The Mill on the Floss (7 page)

The wood I walk in on this mild May day, with the young
yellow-brown foliage of the oaks between me and the blue sky, the
white star-flowers and the blue-eyed speedwell and the ground ivy
at my feet, what grove of tropic palms, what strange ferns or
splendid broad-petalled blossoms, could ever thrill such deep and
delicate fibres within me as this home scene? These familiar
flowers, these well-remembered bird-notes, this sky, with its
fitful brightness, these furrowed and grassy fields, each with a
sort of personality given to it by the capricious hedgerows,–such
things as these are the mother-tongue of our imagination, the
language that is laden with all the subtle, inextricable
associations the fleeting hours of our childhood left behind them.
Our delight in the sunshine on the deep-bladed grass to-day might
be no more than the faint perception of wearied souls, if it were
not for the sunshine and the grass in the far-off years which still
live in us, and transform our perception into love.

Chapter VI
The Aunts and Uncles Are Coming

It was Easter week, and Mrs. Tulliver's cheesecakes were more
exquisitely light than usual. "A puff o' wind 'ud make 'em blow
about like feathers," Kezia the housemaid said, feeling proud to
live under a mistress who could make such pastry; so that no season
or circumstances could have been more propitious for a family
party, even if it had not been advisable to consult sister Glegg
and sister Pullet about Tom's going to school.

"I'd as lief not invite sister Deane this time," said Mrs.
Tulliver, "for she's as jealous and having as can be, and's allays
trying to make the worst o' my poor children to their aunts and
uncles."

"Yes, yes," said Mr. Tulliver, "ask her to come. I never hardly
get a bit o' talk with Deane now; we haven't had him this six
months. What's it matter what she says? My children need be
beholding to nobody."

"That's what you allays say, Mr. Tulliver; but I'm sure there's
nobody o' your side, neither aunt nor uncle, to leave 'em so much
as a five-pound note for a leggicy. And there's sister Glegg, and
sister Pullet too, saving money unknown, for they put by all their
own interest and butter-money too; their husbands buy 'em
everything." Mrs. Tulliver was a mild woman, but even a sheep will
face about a little when she has lambs.

"Tchuh!" said Mr. Tulliver. "It takes a big loaf when there's
many to breakfast. What signifies your sisters' bits o' money when
they've got half-a-dozen nevvies and nieces to divide it among? And
your sister Deane won't get 'em to leave all to one, I reckon, and
make the country cry shame on 'em when they are dead?"

"I don't know what she won't get 'em to do," said Mrs. Tulliver,
"for my children are so awk'ard wi' their aunts and uncles.
Maggie's ten times naughtier when they come than she is other days,
and Tom doesn't like 'em, bless him!–though it's more nat'ral in a
boy than a gell. And there's Lucy Deane's such a good child,–you
may set her on a stool, and there she'llsit for an hour together,
and never offer to get off. I can't help loving the child as if she
was my own; and I'm sure she's more like
my
child than
sister Deane's, for she'd allays a very poor color for one of our
family, sister Deane had."

"Well, well, if you're fond o' the child, ask her father and
mother to bring her with 'em. And won't you ask their aunt and
uncle Moss too, and some o'
their
children?"

"Oh, dear, Mr. Tulliver, why, there'd be eight people besides
the children, and I must put two more leaves i' the table, besides
reaching down more o' the dinner-service; and you know as well as I
do as
my
sisters and
your
sister don't suit well
together."

