Book I
Boy and Girl
Chapter I
Outside Dorlcote Mill
A wide plain, where the broadening Floss hurries on between its green banks to the sea, and the loving tide, rushing to meet it, checks its passage with an impetuous embrace. On this mighty tide the black shipsâladen with the fresh-scented fir-planks, with rounded sacks of oil-bearing seed, or with the dark glitter of coalâare borne along to the town of St. Oggâs, which shows its aged, fluted red roofs and the broad gables of its wharves between the low wooded hill and the river-brink, tingeing the water with a soft purple hue under the transient glance of this February sun. Far away on each hand stretch the rich pastures, and the patches of dark earth made ready for the seed of broad-leaved green crops, or touched already with the tint of the tender-bladed autumn-sown corn. There is a remnant still of last yearâs golden clusters of beehive-ricks rising at intervals beyond the hedgerows; and everywhere the hedgerows are studded with trees; the distant ships seem to be lifting their masts and stretching their red-brown sails close among the branches of the spreading ash. Just by the red-roofed town the tributary Ripple flows with a lively current into the Floss. How lovely the little river is, with its dark changing wavelets! It seems to me like a living companion while I wander along the bank, and listen to its low, placid voice, as to the voice of one who is deaf and loving. I remember those large dipping willows. I remember the stone bridge.
And this is Dorlcote Mill. I must stand a minute or two here on the bridge and look at it, though the clouds are threatening, and it is far on in the afternoon. Even in this leafless time of departing February it is pleasant to look at,âperhaps the chill, damp season adds a charm to the trimly kept, comfortable dwelling-house, as old as the elms and chestnuts that shelter it from the northern blast. The stream is brimful now, and lies high in this little withy plantation, and half drowns the grassy fringe of the croft in front of the house. As I look at the full stream, the vivid grass, the delicate bright-green powder softening the outline of the great trunks and branches that gleam from under the bare purple boughs, I am in love with moistness, and envy the white ducks that are dipping their heads far into the water here among the withes, unmindful of the awkward appearance they make in the drier world above.
The rush of the water and the booming of the mill bring a dreamy deafness, which seems to heighten the peacefulness of the scene. They are like a great curtain of sound, shutting one out from the world beyond. And now there is the thunder of the huge covered wagon coming home with sacks of grain. That honest wagoner is thinking of his dinner, getting sadly dry in the oven at this late hour; but he will not touch it till he has fed his horses,âthe strong, submissive, meek-eyed beasts, who, I fancy, are looking mild reproach at him from between their blinkers, that he should crack his whip at them in that awful manner as if they needed that hint! See how they stretch their shoulders up the slope toward the bridge, with all the more energy because they are so near home. Look at their grand shaggy feet that seem to grasp the firm earth, at the patient strength of their necks, bowed under the heavy collar, at the mighty muscles of their struggling haunches! I should like well to hear them neigh over their hardly earned feed of corn, and see them, with their moist necks freed from the harness, dipping their eager nostrils into the muddy pond. Now they are on the bridge, and down they go again at a swifter pace, and the arch of the covered wagon disappears at the turning behind the trees.
Now I can turn my eyes toward the mill again, and watch the unresting wheel sending out its diamond jets of water. That little girl is watching it too; she has been standing on just the same spot at the edge of the water ever since I paused on the bridge. And that queer white cur with the brown ear seems to be leaping and barking in ineffectual remonstrance with the wheel; perhaps he is jealous because his playfellow in the beaver bonnet is so rapt in its movement. It is time the little playfellow went in, I think; and there is a very bright fire to tempt her: the red light shines out under the deepening gray of the sky. It is time, too, for me to leave off resting my arms on the cold stone of this bridgeâŠ.
Ah, my arms are really benumbed. I have been pressing my elbows on the arms of my chair, and dreaming that I was standing on the bridge in front of Dorlcote Mill, as it looked one February afternoon many years ago. Before I dozed off, I was going to tell you what Mr. and Mrs. Tulliver were talking about, as they sat by the bright fire in the left-hand parlor, on that very afternoon I have been dreaming of.
Chapter II
Mr. Tulliver, of Dorlcote Mill, Declares His Resolution about Tom
âWhat I want, you know,â said Mr. Tulliver,ââwhat I want is to give Tom a good eddication; an eddication asâll be a bread to him. That was what I was thinking of when I gave notice for him to leave the academy at Lady-day. I mean to put him to a downright good school at Midsummer. The two years at thâ academy âud haâ done well enough, if Iâd meant to make a miller and farmer of him, for heâs had a fine sight more schoolinâ nor I ever got. All the learninâ my father ever paid for was a bit oâ birch at one end and the alphabet at thâ other. But I should like Tom to be a bit of a scholard, so as he might be up to the tricks oâ these fellows as talk fine and write with a flourish. It âud be a help to me wiâ these lawsuits, and arbitrations, and things. I wouldnât make a downright lawyer oâ the lad,âI should be sorry for him to be a raskill,âbut a sort oâ engineer, or a surveyor, or an auctioneer and vallyer, like Riley, or one oâ them smartish businesses as are all profits and no outlay, only for a big watch-chain and a high stool. Theyâre pretty nigh all one, and theyâre not far off being even wiâ the law, I believe; for Riley looks Lawyer Wakem iâ the face as hard as one cat looks another. Heâs none frightened at him.â
Mr. Tulliver was speaking to his wife, a blond comely woman in a fan-shaped cap (I am afraid to think how long it is since fan-shaped caps were worn, they must be so near coming in again. At that time, when Mrs. Tulliver was nearly forty, they were new at St. Oggâs, and considered sweet things).
