Nothing grates on me
more than that posthumous grudgingness towards a wife. A man ought to have some
pride and fondness for his widow. I should, I know. I take it as a test of a
man, that he feels the easier about his death when he can think of his wife and
daughters being comfortable after it. I like that story of the fellows in the
Crimean war, who were ready to go to the bottom of the sea, if their widows were
provided for.«
    »It has certainly taken me by surprise,« said Mr. Gascoigne, »all the more
because, as the one who stood in the place of father to my niece, I had shown my
reliance on Mr. Grandcourt's apparent liberality in money matters by making no
claims for her beforehand. That seemed to me due to him under the circumstances.
Probably you think me blamable.«
    »Not blamable exactly. I respect a man for trusting another. But take my
advice. If you marry another niece, though it may be to the Archbishop of
Canterbury, bind him down. Your niece can't be married for the first time twice
over. And if he's a good fellow, he'll wish to be bound. But as to Mrs.
Grandcourt, I can only say that I feel my relation to her all the nearer because
I think that she has not been well treated. And I hope you will urge her to rely
on me as a friend.«
    Thus spake the chivalrous Sir Hugo, in his disgust at the young and
beautiful widow of a Mallinger Grandcourt being left with only two thousand
a-year and a house in a coal-mining district. To the Rector that income
naturally appeared less shabby and less accompanied with mortifying privations;
but in this conversation he had devoured a much keener sense than the baronet's
of the humiliation cast over his niece, and also over her nearest friends, by
the conspicuous publishing of her husband's relation to Mrs. Glasher. And like
all men who are good husbands and fathers, he felt the humiliation through the
minds of the women who would be chiefly affected by it; so that the annoyance of
first hearing the facts was far slighter than what he felt in communicating them
to Mrs. Davilow, and in anticipating Gwendolen's feeling whenever her mother saw
fit to tell her of them. For the good Rector had an innocent conviction that his
niece was unaware of Mrs. Glasher's existence, arguing with masculine soundness
from what maidens and wives were likely to know, do, and