- Dorothea and Lydgate are discussing the new hospital.
- Lydgate explains that it's very important for the town to have this new fever hospital, but, because it's being funded mostly by Bulstrode, a lot of prominent townspeople are against it – Bulstrode isn't popular in certain circles.
- And some of the other medical men are against it, because they disapprove of Lydgate's new-fangled scientific methods.
- Dorothea thinks that it all sounds very petty, and agrees to help fund the hospital.
- She likes helping people, and thinks that this will be a good way to do it.