âWell, Mr. Tulliver, you know best: Iâve no objections. But hadnât I better kill a couple oâ fowl, and have thâ aunts and uncles to dinner next week, so as you may hear what sister Glegg and sister Pullet have got to say about it? Thereâs a couple oâ fowl wants killing!â
âYou may kill every fowl iâ the yard if you like, Bessy; but I shall ask neither aunt nor uncle what Iâm to do wiâ my own lad,â said Mr. Tulliver, defiantly.
âDear heart!â said Mrs. Tulliver, shocked at this sanguinary rhetoric, âhow can you talk so, Mr. Tulliver? But itâs your way to speak disrespectful oâ my family; and sister Glegg throws all the blame upoâ me, though Iâm sure Iâm as innocent as the babe unborn. For nobodyâs ever heard me say as it wasnât lucky for my children to have aunts and uncles as can live independent. Howiver, if Tomâs to go to a new school, I should like him to go where I can wash him and mend him; else he might as well have calico as linen, for theyâd be one as yallow as thâ other before theyâd been washed half-a-dozen times. And then, when the box is goinâ backâard and forrard, I could send the lad a cake, or a pork-pie, or an apple; for he can do with an extry bit, bless him! whether they stint him at the meals or no. My children can eat as much victuals as most, thank God!â
âWell, well, we wonât send him out oâ reach oâ the carrierâs cart, if other things fit in,â said Mr. Tulliver. âBut you mustnât put a spoke iâ the wheel about the washin,â if we canât get a school near enough. Thatâs the fault I have to find wiâ you, Bessy; if you see a stick iâ the road, youâre allays thinkinâ you canât step over it. Youâd want me not to hire a good wagoner, âcause heâd got a mole on his face.â
âDear heart!â said Mrs. Tulliver, in mild surprise, âwhen did I iver make objections to a man because heâd got a mole on his face? Iâm sure Iâm rether fond oâ the moles; for my brother, as is dead anâ gone, had a mole on his brow. But I canât remember your iver offering to hire a wagoner with a mole, Mr. Tulliver. There was John Gibbs hadnât a mole on his face no more nor you have, anâ I was all for having you hire him; anâ so you did hire him, anâ if he hadnât died oâ thâ inflammation, as we paid Dr. Turnbull for attending him, heâd very like haâ been drivinâ the wagon now. He might have a mole somewhere out oâ sight, but how was I to know that, Mr. Tulliver?â
âNo, no, Bessy; I didnât mean justly the mole; I meant it to stand for summat else; but niver mindâitâs puzzling work, talking is. What Iâm thinking on, is how to find the right sort oâ school to send Tom to, for I might be taâen in again, as Iâve been wiâ thâ academy. Iâll have nothing to do wiâ a âcademy again: whativer school I send Tom to, it shaânât be a âcademy; it shall be a place where the lads spend their time iâ summat else besides blacking the familyâs shoes, and getting up the potatoes. Itâs an uncommon puzzling thing to know what school to pick.â
Mr. Tulliver paused a minute or two, and dived with both hands into his breeches pockets as if he hoped to find some suggestion there. Apparently he was not disappointed, for he presently said, âI know what Iâll do: Iâll talk it over wiâ Riley; heâs coming to-morrow, tâ arbitrate about the dam.â
âWell, Mr. Tulliver, Iâve put the sheets out for the best bed, and Keziaâs got âem hanging at the fire. They arenât the best sheets, but theyâre good enough for anybody to sleep in, be he who he will; for as for them best Holland sheets, I should repent buying âem, only theyâll do to lay us out in. Anâ if you was to die to-morrow, Mr. Tulliver, theyâre mangled beautiful, anâ all ready, anâ smell oâ lavender as it âud be a pleasure to lay âem out; anâ they lie at the left-hand corner oâ the big oak linen-chest at the back: not as I should trust anybody to look âem out but myself.â
As Mrs. Tulliver uttered the last sentence, she drew a bright bunch of keys from her pocket, and singled out one, rubbing her thumb and finger up and down it with a placid smile while she looked at the clear fire. If Mr. Tulliver had been a susceptible man in his conjugal relation, he might have supposed that she drew out the key to aid her imagination in anticipating the moment when he would be in a state to justify the production of the best Holland sheets. Happily he was not so; he was only susceptible in respect of his right to water-power; moreover, he had the marital habit of not list...