Felix Holt | Page 2

from everything but its own patch of
earth and sky, away from the parish church by long fields and green
lanes, away from all intercourse except that of tramps. If its face could
be seen, it was most likely dirty; but the dirt was Protestant dirt, and the
big, bold, gin-breathing tramps were Protestant tramps. There was no
sign of superstition near, no crucifix or image to indicate a misguided
reverence: the inhabitants were probably so free from superstition that
they were in much less awe of the parson than of the overseer. Yet they
were saved from the excesses of Protestantism by not knowing how to
read, and by the absence of handlooms and mines to be the pioneers of
Dissent: they were kept safely in the via media of indifference, and
could have registcred themsclves in the census by a big black mark as
members of the Church of England.
But there were trim cheerful villages too, with a neat or handsome
parsonage and grey church set in the midst; there was the pleasant
tinkle of the blacksmith's anvil, the patient cart-horses waiting at his
door; the basket-maker peeling his willow wands in the sunshine; the
wheelwright putting the last touch to a blue cart with red wheels; here
and there a cottage with bright transparent windows showing pots of
blooming balsams or geraniums, and little gardens in front all double
daisies or dark wallflowers; at the well, clean and comely women
carrying yoked buckets, and towards the free school small Britons
dawdling on, and handling their marbles in the pockets of unpatched
corduroys adorned with brass buttons. The land around was rich and
marly, great corn-stacks stood in the rickyards - for the rick-burners
had not found their way hither; the homesteads were those of rich
fammers who paid no rent, or had the rare advantage of a lease, and
could afford to keep their corn till prices had risen. The coach would be
sure to overtake some of them on their way to their outlying fields or to

the market-town, sitting heavily on their well-groomed horses, or
weighing down one side of an olive-green gig. They probably thought
of the coach with some contempt, as an accommodation for people who
had not their own gigs, or who, wanting to travel to London and such
distant places, belonged to the trading and less solid part of the nation.
The passenger on the box could see that this was the district of
protuberant optimists, sure that old England was the best of all possible
countries, and that if there were any facts which had not fallen under
their own observation, they were facts not worth observing: the district
of clean little market-towns without manufactures, of fat livings, an
aristocratic clergy, and low poor-rates. But as the day wore on the
scene would change: the land would begin to be blackened with
coal-pits, the rattle of handlooms to be heard in hamlets and villages.
Here were powerful men walking queerly with knees bent outward
from squatting in the mine, going home to throw themselves down in
their blackened flannel and sleep through the daylight, then rise and
spend much of their high wages at the ale-house with their fellows of
the Benefit Club; here the pale eager faces of handloom-weavers, men
and women, haggard from sitting up late at night to finish the week's
work, hardly begun till the Wednesday. Everywhere the cottages and
the small children were dirty, for the languid mothers gave their
strength to the loom; pious Dissenting women, perhaps, who took life
patiently, and thought that salvation depended chiefly on predestination,
and not at all on cleanliness. The gables of Dissenting chapels now
made a visible sign of religion, and of a meeting-place to
counterbalance the ale-house, even in the hamlets; but if a couple of old
termagants were seen tearing each other's caps, it was a safe conclusion
that, if they had not received the sacraments of the Church, they had not
at least given in to schismatic rites, and were free from the errors of
Voluntaryism. The breath of the manufacturing town, which made a
cloudy day and a red gloom by night on the horizon, diffused itself over
all the surrounding country, filling the air with eager unrest. Here was a
population not convinced that old England was as good as possible;
here were multitudinous men and women aware that their religion was
not exactly the religion of their rulers, who might therefore be better
than they were, and who, if better, might alter many things which now
made the world perhaps more painful than it need be, and certainly

more sinful. Yet there were the grey steeples too, and the churchyards,
with their grassy mounds and venerable head-stones, sleeping in the
sunlight; there