Deep as had been the county’s interest in the marriage of Mr. Adams the wealthy ironmaster and Lucy Marling, daughter of old Squire Marling, even deeper was its curiosity about their future. Some felt that though such a marriage was condoned, nay fully justified, by Mr. Adams’s renunciation of his own political party and his generous support of the Barchester Conservative Association, it should perhaps stop at that point. Old Lady Norton, known to the whole county as the Dreadful Dowager, had spoken her mind very freely upon the subject at dinner, saying that it was one thing to marry for money but there were limits, and though in her young days one did not discuss such things one could not help thinking about them and wishing that people would marry in their own station.