Mrs. Waule, on the other hand, was an acquiescent mild soul, and accepted domestic frankness as in the order of nature,—[1]
"Indeed, she herself was accustomed to think that entire
freedom from the necessity of behaving agreeably was included
in the Almighty's intentions about families."
From this banter we pass to a bitter sarcasm that covers
a burning social sympathy in the account of the Florentine
banquet, where none could eat the tough, expensive
peacock, but all gloried in the extravagance of having it
to play with,—[2]
"And it would have been rashness to speak slightingly of
peacock's flesh, or any other venerable institution at a time when
Fra Girolamo was teaching the disturbing doctrine that it was
not the duty of the rich to be luxurious for the sake of the poor."
Irony is applied to two young men, with totally different
purposes; in one case it is directed against the youth himself;
in the other, against an anticipated criticism of his
conduct.
Fred Vincy belongs to the class of which Algernon Blancove is the most brilliant representative, and from which Evan Harrington made an early escape. He is persuaded that he "wouldn't have been such a bad fellow if he had been rich." But his destiny induces in him "a streak of misanthropic bitterness."[3]
"To be born the son of a Middlemarch manufacturer, and
the inevitable heir to nothing in particular, while such men as
- ↑ Middlemarch, I, 161. This book is also pervaded by the exuberant presence of the versatile but cautious Mr. Brooke, who had always "gone a good deal into that at one time," but always wisely refrained from pushing it too far, as one never can tell where such things will lead.
- ↑ Romola, II, 523.
- ↑ Middlemarch, I, 179.
