"Confound you handsome young fellows! you think of having it allyour own way in the world. You don't under stand women. They don'tadmire you half so much as you admire yourselves. Elinor used to tellher sisters that she married me for my ugliness—it was so various andamusing that it had quite conquered her prudence."
"You! it was easy enough for a woman to love you. But this is noquestion of beauty. I don't like Casaubon." This was Sir James's strongestway of implying that he thought ill of a man's character.
"Why? what do you know against him?" said the Rector laying downhis reels, and putting his thumbs into his armholes with an air ofattention.
Sir James paused. He did not usually find it easy to give his reasons:it seemed to him strange that people should not know them withoutbeing told, since he only felt what was reasonable. At last he said—
"Now, Cadwallader, has he got any heart?"
"Well, yes. I don't mean of the melting sort, but a sound kernel, thatyou may be sure of. He is very good to his poor relations: pensionsseveral of the women, and is educating a young fellow at a good deal ofexpense. Casaubon acts up to his sense of justice. His mother's sistermade a bad match—a Pole, I think—lost herself—at any rate wasdisowned by her family. If it had not been for that, Casaubon would nothave had so much money by half. I believe he went himself to find outhis cousins, and see what he could do for them. Every man would notring so well as that, if you tried his metal. You would, Chettam; but notevery man."
"I don't know," said Sir James, coloring. "I am not so sure of myself."He paused a moment, and then added, "That was a right thing forCasaubon to do. But a man may wish to do what is right, and yet be asort of parchment code. A woman may not be happy with him. And Ithink when a girl is so young as Miss Brooke is, her friends ought tointerfere a little to hinder her from doing anything foolish. You laugh,because you fancy I have some feeling on my own account. But upon myhonor, it is not that. I should feel just the same if I were Miss Brooke'sbrother or uncle."
"Well, but what should you do?"
"I should say that the marriage must not be decided on until she wasof age. And depend upon it, in that case, it would never come off. I wishyou saw it as I do—I wish you would talk to Brooke about it."
Sir James rose as he was finishing his sentence, for he saw Mrs.Cadwallader entering from the study. She held by the hand her youngestgirl, about five years old, who immediately ran to papa, and was madecomfortable on his knee.
"I hear what you are talking about," said the wife. "But you will makeno impression on Humphrey. As long as the fish rise to his bait,everybody is what he ought to be. Bless you, Casaubon has got a trout-stream, and does not care about fishing in it himself: could there be abetter fellow?"
"Well, there is something in that," said the Rector, with his quiet,inward laugh. "It is a very good quality in a man to have a trout-stream."
"But seriously," said Sir James, whose vexation had not yet spentitself, "don't you think the Rector might do some good by speaking?"
"Oh, I told you beforehand what he would say," answered Mrs.Cadwallader, lifting up her eyebrows. "I have done what I could: I washmy hands of the marriage."
"In the first place," said the Rector, looking rather grave, "it would benonsensical to expect that I could convince Brooke, and make him actaccordingly. Brooke is a very good fellow, but pulpy; he will run into anymould, but he won't keep shape."
"He might keep shape long enough to defer the marriage," said SirJames.
"But, my dear Chettam, why should I use my influence to Casaubon'sdisadvantage, unless I were much surer than I am that I should be actingfor the advantage of Miss Brooke? I know no harm of Casaubon. I don'tcare about his Xisuthrus and Fee-fo-fum and the rest; but then he doesn'tcare about my fishing-tackle. As to the line he took on the CatholicQuestion, that was unexpected; but he has always been civil to me, and Idon't see why I should spoil his sport. For anything I can tell, MissBrooke may be happier with him than she would be with any other man."
"Humphrey! I have no patience with you. You know you wouldrather dine under the hedge than with Casaubon alone. You have nothingto say to each other."
"What has that to do with Miss Brooke's marrying him? She does notdo it for my amusement."
"He has got no good red blood in his body," said Sir James.
"No. Somebody put a drop under a magnifying-glass and it was allsemicolons and parentheses," said Mrs. Cadwallader.
"Why does he not bring out his book, instead of marrying," said SirJames, with a disgust which he held warranted by the sound feeling of anEnglish layman.
