“You have an interesting work there, I see, Miss Garth,” he observed, when Mary reentered. “It is by the author of Waverley : that is Sir Walter Scott. I have bought one of his works myself⁠—a very nice thing, a very superior publication, entitled Ivanhoe . You will not get any writer to beat him in a hurry, I think⁠—he will not, in my opinion, be speedily surpassed. I have just been reading a portion at the commencement of Anne of Jeersteen . It commences well.” (Things never began with Mr. Borthrop Trumbull: they always commenced, both in private life and on his handbills.) “You are a reader, I see. Do you subscribe to our Middlemarch library?”

“No,” said Mary. “ Mr. Fred Vincy brought this book.”