Page:Eliot - Middlemarch, vol. I, 1871.djvu/173

Rh "I am quite pleased with your protégé," she said to Mr Brooke before going away.

"My protégé?—dear me!—who is that?" said Mr Brooke.

"This young Lydgate, the new doctor. He seems to me to understand his profession admirably."

"Oh, Lydgate! he is not my protégé, you know; only I knew an uncle of his who sent me a letter about him. However, I think he is likely to be first-rate—has studied in Paris, knew Broussais; has ideas, you know—wants to raise the profession."

"Lydgate has lots of ideas, quite new, about ventilation and diet, that sort of thing," resumed Mr Brooke, after he had handed out Lady Chettam, and had returned to be civil to a group of Middlemarchers.

"Hang it, do you think that is quite sound?—upsetting the old treatment, which has made Englishmen what they are?" said Mr Standish.

"Medical knowledge is at a low ebb among us," said Mr Bulstrode, who spoke in a subdued tone, and had rather a sickly air "I, for my part, hail the advent of Mr. Lydgate. I hope to find good reason for confiding the new hospital to his management."