The Essential Works of George Eliot. George Eliot

I. What Had Happened at Home.

       II. Mrs. Tulliver’s Teraphim, or Household Gods.

       III. The Family Council.

       IV. A Vanishing Gleam.

       V. Tom Applies His Knife to the Oyster.

       VI. Tending to Refute the Popular Prejudice against the Present of a Pocket-Knife.

       VII. How a Hen Takes to Stratagem.

       VIII. Daylight on the Wreck.

       IX. An Item Added to the Family Register.

       Book IV. The Valley of Humiliation.

       I. A Variation of Protestantism Unknown to Bossuet.

       II. The Torn Nest Is Pierced by the Thorns.

       III. A Voice from the Past.

       Book V. Wheat and Tares.

       I. In the Red Deeps.

       II. Aunt Glegg Learns the Breadth of Bob’s Thumb.

       III. The Wavering Balance.

       IV. Another Love-Scene.

       V. The Cloven Tree.

       VI. The Hard-Won Triumph.

       VII. A Day of Reckoning.

       Book VI. The Great Temptation.

       I. A Duet in Paradise.

       II. First Impressions.

       III. Confidential Moments.

       IV. Brother and Sister.

       V. Showing That Tom Had Opened the Oyster.

       VI. Illustrating the Laws of Attraction.

       VII. Philip Re-enters.

       VIII. Wakem in a New Light.

       IX. Charity in Full-Dress.

       X. The Spell Seems Broken.

       XI. In the Lane.

       XII. A Family Party.

       XIII. Borne Along by the Tide.

       XIV. Waking.

       Book VII. The Final Rescue.

       I. The Return to the Mill.

       II. St. Ogg’s Passes Judgment.

       III. Showing That Old Acquaintances Are Capable of Surprising Us.

       IV. Maggie and Lucy.

       V. The Last Conflict.

       Conclusion.

Book I.

       Boy and Girl.

      Chapter I.

       Outside Dorlcote Mill.

       Table of Contents

      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 ships—laden with the fresh-scented fir-planks, with rounded sacks of oil-bearing seed, or with the dark glitter of coal—are borne along to the town of St. Ogg’s, 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 year’s 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,—perhaps 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,