may easily carry the help too far," he said, "and get
over-wrought yourself.  Are you not too much shut up?  You already look
paler.  It would be better for Mr. Casaubon to have a secretary; he
could easily get a man who would do half his work for him.  It would
save him more effectually, and you need only help him in lighter ways."

"How can you think of that?" said Dorothea, in a tone of earnest
remonstrance.  "I should have no happiness if I did not help him in his
work.  What could I do?  There is no good to be done in Lowick.  The
only thing I desire is to help him more.  And he objects to a
secretary: please not to mention that again."

"Certainly not, now I know your feeling.  But I have heard both Mr.
Brooke and Sir James Chettam express the same wish."

"Yes?" said Dorothea, "but they don't understand--they want me to be a
great deal on horseback, and have the garden altered and new
conservatories, to fill up my days.  I thought you could understand
that one's mind has other wants," she added, rather
impatiently--"besides, Mr. Casaubon cannot bear to hear of a secretary."

"My mistake is excusable," said Will.  "In old days I used to hear Mr.
Casaubon speak as if he looked forward to having a secretary.  Indeed
he held out the prospect of that office to me.  But I turned out to
be--not good enough for it."

Dorothea was trying to extract out of this an excuse for her husband's
evident repulsion, as she said, with a playful smile, "You were not a
steady worker enough."

"No," said Will, shaking his head backward somewhat after the manner of
a spirited horse.  And then, the old irritable demon prompting him to
give another good pinch at the moth-wings of poor Mr. Casaubon's glory,
he went on, "And I have seen since that Mr. Casaubon does not like any
one to overlook his work and know thoroughly what he is doing.  He is
too doubtful--too uncertain of himself.  I may not be good for much,
but he dislikes me because I disagree with him."

Will was not without his intentions to be always generous, but our
tongues are little triggers which have usually been pulled before
general intentions can be brought to bear.  And it was too intolerable
that Casaubon's dislike of him should not be fairly accounted for to
Dorothea.  Yet when he had spoken he was rather uneasy as to the effect
on her.

But Dorothea was strangely quiet--not immediately indignant, as she had
been on a like occasion in Rome.  And the cause lay deep.  She was no
longer struggling against the perception of facts, but adjusting
herself to their clearest perception; and now when she looked steadily
at her husband's failure, still more at his possible consciousness of
failure, she seemed to be looking along the one track where duty became
tenderness.  Will's want of reticence might have been met with more
severity, if he had not already been recommended to her mercy by her
husband's dislike, which must seem hard to her till she saw better
reason for it.

She did not answer at once, but after looking down ruminatingly she
said, with some earnestness, "Mr. Casaubon must have overcome his
dislike of you so far as his actions were concerned: and that is
admirable."

"Yes; he has shown a sense of justice in family matters.  It was an
abominable thing that my grandmother should have been disinherited
because she made what they called a mesalliance, though there was
nothing to be said against her husband except that he was a Polish
refugee who gave lessons for his bread."

"I wish I knew all about her!" said Dorothea.  "I wonder how she bore
the change from wealth to poverty: I wonder whether she was happy with
her husband!  Do you know much about them?"

"No; only that my grandfather was a patriot--a bright fellow--could
speak many languages--musical--got his bread by teaching all sorts of
things.  They both died rather early.  And I never knew much of my
father, beyond what my mother told me; but he inherited the musical
talents.  I remember his slow walk and his long thin hands; and one day
remains with me when he was lying ill, and I was very hungry, and had
only a little bit of bread."

"Ah, what a different life from mine!" said Dorothea, with keen
interest, clasping her hands on her lap.  "I have always had too much
of everything.  But tell me how it was--Mr. Casaubon could not have
known about you then."

"No; but my father had made himself known to Mr. Casaubon, and that was
my last hungry day.  My father died soon after, and my mother and I
were well taken care of.  Mr. Casaubon always expressly recognized it
as his duty to take care of us because of the harsh injustice which had
been shown to his mother's sister.  But now I am telling you what is
not new to you."

In his inmost soul Will was conscious of wishing to tell Dorothea what
was rather new even in his own construction of things--namely, that
Mr. Casaubon had never done more than pay a debt towards him.  Will was
much too good a fellow to be easy under the sense of being ungrateful.
And when gratitude has become a matter of reasoning there are many ways
of escaping from its bonds.

