"I don't see the good of that," said Mr. Hawley. "I suppose we all

know whom we mean to vote for. Any man who wants to do justice does

not wait till the last minute to hear both sides of the question. I

have no time to lose, and I propose that the matter be put to the vote

at once."

A brief but still hot discussion followed before each person wrote

"Tyke" or "Farebrother" on a piece of paper and slipped it into a glass

tumbler; and in the mean time Mr. Bulstrode saw Lydgate enter.

"I perceive that the votes are equally divided at present," said Mr.

Bulstrode, in a clear biting voice. Then, looking up at Lydgate--

"There is a casting-vote still to be given. It is yours, Mr. Lydgate:

will you be good enough to write?"

"The thing is settled now," said Mr. Wrench, rising. "We all know how

Mr. Lydgate will vote."

"You seem to speak with some peculiar meaning, sir," said Lydgate,

rather defiantly, and keeping his pencil suspended.

"I merely mean that you are expected to vote with Mr. Bulstrode. Do

you regard that meaning as offensive?"

"It may be offensive to others. But I shall not desist from voting

with him on that account." Lydgate immediately wrote down "Tyke."

So the Rev. Walter Tyke became chaplain to the Infirmary, and Lydgate

continued to work with Mr. Bulstrode. He was really uncertain whether

Tyke were not the more suitable candidate, and yet his consciousness

told him that if he had been quite free from indirect bias he should

have voted for Mr. Farebrother. The affair of the chaplaincy remained

a sore point in his memory as a case in which this petty medium of

Middlemarch had been too strong for him. How could a man be satisfied

with a decision between such alternatives and under such circumstances?

No more than he can be satisfied with his hat, which he has chosen from

among such shapes as the resources of the age offer him, wearing it at

best with a resignation which is chiefly supported by comparison.

But Mr. Farebrother met him with the same friendliness as before. The

character of the publican and sinner is not always practically

incompatible with that of the modern Pharisee, for the majority of us

scarcely see more distinctly the faultiness of our own conduct than the

faultiness of our own arguments, or the dulness of our own jokes. But

the Vicar of St. Botolph's had certainly escaped the slightest tincture

of the Pharisee, and by dint of admitting to himself that he was too

much as other men were, he had become remarkably unlike them in

this--that he could excuse others for thinking slightly of him, and

could judge impartially of their conduct even when it told against him.




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