Poor Mr. Casaubon! This suffering was the harder to bear because it

seemed like a betrayal: the young creature who had worshipped him with

perfect trust had quickly turned into the critical wife; and early

instances of criticism and resentment had made an impression which no

tenderness and submission afterwards could remove. To his suspicious

interpretation Dorothea's silence now was a suppressed rebellion; a

remark from her which he had not in any way anticipated was an

assertion of conscious superiority; her gentle answers had an

irritating cautiousness in them; and when she acquiesced it was a

self-approved effort of forbearance. The tenacity with which he strove

to hide this inward drama made it the more vivid for him; as we hear

with the more keenness what we wish others not to hear.

Instead of wondering at this result of misery in Mr. Casaubon, I think

it quite ordinary. Will not a tiny speck very close to our vision blot

out the glory of the world, and leave only a margin by which we see the

blot? I know no speck so troublesome as self. And who, if Mr.

Casaubon had chosen to expound his discontents--his suspicions that he

was not any longer adored without criticism--could have denied that

they were founded on good reasons? On the contrary, there was a strong

reason to be added, which he had not himself taken explicitly into

account--namely, that he was not unmixedly adorable. He suspected

this, however, as he suspected other things, without confessing it, and

like the rest of us, felt how soothing it would have been to have a

companion who would never find it out.

This sore susceptibility in relation to Dorothea was thoroughly

prepared before Will Ladislaw had returned to Lowick, and what had

occurred since then had brought Mr. Casaubon's power of suspicious

construction into exasperated activity. To all the facts which he

knew, he added imaginary facts both present and future which became

more real to him than those because they called up a stronger dislike,

a more predominating bitterness. Suspicion and jealousy of Will

Ladislaw's intentions, suspicion and jealousy of Dorothea's

impressions, were constantly at their weaving work. It would be quite

unjust to him to suppose that he could have entered into any coarse

misinterpretation of Dorothea: his own habits of mind and conduct,

quite as much as the open elevation of her nature, saved him from any

such mistake. What he was jealous of was her opinion, the sway that

might be given to her ardent mind in its judgments, and the future

possibilities to which these might lead her. As to Will, though until

his last defiant letter he had nothing definite which he would choose

formally to allege against him, he felt himself warranted in believing

that he was capable of any design which could fascinate a rebellious

temper and an undisciplined impulsiveness. He was quite sure that

Dorothea was the cause of Will's return from Rome, and his

determination to settle in the neighborhood; and he was penetrating

enough to imagine that Dorothea had innocently encouraged this course.

It was as clear as possible that she was ready to be attached to Will

and to be pliant to his suggestions: they had never had a tete-a-tete

without her bringing away from it some new troublesome impression, and

the last interview that Mr. Casaubon was aware of (Dorothea, on

returning from Freshitt Hall, had for the first time been silent about

having seen Will) had led to a scene which roused an angrier feeling

against them both than he had ever known before. Dorothea's outpouring

of her notions about money, in the darkness of the night, had done

nothing but bring a mixture of more odious foreboding into her

husband's mind.




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