"No," answered Dorothea; "Mr. Casaubon has always avoided dwelling on
his own honorable actions."  She did not feel that her husband's
conduct was depreciated; but this notion of what justice had required
in his relations with Will Ladislaw took strong hold on her mind.
After a moment's pause, she added, "He had never told me that he
supported your mother.  Is she still living?"

"No; she died by an accident--a fall--four years ago.  It is curious
that my mother, too, ran away from her family, but not for the sake of
her husband.  She never would tell me anything about her family, except
that she forsook them to get her own living--went on the stage, in
fact.  She was a dark-eyed creature, with crisp ringlets, and never
seemed to be getting old.  You see I come of rebellious blood on both
sides," Will ended, smiling brightly at Dorothea, while she was still
looking with serious intentness before her, like a child seeing a drama
for the first time.

But her face, too, broke into a smile as she said, "That is your
apology, I suppose, for having yourself been rather rebellious; I mean,
to Mr. Casaubon's wishes.  You must remember that you have not done
what he thought best for you.  And if he dislikes you--you were
speaking of dislike a little while ago--but I should rather say, if he
has shown any painful feelings towards you, you must consider how
sensitive he has become from the wearing effect of study.  Perhaps,"
she continued, getting into a pleading tone, "my uncle has not told you
how serious Mr. Casaubon's illness was.  It would be very petty of us
who are well and can bear things, to think much of small offences from
those who carry a weight of trial."

"You teach me better," said Will.  "I will never grumble on that
subject again."  There was a gentleness in his tone which came from the
unutterable contentment of perceiving--what Dorothea was hardly
conscious of--that she was travelling into the remoteness of pure pity
and loyalty towards her husband.  Will was ready to adore her pity and
loyalty, if she would associate himself with her in manifesting them.
"I have really sometimes been a perverse fellow," he went on, "but I
will never again, if I can help it, do or say what you would
disapprove."

"That is very good of you," said Dorothea, with another open smile.  "I
shall have a little kingdom then, where I shall give laws.  But you
will soon go away, out of my rule, I imagine.  You will soon be tired
of staying at the Grange."

"That is a point I wanted to mention to you--one of the reasons why I
wished to speak to you alone.  Mr. Brooke proposes that I should stay
in this neighborhood.  He has bought one of the Middlemarch newspapers,
and he wishes me to conduct that, and also to help him in other ways."

"Would not that be a sacrifice of higher prospects for you?" said
Dorothea.

"Perhaps; but I have always been blamed for thinking of prospects, and
not settling to anything.  And here is something offered to me.  If you
would not like me to accept it, I will give it up.  Otherwise I would
rather stay in this part of the country than go away.  I belong to
nobody anywhere else."

"I should like you to stay very much," said Dorothea, at once, as
simply and readily as she had spoken at Rome.  There was not the shadow
of a reason in her mind at the moment why she should not say so.

"Then I _will_ stay," said Ladislaw, shaking his head backward, rising
and going towards the window, as if to see whether the rain had ceased.

But the next moment, Dorothea, according to a habit which was getting
continually stronger, began to reflect that her husband felt
differently from herself, and she colored deeply under the double
embarrassment of having expressed what might be in opposition to her
husband's feeling, and of having to suggest this opposition to Will.
His face was not turned towards her, and this made it easier to say--

"But my opinion is of little consequence on such a subject.  I think
you should be guided by Mr. Casaubon.  I spoke without thinking of
anything else than my own feeling, which has nothing to do with the
real question.  But it now occurs to me--perhaps Mr. Casaubon might
see that the proposal was not wise.  Can you not wait now and mention
it to him?"

"I can't wait to-day," said Will, inwardly seared by the possibility
that Mr. Casaubon would enter.  "The rain is quite over now.  I told
Mr. Brooke not to call for me: I would rather walk the five miles.  I
shall strike across Halsell Common, and see the gleams on the wet
grass.  I like that."

He approached her to shake hands quite hurriedly, longing but not
daring to say, "Don't mention the subject to Mr. Casaubon." No, he
dared not, could not say it.  To ask her to be less simple and direct
would be like breathing on the crystal that you want to see the light
through.  And there was always the other great dread--of himself
becoming dimmed and forever ray-shorn in her eyes.

