Books were of no use. Thinking was of no use. It was Sunday, and she

could not have the carriage to go to Celia, who had lately had a baby.

There was no refuge now from spiritual emptiness and discontent, and

Dorothea had to bear her bad mood, as she would have borne a headache.

After dinner, at the hour when she usually began to read aloud, Mr.

Casaubon proposed that they should go into the library, where, he said,

he had ordered a fire and lights. He seemed to have revived, and to be

thinking intently.

In the library Dorothea observed that he had newly arranged a row of

his note-books on a table, and now he took up and put into her hand a

well-known volume, which was a table of contents to all the others.

"You will oblige me, my dear," he said, seating himself, "if instead of

other reading this evening, you will go through this aloud, pencil in

hand, and at each point where I say 'mark,' will make a cross with your

pencil. This is the first step in a sifting process which I have long

had in view, and as we go on I shall be able to indicate to you certain

principles of selection whereby you will, I trust, have an intelligent

participation in my purpose."

This proposal was only one more sign added to many since his memorable

interview with Lydgate, that Mr. Casaubon's original reluctance to let

Dorothea work with him had given place to the contrary disposition,

namely, to demand much interest and labor from her.

After she had read and marked for two hours, he said, "We will take the

volume up-stairs--and the pencil, if you please--and in case of

reading in the night, we can pursue this task. It is not wearisome to

you, I trust, Dorothea?"

"I prefer always reading what you like best to hear," said Dorothea,

who told the simple truth; for what she dreaded was to exert herself in

reading or anything else which left him as joyless as ever.

It was a proof of the force with which certain characteristics in

Dorothea impressed those around her, that her husband, with all his

jealousy and suspicion, had gathered implicit trust in the integrity of

her promises, and her power of devoting herself to her idea of the

right and best. Of late he had begun to feel that these qualities were

a peculiar possession for himself, and he wanted to engross them.

The reading in the night did come. Dorothea in her young weariness had

slept soon and fast: she was awakened by a sense of light, which seemed

to her at first like a sudden vision of sunset after she had climbed a

steep hill: she opened her eyes and saw her husband wrapped in his warm

gown seating himself in the arm-chair near the fire-place where the

embers were still glowing. He had lit two candles, expecting that

Dorothea would awake, but not liking to rouse her by more direct means.




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