MIDDLEMARCH (Completed)

Chapter 59

They said of old the Soul had human shape,

But smaller, subtler than the fleshly self,

So wandered forth for airing when it pleased.

And see! beside her cherub-face there floats

A pale-lipped form aerial whispering

Its promptings in that little shell her ear."

News is often dispersed as thoughtlessly and effectively as that

pollen which the bees carry off (having no idea how powdery they are)

when they are buzzing in search of their particular nectar.

This fine comparison has reference to Fred Vincy, who on that evening

at Lowick Parsonage heard a lively discussion among the ladies on

the news which their old servant had got from Tantripp concerning

Mr. Casaubon's strange mention of Mr. Ladislaw in a codicil to his will

made not long before his death. Miss Winifred was astounded to find

that her brother had known the fact before, and observed that Camden

was the most wonderful man for knowing things and not telling them;

whereupon Mary Garth said that the codicil had perhaps got mixed

up with the habits of spiders, which Miss Winifred never would

listen to. Mrs. Farebrother considered that the news had something

to do with their having only once seen Mr. Ladislaw at Lowick,

and Miss Noble made many small compassionate mewings.

Fred knew little and cared less about Ladislaw and the Casaubons,

and his mind never recurred to that discussion till one day calling

on Rosamond at his mother's request to deliver a message as he passed,

he happened to see Ladislaw going away. Fred and Rosamond had little

to say to each other now that marriage had removed her from collision

with the unpleasantness of brothers, and especially now that he had

taken what she held the stupid and even reprehensible step of giving

up the Church to take to such a business as Mr. Garth's. Hence

Fred talked by preference of what he considered indifferent news,

and "a propos of that young Ladislaw" mentioned what he had

heard at Lowick Parsonage.

Now Lydgate, like Mr. Farebrother, knew a great deal more than

he told, and when he had once been set thinking about the relation

between Will and Dorothea his conjectures had gone beyond the fact.

He imagined that there was a passionate attachment on both sides,

and this struck him as much too serious to gossip about.

He remembered Will's irritability when he had mentioned Mrs. Casaubon,

and was the more circumspect. On the whole his surmises, in addition

to what he knew of the fact, increased his friendliness and tolerance