that your husband is fit for
Newgate," said Mrs. Hackbutt. "Fancy living with such a man! I should
expect to be poisoned."

"Yes, I think myself it is an encouragement to crime if such men are to
be taken care of and waited on by good wives," said Mrs. Tom Toller.

"And a good wife poor Harriet has been," said Mrs. Plymdale. "She
thinks her husband the first of men. It's true he has never denied her
anything."

"Well, we shall see what she will do," said Mrs. Hackbutt. "I suppose
she knows nothing yet, poor creature. I do hope and trust I shall not
see her, for I should be frightened to death lest I should say anything
about her husband. Do you think any hint has reached her?"

"I should hardly think so," said Mrs. Tom Toller. "We hear that he is
ill, and has never stirred out of the house since the meeting on
Thursday; but she was with her girls at church yesterday, and they had
new Tuscan bonnets. Her own had a feather in it. I have never seen
that her religion made any difference in her dress."

"She wears very neat patterns always," said Mrs. Plymdale, a little
stung. "And that feather I know she got dyed a pale lavender on
purpose to be consistent. I must say it of Harriet that she wishes to
do right."

"As to her knowing what has happened, it can't be kept from her long,"
said Mrs. Hackbutt. "The Vincys know, for Mr. Vincy was at the
meeting. It will he a great blow to him. There is his daughter as
well as his sister."

"Yes, indeed," said Mrs. Sprague. "Nobody supposes that Mr. Lydgate
can go on holding up his head in Middlemarch, things look so black
about the thousand pounds he took just at that man's death. It really
makes one shudder."

"Pride must have a fall," said Mrs. Hackbutt.

"I am not so sorry for Rosamond Vincy that was as I am for her aunt,"
said Mrs. Plymdale. "She needed a lesson."

"I suppose the Bulstrodes will go and live abroad somewhere," said Mrs.
Sprague. "That is what is generally done when there is anything
disgraceful in a family."

"And a most deadly blow it will be to Harriet," said Mrs. Plymdale.
"If ever a woman was crushed, she will be. I pity her from my heart.
And with all her faults, few women are better. From a girl she had the
neatest ways, and was always good-hearted, and as open as the day. You
might look into her drawers when you would--always the same. And so
she has brought up Kate and Ellen. You may think how hard it will be
for her