"I wish you could have stayed," said Dorothea, with a touch of
mournfulness, as she rose and put out her hand.  She also had her
thought which she did not like to express:--Will certainly ought to
lose no time in consulting Mr. Casaubon's wishes, but for her to urge
this might seem an undue dictation.

So they only said "Good-by," and Will quitted the house, striking
across the fields so as not to run any risk of encountering Mr.
Casaubon's carriage, which, however, did not appear at the gate until
four o'clock. That was an unpropitious hour for coming home: it was too
early to gain the moral support under ennui of dressing his person for
dinner, and too late to undress his mind of the day's frivolous
ceremony and affairs, so as to be prepared for a good plunge into the
serious business of study.  On such occasions he usually threw into an
easy-chair in the library, and allowed Dorothea to read the London
papers to him, closing his eyes the while.  To-day, however, he
declined that relief, observing that he had already had too many public
details urged upon him; but he spoke more cheerfully than usual, when
Dorothea asked about his fatigue, and added with that air of formal
effort which never forsook him even when he spoke without his waistcoat
and cravat--

"I have had the gratification of meeting my former acquaintance, Dr.
Spanning, to-day, and of being praised by one who is himself a worthy
recipient of praise.  He spoke very handsomely of my late tractate on
the Egyptian Mysteries,--using, in fact, terms which it would not
become me to repeat."  In uttering the last clause, Mr. Casaubon leaned
over the elbow of his chair, and swayed his head up and down,
apparently as a muscular outlet instead of that recapitulation which
would not have been becoming.

"I am very glad you have had that pleasure," said Dorothea, delighted
to see her husband less weary than usual at this hour.  "Before you
came I had been regretting that you happened to be out to-day."

"Why so, my dear?" said Mr. Casaubon, throwing himself backward again.

"Because Mr. Ladislaw has been here; and he has mentioned a proposal of
my uncle's which I should like to know your opinion of." Her husband
she felt was really concerned in this question.  Even with her
ignorance of the world she had a vague impression that the position
offered to Will was out of keeping with his family connections, and
certainly Mr. Casaubon had a claim to be consulted.  He did not speak,
but merely bowed.

"Dear uncle, you know, has many projects.  It appears that he has
bought one of the Middlemarch newspapers, and he has asked Mr. Ladislaw
to stay in this neighborhood and conduct the paper for him, besides
helping him in other ways."

Dorothea looked at her husband while she spoke, but he had at first
blinked and finally closed his eyes, as if to save them; while his lips
became more tense.  "What is your opinion?" she added, rather timidly,
after a slight pause.

"Did Mr. Ladislaw come on purpose to ask my opinion?" said Mr.
Casaubon, opening his eyes narrowly with a knife-edged look at
Dorothea.  She was really uncomfortable on the point he inquired about,
but she only became a little more serious, and her eyes did not swerve.

"No," she answered immediately, "he did not say that he came to ask
your opinion.  But when he mentioned the proposal, he of course
expected me to tell you of it."

Mr. Casaubon was silent.

"I feared that you might feel some objection.  But certainly a young
man with so much talent might be very useful to my uncle--might help
him to do good in a better way.  And Mr. Ladislaw wishes to have some
fixed occupation.  He has been blamed, he says, for not seeking
something of that kind, and he would like to stay in this neighborhood
because no one cares for him elsewhere."

Dorothea felt that this was a consideration to soften her husband.
However, he did not speak, and she presently recurred to Dr. Spanning
and the Archdeacon's breakfast.  But there was no longer sunshine on
these subjects.

The next morning, without Dorothea's knowledge, Mr. Casaubon despatched
the following letter, beginning "Dear Mr. Ladislaw" (he had always
before addressed him as "Will"):--


"Mrs. Casaubon informs me that a proposal has been made to you, and
(according to an inference by no means stretched) has on your part been
in some degree entertained, which involves your residence in this
neighborhood in a capacity which I am justified in saying touches my
own position in such a way as renders it not only natural and
warrantable in me when that effect is viewed under the influence of
legitimate feeling, but incumbent on me when the same effect is
considered in the light of my responsibilities, to state at once that
your acceptance of the proposal above indicated would be highly
offensive to me.  That I have some claim to the exercise of a veto
here, would not, I believe, be denied by any reasonable person
cognizant of the relations between us: relations which, though thrown
into the past by your recent procedure, are not thereby annulled in
their character of determining antecedents.  I will not here make
reflections on any person's judgment.  It is enough for me to point out
to yourself that there are certain social fitnesses and proprieties
which should hinder a somewhat near relative of mine from becoming any
wise conspicuous in this vicinity in a status not only much beneath my
own, but associated at best with the sciolism of literary or political
adventurers.  At any rate, the contrary issue must exclude you from
further reception at my house.