"Oh, he dreams footnotes, and they run away with all his brains.They say, when he was a little boy, he made an abstract of 'Hop o' myThumb,' and he has been making abstracts ever since. Ugh! And that isthe man Humphrey goes on saying that a woman may be happy with."
"Well, he is what Miss Brooke likes," said the Rector. "I don't professto understand every young lady's taste."
"But if she were your own daughter?" said Sir James.
"That would be a different affair. She is not my daughter, and I don'tfeel called upon to interfere. Casaubon is as good as most of us. He is ascholarly clergyman, and creditable to the cloth. Some Radical fellowspeechifying at Middlemarch said Casaubon was the learned straw-chopping incumbent, and Freke was the brick-and-mortar incumbent,and I was the angling incumbent. And upon my word, I don't see thatone is worse or better than the other." The Rector ended with his silentlaugh. He always saw the joke of any satire against himself. Hisconscience was large and easy, like the rest of him: it did only what itcould do without any trouble.
Clearly, there would be no interference with Miss Brooke's marriagethrough Mr. Cadwallader; and Sir James felt with some sadness that shewas to have perfect liberty of misjudgment. It was a sign of his gooddisposition that he did not slacken at all in his intention of carrying outDorothea's design of the cottages. Doubtless this persistence was the bestcourse for his own dignity: but pride only helps us to be generous; itnever makes us so, any more than vanity makes us witty. She was nowenough aware of Sir James's position with regard to her, to appreciate therectitude of his perseverance in a landlord's duty, to which he had atfirst been urged by a lover's complaisance, and her pleasure in it wasgreat enough to count for something even in her present happiness.Perhaps she gave to Sir James Chettam's cottages all the interest shecould spare from Mr. Casaubon, or rather from the symphony of hopefuldreams, admiring trust, and passionate self devotion which that learnedgentleman had set playing in her soul. Hence it happened that in thegood baronet's succeeding visits, while he was beginning to pay smallattentions to Celia, he found himself talking with more and morepleasure to Dorothea. She was perfectly unconstrained and withoutirritation towards him now, and he was gradually discovering the delightthere is in frank kindness and companionship between a man and awoman who have no passion to hide or confess.
CHAPTER IX.
1st Gent. An ancient land in ancient oracles
Is called "law-thirsty": all the struggle there
Was after order and a perfect rule.
Pray, where lie such lands now? . . .
2d Gent. Why, where they lay of old—in human souls.
Mr. Casaubon's behavior about settlements was highly satisfactory toMr. Brooke, and the preliminaries of marriage rolled smoothly along,shortening the weeks of courtship. The betrothed bride must see herfuture home, and dictate any changes that she would like to have madethere. A woman dictates before marriage in order that she may have anappetite for submission afterwards. And certainly, the mistakes that wemale and female mortals make when we have our own way might fairlyraise some wonder that we are so fond of it.
On a gray but dry November morning Dorothea drove to Lowick incompany with her uncle and Celia. Mr. Casaubon's home was the manor-house. Close by, visible from some parts of the garden, was the littlechurch, with the old parsonage opposite. In the beginning of his career,Mr. Casaubon had only held the living, but the death of his brother hadput him in possession of the manor also. It had a small park, with a fineold oak here and there, and an avenue of limes towards the southwestfront, with a sunk fence between park and pleasure-ground, so that fromthe drawing-room windows the glance swept uninterruptedly along aslope of greensward till the limes ended in a level of corn and pastures,which often seemed to melt into a lake under the setting sun. This wasthe happy side of the house, for the south and east looked rathermelancholy even under the brightest morning. The grounds here weremore confined, the flower-beds showed no very careful tendance, andlarge clumps of trees, chiefly of sombre yews, had risen high, not tenyards from the windows. The building, of greenish stone, was in the oldEnglish style, not ugly, but small-windowed and melancholy-looking: thesort of house that must have children, many flowers, open windows, andlittle vistas of bright things, to make it seem a joyous home. In this latterend of autumn, with a sparse remnant of yellow leaves falling slowlyathwart the dark evergreens in a stillness without sunshine, the housetoo had an air of autumnal decline, and Mr. Casaubon, when hepresented himself, had no bloom that could be thrown into relief by thatbackground.
