a carriage. Mrs. Lemon herself had
always held up Miss Vincy as an example: no pupil, she said, exceeded that young
lady for mental acquisition and propriety of speech, while her musical execution
was quite exceptional. We cannot help the way in which people speak of us, and
probably if Mrs. Lemon had undertaken to describe Juliet or Imogen, these
heroines would not have seemed poetical. The first vision of Rosamond would have
been enough with most judges to dispel any prejudice excited by Mrs. Lemon's
praise.
    Lydgate could not be long in Middlemarch without having that agreeable
vision, or even without making the acquaintance of the Vincy family; for though
Mr. Peacock, whose practice he had paid something to enter on, had not been
their doctor (Mrs. Vincy not liking the lowering system adopted by him), he had
many patients among their connections and acquaintances. For who of any
consequence in Middlemarch was not connected or at least acquainted with the
Vincys? They were old manufacturers, and had kept a good house for three
generations, in which there had naturally been much intermarrying with
neighbours more or less decidedly genteel. Mr. Vincy's sister had made a wealthy
match in accepting Mr. Bulstrode, who, however, as a man not born in the town,
and altogether of dimly-known origin, was considered to have done well in
uniting himself with a real Middlemarch family; on the other hand, Mr. Vincy had
descended a little, having taken an innkeeper's daughter. But on this side too
there was a cheering sense of money; for Mrs. Vincy's sister had been second
wife to rich old Mr. Featherstone, and had died childless years ago, so that her
nephews and nieces might be supposed to touch the affections of the widower. And
it happened that Mr. Bulstrode and Mr. Featherstone, two of Peacock's most
important patients, had, from different causes, given an especially good
reception to his successor, who had raised some partisanship as well as
discussion. Mr. Wrench, medical attendant to the Vincy family, very early had
grounds for thinking lightly of Lydgate's professional discretion, and there was
no report about him which was not retailed at the Vincys', where visitors were
frequent. Mr. Vincy was more inclined to general good-fellowship than to taking
sides, but there was no need for him to be hasty in making any new man's
acquaintance. Rosamond silently wished that her father would invite Mr. Lydgate.
She was tired of the faces and figures she had always been