                Yours faithfully,
                        "EDWARD CASAUBON."


Meanwhile Dorothea's mind was innocently at work towards the further
embitterment of her husband; dwelling, with a sympathy that grew to
agitation, on what Will had told her about his parents and
grandparents.  Any private hours in her day were usually spent in her
blue-green boudoir, and she had come to be very fond of its pallid
quaintness.  Nothing had been outwardly altered there; but while the
summer had gradually advanced over the western fields beyond the avenue
of elms, the bare room had gathered within it those memories of an
inward life which fill the air as with a cloud of good or bad angels,
the invisible yet active forms of our spiritual triumphs or our
spiritual falls.  She had been so used to struggle for and to find
resolve in looking along the avenue towards the arch of western light
that the vision itself had gained a communicating power.  Even the pale
stag seemed to have reminding glances and to mean mutely, "Yes, we
know." And the group of delicately touched miniatures had made an
audience as of beings no longer disturbed about their own earthly lot,
but still humanly interested.  Especially the mysterious "Aunt Julia"
about whom Dorothea had never found it easy to question her husband.

And now, since her conversation with Will, many fresh images had
gathered round that Aunt Julia who was Will's grandmother; the presence
of that delicate miniature, so like a living face that she knew,
helping to concentrate her feelings.  What a wrong, to cut off the girl
from the family protection and inheritance only because she had chosen
a man who was poor!  Dorothea, early troubling her elders with
questions about the facts around her, had wrought herself into some
independent clearness as to the historical, political reasons why
eldest sons had superior rights, and why land should be entailed: those
reasons, impressing her with a certain awe, might be weightier than she
knew, but here was a question of ties which left them uninfringed.
Here was a daughter whose child--even according to the ordinary aping
of aristocratic institutions by people who are no more aristocratic
than retired grocers, and who have no more land to "keep together" than
a lawn and a paddock--would have a prior claim.  Was inheritance a
question of liking or of responsibility?  All the energy of Dorothea's
nature went on the side of responsibility--the fulfilment of claims
founded on our own deeds, such as marriage and parentage.

It was true, she said to herself, that Mr. Casaubon had a debt to the
Ladislaws--that he had to pay back what the Ladislaws had been wronged
of.  And now she began to think of her husband's will, which had been
made at the time of their marriage, leaving the bulk of his property to
her, with proviso in case of her having children.  That ought to be
altered; and no time ought to be lost.  This very question which had
just arisen about Will Ladislaw's occupation, was the occasion for
placing things on a new, right footing.  Her husband, she felt sure,
according to all his previous conduct, would be ready to take the just
view, if she proposed it--she, in whose interest an unfair
concentration of the property had been urged.  His sense of right had
surmounted and would continue to surmount anything that might be called
antipathy.  She suspected that her uncle's scheme was disapproved by
Mr. Casaubon, and this made it seem all the more opportune that a fresh
understanding should be begun, so that instead of Will's starting
penniless and accepting the first function that offered itself, he
should find himself in possession of a rightful income which should be
paid by her husband during his life, and, by an immediate alteration of
the will, should be secured at his death.  The vision of all this as
what ought to be done seemed to Dorothea like a sudden letting in of
daylight, waking her from her previous stupidity and incurious
self-absorbed ignorance about her husband's relation to others.  Will
Ladislaw had refused Mr. Casaubon's future aid on a ground that no
longer appeared right to her; and Mr. Casaubon had never himself seen
fully what was the claim upon him.  "But he will!" said Dorothea.  "The
great strength of his character lies here.  And what are we doing with
our money?  We make no use of half of our income.  My own money buys me
nothing but an uneasy conscience."