"Well, well, do as you like, Bessy," said Mr. Tulliver, taking
up his hat and walking out to the mill. Few wives were more
submissive than Mrs. Tulliver on all points unconnected with her
family relations; but she had been a Miss Dodson, and the Dodsons
were a very respectable family indeed,–as much looked up to as any
in their own parish, or the next to it. The Miss Dodsons had always
been thought to hold up their heads very high, and no one was
surprised the two eldest had married so well,–not at an early age,
for that was not the practice of the Dodson family. There were
particular ways of doing everything in that family: particular ways
of bleaching the linen, of making the cowslip wine, curing the
hams, and keeping the bottled gooseberries; so that no daughter of
that house could be indifferent to the privilege of having been
born a Dodson, rather than a Gibson or a Watson. Funerals were
always conducted with peculiar propriety in the Dodson family: the
hat-bands were never of a blue shade, the gloves never split at the
thumb, everybody was a mourner who ought to be, and there were
always scarfs for the bearers. When one of the family was in
trouble or sickness, all the rest went to visit the unfortunate
member, usually at the same time, and did not shrink from uttering
the most disagreeable truths that correct family feeling dictated;
if the illness or trouble was the sufferer's own fault, it was not
in the practice of the Dodson family to shrink from saying so. In
short, there was in this family a peculiar tradition as to what was
the right thing in household management and social demeanor, and
the only bitter circumstance attending this superiority was a
painful inability to approve the condiments or the conduct of
families ungoverned by the Dodson tradition. A female Dodson, when
in "strange houses," always ate dry bread with her tea, and
declined any sort of preserves, having no confidence in the butter,
and thinking that the preserves had probably begun to ferment from
want of due sugar and boiling. There were some Dodsons less like
the family than others, that was admitted; but in so far as they
were "kin," they were of necessity better than those who were "no
kin." And it is remarkable that while no individual Dodson was
satisfied with any other individual Dodson, each was satisfied, not
only with him or her self, but with the Dodsons collectively. The
feeblest member of a family–the one who has the least character–is
often the merest epitome of the family habits and traditions; and
Mrs. Tulliver was a thorough Dodson, though a mild one, as
small-beer, so long as it is anything, is only describable as very
weak ale: and though she had groaned a little in her youth under
the yoke of her elder sisters, and still shed occasional tears at
their sisterly reproaches, it was not in Mrs. Tulliver to be an
innovator on the family ideas. She was thankful to have been a
Dodson, and to have one child who took after her own family, at
least in his features and complexion, in liking salt and in eating
beans, which a Tulliver never did.

In other respects the true Dodson was partly latent in Tom, and
he was as far from appreciating his "kin" on the mother's side as
Maggie herself, generally absconding for the day with a large
supply of the most portable food, when he received timely warning
that his aunts and uncles were coming,–a moral symptom from which
his aunt Glegg deduced the gloomiest views of his future. It was
rather hard on Maggie that Tom always absconded without letting her
into the secret, but the weaker sex are acknowledged to be serious
impedimenta
in cases of flight.

On Wednesday, the day before the aunts and uncles were coming,
there were such various and suggestive scents, as of plumcakes in
the oven and jellies in the hot state, mingled with the aroma of
gravy, that it was impossible to feel altogether gloomy: there was
hope in the air. Tom and Maggie made several inroads into the
kitchen, and, like other marauders, were induced to keep aloof for
a time only by being allowed to carry away a sufficient load of
booty.

"Tom," said Maggie, as they sat on the boughs of the elder-tree,
eating their jam-puffs, "shall you run away to-morrow?"

"No," said Tom, slowly, when he had finished his puff, and was
eying the third, which was to be divided between them,–"no, I
sha'n't."

"Why, Tom? Because Lucy's coming?"

"No," said Tom, opening his pocket-knife and holding it over the
puff, with his head on one side in a dubitative manner. (It was a
difficult problem to divide that very irregular polygon into two
equal parts.) "What do
I
care about Lucy? She's only a
girl,–
she
can't play at bandy."

"Is it the tipsy-cake, then?" said Maggie, exerting her
hypothetic powers, while she leaned forward toward Tom with her
eyes fixed on the hovering knife.

"No, you silly, that'll be good the day after. It's the pudden.
I know what the pudden's to be,–apricot roll-up–O my buttons!"

With this interjection, the knife descended on the puff, and it
was in two, but the result was not satisfactory to Tom, for he
still eyed the halves doubtfully. At last he said,–

"Shut your eyes, Maggie."

"What for?"

"You never mind what for. Shut 'em when I tell you."

Maggie obeyed.

"Now, which'll you have, Maggie,–right hand or left?"

"I'll have that with the jam run out," said Maggie, keeping her
eyes shut to please Tom.

"Why, you don't like that, you silly. You may have it if it
comes to you fair, but I sha'n't give it you without. Right or
left,–you choose, now. Ha-a-a!" said Tom, in a tone of
exasperation, as Maggie peeped. "You keep your eyes shut, now, else
you sha'n't have any."

