Middlemarch, Page 8

  CHAPTER VII.

  "Piacer e popone Vuol la sua stagione." --Italian Proverb.

  Mr. Casaubon, as might be expected, spent a great deal of his time atthe Grange in these weeks, and the hindrance which courtship occasionedto the progress of his great work--the Key to allMythologies--naturally made him look forward the more eagerly to thehappy termination of courtship. But he had deliberately incurred thehindrance, having made up his mind that it was now time for him toadorn his life with the graces of female companionship, to irradiatethe gloom which fatigue was apt to hang over the intervals of studiouslabor with the play of female fancy, and to secure in this, hisculminating age, the solace of female tendance for his declining years.Hence he determined to abandon himself to the stream of feeling, andperhaps was surprised to find what an exceedingly shallow rill it was.As in droughty regions baptism by immersion could only be performedsymbolically, Mr. Casaubon found that sprinkling was the utmostapproach to a plunge which his stream would afford him; and heconcluded that the poets had much exaggerated the force of masculinepassion. Nevertheless, he observed with pleasure that Miss Brookeshowed an ardent submissive affection which promised to fulfil his mostagreeable previsions of marriage. It had once or twice crossed hismind that possibly there was some deficiency in Dorothea to account forthe moderation of his abandonment; but he was unable to discern thedeficiency, or to figure to himself a woman who would have pleased himbetter; so that there was clearly no reason to fall back upon but theexaggerations of human tradition.

  "Could I not be preparing myself now to be more useful?" said Dorotheato him, one morning, early in the time of courtship; "could I not learnto read Latin and Greek aloud to you, as Milton's daughters did totheir father, without understanding what they read?"

  "I fear that would be wearisome to you," said Mr. Casaubon, smiling;"and, indeed, if I remember rightly, the young women you have mentionedregarded that exercise in unknown tongues as a ground for rebellionagainst the poet."

  "Yes; but in the first place they were very naughty girls, else theywould have been proud to minister to such a father; and in the secondplace they might have studied privately and taught themselves tounderstand what they read, and then it would have been interesting. Ihope you don't expect me to be naughty and stupid?"

  "I expect you to be all that an exquisite young lady can be in everypossible relation of life. Certainly it might be a great advantage ifyou were able to copy the Greek character, and to that end it were wellto begin with a little reading."

  Dorothea seized this as a precious permission. She would not haveasked Mr. Casaubon at once to teach her the languages, dreading of allthings to be tiresome instead of helpful; but it was not entirely outof devotion to her future husband that she wished to know Latin andGreek. Those provinces of masculine knowledge seemed to her astanding-ground from which all truth could be seen more truly. As itwas, she constantly doubted her own conclusions, because she felt herown ignorance: how could she be confident that one-roomed cottages werenot for the glory of God, when men who knew the classics appeared toconciliate indifference to the cottages with zeal for the glory?Perhaps even Hebrew might be necessary--at least the alphabet and a fewroots--in order to arrive at the core of things, and judge soundly onthe social duties of the Christian. And she had not reached that pointof renunciation at which she would have been satisfied with having awise husband: she wished, poor child, to be wise herself. Miss Brookewas certainly very naive with all her alleged cleverness. Celia, whosemind had never been thought too powerful, saw the emptiness of otherpeople's pretensions much more readily. To have in general but littlefeeling, seems to be the only security against feeling too much on anyparticular occasion.

  However, Mr. Casaubon consented to listen and teach for an hourtogether, like a schoolmaster of little boys, or rather like a lover,to whom a mistress's elementary ignorance and difficulties have atouching fitness. Few scholars would have disliked teaching thealphabet under such circumstances. But Dorothea herself was a littleshocked and discouraged at her own stupidity, and the answers she gotto some timid questions about the value of the Greek accents gave her apainful suspicion that here indeed there might be secrets not capableof explanation to a woman's reason.