There was a peculiar fascination for Dorothea in this division of
property intended for herself, and always regarded by her as excessive.
She was blind, you see, to many things obvious to others--likely to
tread in the wrong places, as Celia had warned her; yet her blindness
to whatever did not lie in her own pure purpose carried her safely by
the side of precipices where vision would have been perilous with fear.

The thoughts which had gathered vividness in the solitude of her
boudoir occupied her incessantly through the day on which Mr. Casaubon
had sent his letter to Will.  Everything seemed hindrance to her till
she could find an opportunity of opening her heart to her husband.  To
his preoccupied mind all subjects were to be approached gently, and she
had never since his illness lost from her consciousness the dread of
agitating him.  But when young ardor is set brooding over the
conception of a prompt deed, the deed itself seems to start forth with
independent life, mastering ideal obstacles.  The day passed in a
sombre fashion, not unusual, though Mr. Casaubon was perhaps unusually
silent; but there were hours of the night which might be counted on as
opportunities of conversation; for Dorothea, when aware of her
husband's sleeplessness, had established a habit of rising, lighting a
candle, and reading him to sleep again.  And this night she was from
the beginning sleepless, excited by resolves.  He slept as usual for a
few hours, but she had risen softly and had sat in the darkness for
nearly an hour before he said--

"Dorothea, since you are up, will you light a candle?"

"Do you feel ill, dear?" was her first question, as she obeyed him.

"No, not at all; but I shall be obliged, since you are up, if you will
read me a few pages of Lowth."

"May I talk to you a little instead?" said Dorothea.

"Certainly."

"I have been thinking about money all day--that I have always had too
much, and especially the prospect of too much."

"These, my dear Dorothea, are providential arrangements."

"But if one has too much in consequence of others being wronged, it
seems to me that the divine voice which tells us to set that wrong
right must be obeyed."

"What, my love, is the bearing of your remark?"

"That you have been too liberal in arrangements for me--I mean, with
regard to property; and that makes me unhappy."

"How so?  I have none but comparatively distant connections."

"I have been led to think about your aunt Julia, and how she was left
in poverty only because she married a poor man, an act which was not
disgraceful, since he was not unworthy.  It was on that ground, I know,
that you educated Mr. Ladislaw and provided for his mother."

Dorothea waited a few moments for some answer that would help her
onward.  None came, and her next words seemed the more forcible to her,
falling clear upon the dark silence.

"But surely we should regard his claim as a much greater one, even to
the half of that property which I know that you have destined for me.
And I think he ought at once to be provided for on that understanding.
It is not right that he should be in the dependence of poverty while we
are rich.  And if there is any objection to the proposal he mentioned,
the giving him his true place and his true share would set aside any
motive for his accepting it."

"Mr. Ladislaw has probably been speaking to you on this subject?" said
Mr. Casaubon, with a certain biting quickness not habitual to him.

"Indeed, no!" said Dorothea, earnestly.  "How can you imagine it, since
he has so lately declined everything from you?  I fear you think too
hardly of him, dear.  He only told me a little about his parents and
grandparents, and almost all in answer to my questions.  You are so
good, so just--you have done everything you thought to be right.  But
it seems to me clear that more than that is right; and I must speak
about it, since I am the person who would get what is called benefit by
that 'more' not being done."

There was a perceptible pause before Mr. Casaubon replied, not quickly
as before, but with a still more biting emphasis.

"Dorothea, my love, this is not the first occasion, but it were well
that it should be the last, on which you have assumed a judgment on
subjects beyond your scope.  Into the question how far conduct,
especially in the matter of alliances, constitutes a forfeiture of
family claims, I do not now enter.  Suffice it, that you are not here
qualified to discriminate.  What I now wish you to understand is, that
I accept no revision, still less dictation within that range of affairs
which I have deliberated upon as distinctly and properly mine.  It is
not for you to interfere between me and Mr. Ladislaw, and still less to
encourage communications from him to you which constitute a criticism
on my procedure."

Poor Dorothea, shrouded in the darkness, was in a tumult of conflicting
emotions.  Alarm at the possible effect on himself of her husband's
strongly manifested anger, would have checked any expression of her own
resentment, even if she had been quite free from doubt and compunction
under the consciousness that there might be some justice in his last
insinuation.  Hearing him breathe quickly after he had spoken, she sat
listening, frightened, wretched--with a dumb inward cry for help to
bear this nightmare of a life in which every energy was arrested by
dread.  But nothing else happened, except that they both remained a
long while sleepless, without speaking again.

