He sat looking at her, and did not rise to pay her any compliments,
leaving that to others, now that his admiration was deepened.
Her singing was less remarkable, but also well trained, and sweet
to hear as a chime perfectly in tune. It is true she sang "Meet
me by moonlight," and "I've been roaming"; for mortals must share
the fashions of their time, and none but the ancients can be
always classical. But Rosamond could also sing "Black-eyed Susan"
with effect, or Haydn's canzonets, or "Voi, che sapete,"
or "Batti, batti"--she only wanted to know what her audience liked.
Her father looked round at the company, delighting in their admiration.
Her mother sat, like a Niobe before her troubles, with her youngest
little girl on her lap, softly beating the child's hand up and
down in time to the music. And Fred, notwithstanding his general
scepticism about Rosy, listened to her music with perfect allegiance,
wishing he could do the same thing on his flute. It was the pleasantest
family party that Lydgate had seen since he came to Middlemarch.
The Vincys had the readiness to enjoy, the rejection of all anxiety,
and the belief in life as a merry lot, which made a house exceptional
in most county towns at that time, when Evangelicalism had cast
a certain suspicion as of plague-infection over the few amusements
which survived in the provinces.
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