  Mr. Brooke had no doubt on that point, and expressed himself with hisusual strength upon it one day that he came into the library while thereading was going forward.

  "Well, but now, Casaubon, such deep studies, classics, mathematics,that kind of thing, are too taxing for a woman--too taxing, you know."

  "Dorothea is learning to read the characters simply," said Mr.Casaubon, evading the question. "She had the very considerate thoughtof saving my eyes."

  "Ah, well, without understanding, you know--that may not be so bad.But there is a lightness about the feminine mind--a touch andgo--music, the fine arts, that kind of thing--they should study thoseup to a certain point, women should; but in a light way, you know. Awoman should be able to sit down and play you or sing you a good oldEnglish tune. That is what I like; though I have heard mostthings--been at the opera in Vienna: Gluck, Mozart, everything of thatsort. But I'm a conservative in music--it's not like ideas, you know.I stick to the good old tunes."

  "Mr. Casaubon is not fond of the piano, and I am very glad he is not,"said Dorothea, whose slight regard for domestic music and feminine fineart must be forgiven her, considering the small tinkling and smearingin which they chiefly consisted at that dark period. She smiled andlooked up at her betrothed with grateful eyes. If he had always beenasking her to play the "Last Rose of Summer," she would have requiredmuch resignation. "He says there is only an old harpsichord at Lowick,and it is covered with books."

  "Ah, there you are behind Celia, my dear. Celia, now, plays veryprettily, and is always ready to play. However, since Casaubon doesnot like it, you are all right. But it's a pity you should not havelittle recreations of that sort, Casaubon: the bow always strung--thatkind of thing, you know--will not do."

  "I never could look on it in the light of a recreation to have my earsteased with measured noises," said Mr. Casaubon. "A tune much iteratedhas the ridiculous effect of making the words in my mind perform a sortof minuet to keep time--an effect hardly tolerable, I imagine, afterboyhood. As to the grander forms of music, worthy to accompany solemncelebrations, and even to serve as an educating influence according tothe ancient conception, I say nothing, for with these we are notimmediately concerned."

  "No; but music of that sort I should enjoy," said Dorothea. "When wewere coming home from Lausanne my uncle took us to hear the great organat Freiberg, and it made me sob."

  "That kind of thing is not healthy, my dear," said Mr. Brooke."Casaubon, she will be in your hands now: you must teach my niece totake things more quietly, eh, Dorothea?"

  He ended with a smile, not wishing to hurt his niece, but reallythinking that it was perhaps better for her to be early married to sosober a fellow as Casaubon, since she would not hear of Chettam.

  "It is wonderful, though," he said to himself as he shuffled out of theroom--"it is wonderful that she should have liked him. However, thematch is good. I should have been travelling out of my brief to havehindered it, let Mrs. Cadwallader say what she will. He is prettycertain to be a bishop, is Casaubon. That was a very seasonablepamphlet of his on the Catholic Question:--a deanery at least. Theyowe him a deanery."

  And here I must vindicate a claim to philosophical reflectiveness, byremarking that Mr. Brooke on this occasion little thought of theRadical speech which, at a later period, he was led to make on theincomes of the bishops. What elegant historian would neglect astriking opportunity for pointing out that his heroes did not foreseethe history of the world, or even their own actions?--For example, thatHenry of Navarre, when a Protestant baby, little thought of being aCatholic monarch; or that Alfred the Great, when he measured hislaborious nights with burning candles, had no idea of future gentlemenmeasuring their idle days with watches. Here is a mi
ne of truth,which, however vigorously it may be worked, is likely to outlast ourcoal.

  But of Mr. Brooke I make a further remark perhaps less warranted byprecedent--namely, that if he had foreknown his speech, it might nothave made any great difference. To think with pleasure of his niece'shusband having a large ecclesiastical income was one thing--to make aLiberal speech was another thing; and it is a narrow mind which cannotlook at a subject from various points of view.