The next day, Mr. Casaubon received the following answer from Will
Ladislaw:--


"DEAR MR. CASAUBON,--I have given all due consideration to your letter
of yesterday, but I am unable to take precisely your view of our mutual
position.  With the fullest acknowledgment of your generous conduct to
me in the past, I must still maintain that an obligation of this kind
cannot fairly fetter me as you appear to expect that it should.
Granted that a benefactor's wishes may constitute a claim; there must
always be a reservation as to the quality of those wishes.  They may
possibly clash with more imperative considerations.  Or a benefactor's
veto might impose such a negation on a man's life that the consequent
blank might be more cruel than the benefaction was generous.  I am
merely using strong illustrations.  In the present case I am unable to
take your view of the bearing which my acceptance of occupation--not
enriching certainly, but not dishonorable--will have on your own
position which seems to me too substantial to be affected in that
shadowy manner.  And though I do not believe that any change in our
relations will occur (certainly none has yet occurred) which can
nullify the obligations imposed on me by the past, pardon me for not
seeing that those obligations should restrain me from using the
ordinary freedom of living where I choose, and maintaining myself by
any lawful occupation I may choose.  Regretting that there exists this
difference between us as to a relation in which the conferring of
benefits has been entirely on your side--

                I remain, yours with persistent obligation,
                        WILL LADISLAW."


Poor Mr. Casaubon felt (and must not we, being impartial, feel with him
a little?) that no man had juster cause for disgust and suspicion than
he.  Young Ladislaw, he was sure, meant to defy and annoy him, meant to
win Dorothea's confidence and sow her mind with disrespect, and perhaps
aversion, towards her husband.  Some motive beneath the surface had
been needed to account for Will's sudden change of course in rejecting Mr.
Casaubon's aid and quitting his travels; and this defiant determination
to fix himself in the neighborhood by taking up something so much at
variance with his former choice as Mr. Brooke's Middlemarch projects,
revealed clearly enough that the undeclared motive had relation to
Dorothea.  Not for one moment did Mr. Casaubon suspect Dorothea of any
doubleness: he had no suspicions of her, but he had (what was little
less uncomfortable) the positive knowledge that her tendency to form
opinions about her husband's conduct was accompanied with a disposition
to regard Will Ladislaw favorably and be influenced by what he said.
His own proud reticence had prevented him from ever being undeceived in
the supposition that Dorothea had originally asked her uncle to invite
Will to his house.

And now, on receiving Will's letter, Mr. Casaubon had to consider his
duty.  He would never have been easy to call his action anything else
than duty; but in this case, contending motives thrust him back into
negations.

Should he apply directly to Mr. Brooke, and demand of that troublesome
gentleman to revoke his proposal?  Or should he consult Sir James
Chettam, and get him to concur in remonstrance against a step which
touched the whole family?  In either case Mr. Casaubon was aware that
failure was just as probable as success.  It was impossible for him to
mention Dorothea's name in the matter, and without some alarming
urgency Mr. Brooke was as likely as not, after meeting all
representations with apparent assent, to wind up by saying, "Never
fear, Casaubon!  Depend upon it, young Ladislaw will do you credit.
Depend upon it, I have put my finger on the right thing."  And Mr.
Casaubon shrank nervously from communicating on the subject with Sir
James Chettam, between whom and himself there had never been any
cordiality, and who would immediately think of Dorothea without any
mention of her.

Poor Mr. Casaubon was distrustful of everybody's feeling towards him,
especially as a husband.  To let any one suppose that he was jealous
would be to admit their (suspected) view of his disadvantages: to let
them know that he did not find marriage particularly blissful would
imply his conversion to their (probably) earlier disapproval.  It would
be as bad as letting Carp, and Brasenose generally, know how backward
he was in organizing the matter for his "Key to all Mythologies."  All
through his life Mr. Casaubon had been trying not to admit even to
himself the inward sores of self-doubt and jealousy.  And on the most
delicate of all personal subjects, the habit of proud suspicious
reticence told doubly.

Thus Mr. Casaubon remained proudly, bitterly silent.  But he had
forbidden Will to come to Lowick Manor, and he was mentally preparing
other measures of frustration.

