Middlemarch
Featherstone’s stupid demand without incurring consequences which he
liked less even than the task of fulfilling it. His father was already
out of humor with him, and would be still more so if he were the
occasion of any additional coolness between his own family and the
Bulstrodes. Then, he himself hated having to go and speak to his uncle
Bulstrode, and perhaps after drinking wine he had said many foolish
things about Featherstone’s property, and these had been magnified by
report. Fred felt that he made a wretched figure as a fellow who
bragged about expectations from a queer old miser like Featherstone,
and went to beg for certificates at his bidding. But—those
expectations! He really had them, and he saw no agreeable alternative
if he gave them up; besides, he had lately made a debt which galled him
extremely, and old Featherstone had almost bargained to pay it off. The
whole affair was miserably small: his debts were small, even his
expectations were not anything so very magnificent. Fred had known men
to whom he would have been ashamed of confessing the smallness of his
scrapes. Such ruminations naturally produced a streak of misanthropic
bitterness. To be born the son of a Middlemarch manufacturer, and
inevitable heir to nothing in particular, while such men as Mainwaring
and Vyan—certainly life was a poor business, when a spirited young
fellow, with a good appetite for the best of everything, had so poor an
outlook.
It had not occurred to Fred that the introduction of Bulstrode’s name
in the matter was a fiction of old Featherstone’s; nor could this have
made any difference to his position. He saw plainly enough that the old
man wanted to exercise his power by tormenting him a little, and also
probably to get some satisfaction out of seeing him on unpleasant terms
with Bulstrode. Fred fancied that he saw to the bottom of his uncle
Featherstone’s soul, though in reality half what he saw there was no
more than the reflex of his own inclinations. The difficult task of
knowing another soul is not for young gentlemen whose consciousness is
chiefly made up of their own wishes.
Fred’s main point of debate with himself was, whether he should tell
his father, or try to get through the affair without his father’s
knowledge. It was probably Mrs. Waule who had been talking about him;
and if Mary Garth had repeated Mrs. Waule’s report to Rosamond, it
would be sure to reach his father, who would as surely question him
about it. He said to Rosamond, as they slackened their pace—
“Rosy, did Mary tell you that Mrs. Waule had said anything about me?”
“Yes, indeed, she did.”
“What?”
“That you were very unsteady.”
“Was that all?”
“I should think that was enough, Fred.”
“You are sure she said no more?”
“Mary mentioned nothing else. But really, Fred, I think you ought to be
ashamed.”
“Oh, fudge! Don’t lecture me. What did Mary say about it?”
“I am not obliged to tell you. You care so very much what Mary says,
and you are too rude to allow me to speak.”
“Of course I care what Mary says. She is the best girl I know.”
“I should never have thought she was a girl to fall in love with.”
“How do you know what men would fall in love with? Girls never know.”
“At least, Fred, let me advise _you_ not to fall in love with her, for
she says she would not marry you if you asked her.”
“She might have waited till I did ask her.”
“I knew it would nettle you, Fred.”
“Not at all. She would not have said so if you had not provoked her.”
Before reaching home, Fred concluded that he would tell the whole
affair as simply as possible to his father, who might perhaps take on
himself the unpleasant business of speaking to Bulstrode.
BOOK II.
OLD AND YOUNG.
CHAPTER XIII.
1_st Gent_. How class your man?—as better than the most,
Or, seeming better, worse beneath that cloak?
As saint or knave, pilgrim or hypocrite?
2_d Gent_. Nay, tell me how you class your wealth of books
The drifted relics of all time.
As well sort them at once by size and livery:
Vellum, tall copies, and the common calf
Will hardly cover more diversity
Than all your labels cunningly devised
To class your unread authors.
In consequence of what he had heard from Fred, Mr. Vincy determined to
speak with Mr. Bulstrode in his private room at the Bank at half-past
one, when he was usually free from other callers. But a visitor had
come in at one o’clock, and Mr. Bulstrode had so much to say to him,
that there was little chance of the interview being over in half an
hour. The banker’s speech was fluent, but it was also copious, and he
used up an appreciable amount of time in brief meditative pauses. Do
not imagine his sickly aspect to have been of the yellow, black-haired
sort: he had a pale blond skin, thin gray-besprinkled brown hair,
light-gray eyes, and a large forehead. Loud men called his subdued tone
an undertone, and sometimes implied that it was inconsistent with
openness; though there seems to be no reason why a loud man should not
be given to concealment of anything except his own voice, unless it can
be shown that Holy Writ has placed the seat of candor in the lungs. Mr.
