Both Uses

forbearance
in
Middlemarch
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"Have you got nothing else for my breakfast, Pritchard?" said Fred, to the servant who brought in coffee and buttered toast; while he walked round the table surveying the ham, potted beef, and other cold remnants, with an air of silent rejection, and polite forbearance from signs of disgust.†
Chpt 1 *

forbearance = refraining (holding back) from acting OR patience, tolerance, or self-control
To his suspicious interpretation Dorothea's silence now was a suppressed rebellion; a remark from her which he had not in any way anticipated was an assertion of conscious superiority; her gentle answers had an irritating cautiousness in them; and when she acquiesced it was a self-approved effort of forbearance.†
Chpt 4

Definitions:

(1) (forbearance)
patient tolerance or self-control; or holding back from taking action or enforcing a right

Today, the word, forbearance, is most commonly seen in the field of law to indicate that a legal right, claim or privilege is not being enforced.
(2) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)
The form, forbears is typically a verb, but can be an alternate spelling of the noun forebears; i.e., ancestors. Note that these words put the emphasis on different syllables: for-BEARS v. FORE-bears