"Oh dear!" Celia said to herself, "I am sure Freshitt Hall would havebeen pleasanter than this." She thought of the white freestone, thepillared portico, and the terrace full of flowers, Sir James smiling abovethem like a prince issuing from his enchantment in a rose-bush, with ahandkerchief swiftly metamorphosed from the most delicately odorouspetals—Sir James, who talked so agreeably, always about things whichhad common-sense in them, and not about learning! Celia had those lightyoung feminine tastes which grave and weatherworn gentlemensometimes prefer in a wife; but happily Mr. Casaubon's bias had beendifferent, for he would have had no chance with Celia.
Dorothea, on the contrary, found the house and grounds all that shecould wish: the dark book-shelves in the long library, the carpets andcurtains with colors subdued by time, the curious old maps and bird's-eye views on the walls of the corridor, with here and there an old vasebelow, had no oppression for her, and seemed more cheerful than theeasts and pictures at the Grange, which her uncle had long ago broughthome from his travels—they being probably among the ideas he hadtaken in at one time. To poor Dorothea these severe classical nuditiesand smirking Renaissance-Correggiosities were painfully inexplicable,staring into the midst of her Puritanic conceptions: she had never beentaught how she could bring them into any sort of relevance with her life.But the owners of Lowick apparently had not been travellers, and Mr.Casaubon's studies of the past were not carried on by means of suchaids.
Dorothea walked about the house with delightful emotion.Everything seemed hallowed to her: this was to be the home of herwifehood, and she looked up with eyes full of confidence to Mr.Casaubon when he drew her attention specially to some actualarrangement and asked her if she would like an alteration. All appeals toher taste she met gratefully, but saw nothing to alter. His efforts at exactcourtesy and formal tenderness had no defect for her. She filled up allblanks with unmanifested perfections, interpreting him as sheinterpreted the works of Providence, and accounting for seemingdiscords by her own deafness to the higher harmonies. And there aremany blanks left in the weeks of courtship which a loving faith fills withhappy assurance.
"Now, my dear Dorothea, I wish you to favor me by pointing outwhich room you would like to have as your boudoir," said Mr. Casaubon,showing that his views of the womanly nature were sufficiently large toinclude that requirement.
"It is very kind of you to think of that," said Dorothea, "but I assureyou I would rather have all those matters decided for me. I shall be muchhappier to take everything as it is—just as you have been used to have it,or as you will yourself choose it to be. I have no motive for wishinganything else."
"Oh, Dodo," said Celia, "will you not have the bow-windowed roomup-stairs?"
Mr. Casaubon led the way thither. The bow-window looked downthe avenue of limes; the furniture was all of a faded blue, and there wereminiatures of ladies and gentlemen with powdered hair hanging in agroup. A piece of tapestry over a door also showed a blue-green worldwith a pale stag in it. The chairs and tables were thin-legged and easy toupset. It was a room where one might fancy the ghost of a tight-lacedlady revisiting the scene of her embroidery. A light bookcase containedduodecimo volumes of polite literature in calf, completing the furniture.
"Yes," said Mr. Brooke, "this would be a pretty room with some newhangings, sofas, and that sort of thing. A little bare now."
"No, uncle," said Dorothea, eagerly. "Pray do not speak of alteringanything. There are so many other things in the world that wantaltering—I like to take these things as they are. And you like them asthey are, don't you?" she added, looking at Mr. Casaubon. "Perhaps thiswas your mother's room when she was young."
"It was," he said, with his slow bend of the head.
"This is your mother," said Dorothea, who had turned to examine thegroup of miniatures. "It is like the tiny one you brought me; only, Ishould think, a better portrait. And this one opposite, who is this?"
"Her elder sister. They were, like you and your sister, the only twochildren of their parents, who hang above them, you see."
"The sister is pretty," said Celia, implying that she thought lessfavorably of Mr. Casaubon's mother. It was a new opening to Celia'simagination, that he came of a family who had all been young in theirtime—the ladies wearing necklaces.
"It is a peculiar face," said Dorothea, looking closely. "Those deepgray eyes rather near together—and the delicate irregular nose with asort of ripple in it—and all the powdered curls hanging backward.Altogether it seems to me peculiar rather than pretty. There is not even afamily likeness between her and your mother."
