George Eliot | Page 3

as in the love of perfect work in
"Stradivarius." He had Adam Bede's stalwart figure and robust
manhood. Caleb Garth, in Middlemarch, is in many ways a fine portrait
of him as to the nature of his employment, his delight in the soil, and
his honest, rugged character.
Caleb was wont to say that "it's a fine thing to have the chance of
getting a bit of the country into good fettle, and putting men into the
right way with their farming, and getting a bit of good contriving and
solid building done--that those who are living and those who come
after will be the better for. I'd sooner have it than a fortune. I hold it the
most honorable work that is." Robert Evans, like Caleb Garth, "while
faithfully serving his employers enjoyed great popularity among their
tenants. He was gentle but of indomitable firmness; and while stern to
the idle and unthrifty, he did not press heavily on those who might be
behindhand with their rent, owing to ill luck or misfortune, on quarter
days."

While still living in Staffordshire, Robert Evans lost his first wife, by
whom he had a son and a daughter. His second wife, the mother of
Marian, was a Miss Pearson, a gentle, loving woman, and a notable
housewife. She is described in the Mrs. Hackit of "Amos Barton,"
whose industry, sharp tongue, epigrammatic speech and marked
character were taken from life. Something of Mrs. Poyser also entered
into her nature. She had three children, Christiana, Isaac and Mary Ann.
The house at Griff was situated in a rich landscape, and was a large,
commodious farm-house of red brick, ivy-covered, and of two stories'
height. At the back was a large garden, and a farm-yard with barns and
sheds.
In the series of sonnets entitled "Brother and Sister," Marian has given
some account of her early life. She had the attachment there described
for her brother Isaac, and followed him about with the same persistence
and affection. The whole of that poem is autobiographical. The account
of the mother gives a delightful glimpse into Marian's child-life:
Our mother bade us keep the trodden ways, Stroked down my tippet,
set my brother's frill, Then with the benediction of her gaze Clung to us
lessening, and pursued us still Across the homestead to the rookery
elms, Whose tall old trunks had each a grassy mound, So rich for us,
we counted them as realms With varied products.
The early life of Marian Evans has, in many features of it, been very
fully described in the story of Maggie Tulliver. How far her own life is
that of Maggie may be seen by comparing the earlier chapters in The
Mill on the Floss with the "Brother and Sister." The incident described
in the poem, of her brother leaving her in charge of the fishing-rod, is
repeated in all its main features in the experiences of Maggie. In the
poem she describes an encounter with a gipsy, which again recalls
Maggie's encounter with some persons of that race. The whole account
of her childhood life with her brother, her trust in him, their delight in
the common pleasures of childhood, and the impression made on her by
the beauties of nature, reappears in striking similarity in the description
of the child-life of Maggie and Tom. These elements of her early
experience and observation of life have been well described by one

who knew her personally. This person says that "Maggie Tulliver's
childhood is clearly full of the most accurate personal recollections."
Marian Evans very early became an enthusiastic reader of the best
books. In an almanac she found a portion of one of the essays of
Charles Lamb, and remembered reading it with great delight. In her
seventh year a copy of Waverley was loaned to her older sister. She
became herself intensely fascinated by it, and when it was returned
before she had completed it she was thrown into much distress. The
story so possessed her that she began to complete it in writing,
according to her own conception. When this was discovered, the book
was again secured for her perusal. This incident she has described in a
sonnet, which appears as the motto to the fifty-seventh chapter of
Middlemarch.
They numbered scarce eight summers when a name Rose on their souls
and stirred such motions there As thrill the buds and shape their hidden
frame At penetration of the quickening air: His name who told of loyal
Evan Dhu, Of quaint Bradwardine, and Vich Ian Vor, Making the little
world their childhood knew Large with a land of mountain, lake and
scaur,
And larger yet with wonder, love, belief, Toward Walter Scott, who
living far away Sent them this wealth of joy and noble grief. The book