 The chapter opens with historical and political context: the old King has died and so Parliament's session has ended. This tells us the exact date: it's the summer of 1830. Historical Context Time: George Eliot assumes her readers in the 1870s would remember this, so the context she gives is short on detail. We're going to give you the low-down on the political situation in England at the time, because, unless you specialize in the history of British politics, a lot of it might be unfamiliar. King George IV was pretty unpopular during his life because he spent money like crazy and was a little too excited about his ceremonial rights as a king. In fact, the British system requires the king to divide power with the two houses of Parliament , and old George didn't like sharing power with anyone. So George IV wasn't popular either with the people or with Parliament because of his extravagance, and no one was sorry when he died. His death meant all kinds of changes, politically speaking - a new monarch means that they have to hold new elections. But because change is in the air, everything seems topsy-turvy. No one knows what party is going to be elected. The two parties in England at this point are the Whigs and the Tories . There are also some more radically liberal politicians out there, who think that maybe more people should have the right to vote , but no one really takes the Radicals seriously. And back to the story. The new election has all the residents of Middlemarch pretty excited. Word gets around town that Mr. Brooke has bought a local newspaper, called the Pioneer, which had a reputation as a liberal rag. Rumor also has it that Brooke has hired some new outsider, possibly a foreigner, named Ladislaw, to edit the newspaper. Brooke thinks that Casaubon will be delighted that he's hired his young relative. Casaubon isn't so happy about this. He never liked Will, and likes him even less now that Will is independent. Will knows that Casaubon hates him, and uses that as an excuse to go on disliking Casaubon, despite Casaubon's past generosity to him. Will wants to see Dorothea, but knows that Casaubon might not like it. He goes to sketch at Lowick , hoping that he might run into Dorothea as if by accident in the garden. But it starts raining, so he's forced to take shelter in the house. The butler informs him that Mr. Casaubon is out, but that Mrs. Casaubon is alone in the library. Will, inspired by Dorothea's simplicity, tells her the truth: he's come on purpose to see her alone. He has a crush, but he honestly does just want to talk with her. They'd had such a good understanding at Rome. Dorothea doesn't suspect the crush, though, and is happy to see him again. She's been lonely. They discuss Casaubon's work, as they did in Rome - and again Will feels an irrepressible desire to burst Dorothea's bubble. He wants to deflate her over-inflated sense of Casaubon's intelligence and importance. But Dorothea's already figured out that Casaubon's work isn't as important as she originally thought, and has also figured out that Casaubon is at least partly aware of it himself. And so she feels sorry for him. Will tells her about his own family, acknowledging that Casaubon had been generous to him, but also adding that it was only fair, considering that his grandmother had been unfairly cut out of the family will because of her marriage to a Polish musician. He also tells her that his mother had run away from her family, too, but had never told him why. She had become an actress to escape from her family for some reason, and had later married his father. Will then tells Dorothea about the newspaper that Brooke wants him to edit, and asks her advice: does she think he should stay in the neighborhood to work for Brooke? Dorothea wants him to stay, and says so, but then remembers that Casaubon might not agree. She suggests that Will wait and ask Casaubon himself. Will asks Dorothea to mention it to her husband for him; he can't wait around. When Dorothea does tell Casaubon that Will is planning on staying in the neighborhood to work for a liberal newspaper, Casaubon sends a very stiff, formal letter to Will, telling him that it's not an appropriate profession for him. Dorothea, meanwhile, knows nothing about the letter, and is reflecting on what Will told her about his family. Dorothea thinks that she and Casaubon should give Will a portion of their income, since it really would have been his if his grandmother hadn't been disinherited. Casaubon is naturally irritated when Dorothea suggests this. After all, he put the kid through school, despite the fact that he never liked him, and now Dorothea says that they aren't doing enough? So Casaubon tells Dorothea to mind her own business. And Will sends Casaubon a polite letter telling him to mind his. He's planning on staying in town and working for Mr. Brooke's newspaper, so there. Casaubon doesn't think that Will is trying to seduce Dorothea, but he is suspicious that Will is trying to win her over and make her disrespect her husband. But Casaubon doesn't say anything to anybody - he doesn't want people to know how insecure and jealous he is. He tells Will not to visit Lowick as long as he's working for a newspaper, but that's it.