Bulstrode had also a deferential bending attitude in listening, and an
apparently fixed attentiveness in his eyes which made those persons who
thought themselves worth hearing infer that he was seeking the utmost
improvement from their discourse. Others, who expected to make no great
figure, disliked this kind of moral lantern turned on them. If you are
not proud of your cellar, there is no thrill of satisfaction in seeing
your guest hold up his wine-glass to the light and look judicial. Such
joys are reserved for conscious merit. Hence Mr. Bulstrode’s close
attention was not agreeable to the publicans and sinners in
Middlemarch; it was attributed by some to his being a Pharisee, and by
others to his being Evangelical. Less superficial reasoners among them
wished to know who his father and grandfather were, observing that
five-and-twenty years ago nobody had ever heard of a Bulstrode in
Middlemarch. To his present visitor, Lydgate, the scrutinizing look was
a matter of indifference: he simply formed an unfavorable opinion of
the banker’s constitution, and concluded that he had an eager inward
life with little enjoyment of tangible things.
“I shall be exceedingly obliged if you will look in on me here
occasionally, Mr. Lydgate,” the banker observed, after a brief pause.
“If, as I dare to hope, I have the privilege of finding you a valuable
coadjutor in the interesting matter of hospital management, there will
be many questions which we shall need to discuss in private. As to the
new hospital, which is nearly finished, I shall consider what you have
said about the advantages of the special destination for fevers. The
decision will rest with me, for though Lord Medlicote has given the
land and timber for the building, he is not disposed to give his
personal attention to the object.”
“There are few things better worth the pains in a provincial town like
this,” said Lydgate. “A fine fever hospital in addition to the old
infirmary might be the nucleus of a medical school here, when once we
get our medical reforms; and what would do more for medical education
than the spread of such schools over the country? A born provincial man
who has a grain of public spirit as well as a few ideas, should do what
he can to resist the rush of everything that is a little better than
common towards London. Any valid professional aims may often find a
freer, if not a richer field, in the provinces.”
One of Lydgate’s gifts was a voice habitually deep and sonorous, yet
capable of becoming very low and gentle at the right moment. About his
ordinary bearing there was a certain fling, a fearless expectation of
success, a confidence in his own powers and integrity much fortified by
contempt for petty obstacles or seductions of which he had had no
experience. But this proud openness was made lovable by an expression
of unaffected good-will. Mr. Bulstrode perhaps liked him the better for
the difference between them in pitch and manners; he certainly liked
him the better, as Rosamond did, for being a stranger in Middlemarch.
One can begin so many things with a new person!—even begin to be a
better man.
“I shall rejoice to furnish your zeal with fuller opportunities,” Mr.
Bulstrode answered; “I mean, by confiding to you the superintendence of
my new hospital, should a maturer knowledge favor that issue, for I am
determined that so great an object shall not be shackled by our two
physicians. Indeed, I am encouraged to consider your advent to this
town as a gracious indication that a more manifest blessing is now to
be awarded to my efforts, which have hitherto been much withstood. With
regard to the old infirmary, we have gained the initial point—I mean
your election. And now I hope you will not shrink from incurring a
certain amount of jealousy and dislike from your professional brethren
by presenting yourself as a reformer.”
“I will not profess bravery,” said Lydgate, smiling, “but I acknowledge
a good deal of pleasure in fighting, and I should not care for my
profession, if I did not believe that better methods were to be found
and enforced there as well as everywhere else.”
“The standard of that profession is low in Middlemarch, my dear sir,”
said the banker. “I mean in knowledge and skill; not in social status,
for our medical men are most of them connected with respectable
townspeople here. My own imperfect health has induced me to give some
attention to those palliative resources which the divine mercy has
placed within our reach. I have consulted eminent men in the
metropolis, and I am painfully aware of the backwardness under which
medical treatment labors in our provincial districts.”
“Yes;—with our present medical rules and education, one must be
satisfied now and then to meet with a fair practitioner. As to all the
higher questions which determine the starting-point of a diagnosis—as
to the philosophy of medical evidence—any glimmering of these can only
come from a scientific culture of which country practitioners have
usually no more notion than the man in the moon.”
Mr. Bulstrode, bending and looking intently, found the form which
Lydgate had given to his agreement not quite suited to his
comprehension. Under such circumstances a judicious man changes the
topic and enters on ground where his own gifts may be more useful.
“I am aware,” he said, “that the peculiar bias of medical ability is
towards material means. Nevertheless, Mr. Lydgate, I hope we shall not
vary in sentiment as to a measure in which you are not likely to be
actively concerned, but in which your sympathetic concurrence may be an
aid to me. You recognize, I hope; the existence of spiritual interests
in your patients?”
“Certainly I do. But those words are apt to cover different meanings to
different minds.”
“Precisely. And on such subjects wrong teaching is as fatal as no
teaching. Now a point which I have much at heart to secure is a new
regulation as to clerical attendance at the old infirmary. The building
stands in Mr. Farebrother’s parish. You know Mr. Farebrother?”
“I have seen him. He gave me his vote. I must call to thank him. He
seems a very bright pleasant little fellow. And I understand he is a
naturalist.”
“Mr. Farebrother, my dear sir, is a man deeply painful to contemplate.
I suppose there is not a clergyman in this country who has greater
talents.” Mr. Bulstrode paused and looked meditative.
“I have not yet been pained by finding any excessive talent in
Middlemarch,” said Lydgate, bluntly.
“What I desire,” Mr. Bulstrode continued, looking still more serious,