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CHAPTER LXXIV . “ Mercifully grant that we may grow aged together . ” — BOOK OF TOBIT : Marriage Prayer . In Middlemarch a wife could not long remain ignorant that the town held a bad opinion of her husband . No feminine intimate might carry her friendship so far as to make a plain statement to the wife of the unpleasant fact known or believed about her husband ; but when a woman with her thoughts much at leisure got them suddenly employed on something grievously disadvantageous to her neighbors , various moral impulses were called into play which tended to stimulate utterance . Candor was one . To be candid , in Middlemarch phraseology , meant , to use an early opportunity of letting your friends know that you did not take a cheerful view of their capacity , their conduct , or their position ; and a robust candor never waited to be asked for its opinion . Then , again , there was the love of truth — a wide phrase , but meaning in this relation , a lively objection to seeing a wife look happier than her husband’s character warranted , or manifest too much satisfaction in her lot — the poor thing should have some hint given her that if she knew the truth she would have less complacency in her bonnet , and in light dishes for a supper - party . Stronger than all , there was the regard for a friend’s moral improvement , sometimes called her soul , which was likely to be benefited by remarks tending to gloom , uttered with the accompaniment of pensive staring at the furniture and a manner implying that the speaker would not tell what was on her mind , from regard to the feelings of her hearer . On the whole , one might say that an ardent charity was at work setting the virtuous mind to make a neighbor unhappy for her good . There were hardly any wives in Middlemarch whose matrimonial misfortunes would in different ways be likely to call forth more of this moral activity than Rosamond and her aunt Bulstrode . Mrs . Bulstrode was not an object of dislike , and had never consciously injured any human being . Men had always thought her a handsome comfortable woman , and had reckoned it among the signs of Bulstrode’s hypocrisy that he had chosen a red - blooded Vincy , instead of a ghastly and melancholy person suited to his low esteem for earthly pleasure . When the scandal about her husband was disclosed they remarked of her — “ Ah , poor woman ! She’s as honest as the day — she never suspected anything wrong in him , you may depend on it . ” Women , who were intimate with her , talked together much of “ poor Harriet , ” imagined what her feelings must be when she came to know everything , and conjectured how much she had already come to know . There was no spiteful disposition towards her ; rather , there was a busy benevolence anxious to ascertain what it would be well for her to feel and do under the circumstances , which of course kept the imagination occupied with her character and history from the times when she was Harriet Vincy till now . With the review of Mrs . Bulstrode and her position it was inevitable to associate Rosamond , whose prospects were under the same blight with her aunt’s . Rosamond was more severely criticised and less pitied , though she too , as one of the good old Vincy family who had always been known in Middlemarch , was regarded as a victim to marriage with an interloper . The Vincys had their weaknesses , but then they lay on the surface : there was never anything bad to be “ found out ” concerning them . Mrs . Bulstrode was vindicated from any resemblance to her husband . Harriet’s faults were her own .
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