Maggie's power of sacrifice did not extend so far; indeed, I
fear she cared less that Tom should enjoy the utmost possible
amount of puff, than that he should be pleased with her for giving
him the best bit. So she shut her eyes quite close, till Tom told
her to "say which," and then she said, "Left hand."

"You've got it," said Tom, in rather a bitter tone.

"What! the bit with the jam run out?"

"No; here, take it," said Tom, firmly, handing, decidedly the
best piece to Maggie.

"Oh, please, Tom, have it; I don't mind–I like the other; please
take this."

"No, I sha'n't," said Tom, almost crossly, beginning on his own
inferior piece.

Maggie, thinking it was no use to contend further, began too,
and ate up her half puff with considerable relish as well as
rapidity. But Tom had finished first, and had to look on while
Maggie ate her last morsel or two, feeling in himself a capacity
for more. Maggie didn't know Tom was looking at her; she was
seesawing on the elder-bough, lost to almost everything but a vague
sense of jam and idleness.

"Oh, you greedy thing!" said Tom, when she had swallowed the
last morsel. He was conscious of having acted very fairly, and
thought she ought to have considered this, and made up to him for
it. He would have refused a bit of hers beforehand, but one is
naturally at a different point of view before and after one's own
share of puff is swallowed.

Maggie turned quite pale. "Oh, Tom, why didn't you ask me?"

"I wasn't going to ask you for a bit, you greedy. You might have
thought of it without, when you knew I gave you the best bit."

"But I wanted you to have it; you know I did," said Maggie, in
an injured tone.

"Yes, but I wasn't going to do what wasn't fair, like Spouncer.
He always takes the best bit, if you don't punch him for it; and if
you choose the best with your eyes shut, he changes his hands. But
if I go halves, I'll go 'em fair; only I wouldn't be a greedy."

With this cutting innuendo, Tom jumped down from his bough, and
threw a stone with a "hoigh!" as a friendly attention to Yap, who
had also been looking on while the eatables vanished, with an
agitation of his ears and feelings which could hardly have been
without bitterness. Yet the excellent dog accepted Tom's attention
with as much alacrity as if he had been treated quite
generously.

But Maggie, gifted with that superior power of misery which
distinguishes the human being, and places him at a proud distance
from the most melancholy chimpanzee, sat still on her bough, and
gave herself up to the keen sense of unmerited reproach. She would
have given the world not to have eaten all her puff, and to have
saved some of it for Tom. Not but that the puff was very nice, for
Maggie's palate was not at all obtuse, but she would have gone
without it many times over, sooner than Tom should call her greedy
and be cross with her. And he had said he wouldn't have it, and she
ate it without thinking; how could she help it? The tears flowed so
plentifully that Maggie saw nothing around her for the next ten
minutes; but by that time resentment began to give way to the
desire of reconciliation, and she jumped from her bough to look for
Tom. He was no longer in the paddock behind the rickyard; where was
he likely to be gone, and Yap with him? Maggie ran to the high bank
against the great holly-tree, where she could see far away toward
the Floss. There was Tom; but her heart sank again as she saw how
far off he was on his way to the great river, and that he had
another companion besides Yap,–naughty Bob Jakin, whose official,
if not natural, function of frightening the birds was just now at a
standstill. Maggie felt sure that Bob was wicked, without very
distinctly knowing why; unless it was because Bob's mother was a
dreadfully large fat woman, who lived at a queer round house down
the river; and once, when Maggie and Tom had wandered thither,
there rushed out a brindled dog that wouldn't stop barking; and
when Bob's mother came out after it, and screamed above the barking
to tell them not to be frightened, Maggie thought she was scolding
them fiercely, and her heart beat with terror. Maggie thought it
very likely that the round house had snakes on the floor, and bats
in the bedroom; for she had seen Bob take off his cap to show Tom a
little snake that was inside it, and another time he had a handful
of young bats: altogether, he was an irregular character, perhaps
even slightly diabolical, judging from his intimacy with snakes and
bats; and to crown all, when Tom had Bob for a companion, he didn't
mind about Maggie, and would never let her go with him.