Adam Bede
explanatory of the inconvenience he should find in having to buy and
sell more stock, with, “Well, sir, I think as it’s rether hard...” when
Mrs. Poyser burst in with the desperate determination to have her say
out this once, though it were to rain notices to quit and the only
shelter were the work-house.
“Then, sir, if I may speak—as, for all I’m a woman, and there’s folks
as thinks a woman’s fool enough to stan’ by an’ look on while the men
sign her soul away, I’ve a right to speak, for I make one quarter o’
the rent, and save another quarter—I say, if Mr. Thurle’s so ready to
take farms under you, it’s a pity but what he should take this, and see
if he likes to live in a house wi’ all the plagues o’ Egypt in’t—wi’
the cellar full o’ water, and frogs and toads hoppin’ up the steps by
dozens—and the floors rotten, and the rats and mice gnawing every bit
o’ cheese, and runnin’ over our heads as we lie i’ bed till we expect
’em to eat us up alive—as it’s a mercy they hanna eat the children long
ago. I should like to see if there’s another tenant besides Poyser as
’ud put up wi’ never having a bit o’ repairs done till a place tumbles
down—and not then, on’y wi’ begging and praying and having to pay
half—and being strung up wi’ the rent as it’s much if he gets enough
out o’ the land to pay, for all he’s put his own money into the ground
beforehand. See if you’ll get a stranger to lead such a life here as
that: a maggot must be born i’ the rotten cheese to like it, I reckon.
You may run away from my words, sir,” continued Mrs. Poyser, following
the old squire beyond the door—for after the first moments of stunned
surprise he had got up, and, waving his hand towards her with a smile,
had walked out towards his pony. But it was impossible for him to get
away immediately, for John was walking the pony up and down the yard,
and was some distance from the causeway when his master beckoned.
“You may run away from my words, sir, and you may go spinnin’ underhand
ways o’ doing us a mischief, for you’ve got Old Harry to your friend,
though nobody else is, but I tell you for once as we’re not dumb
creatures to be abused and made money on by them as ha’ got the lash i’
their hands, for want o’ knowing how t’ undo the tackle. An’ if I’m th’
only one as speaks my mind, there’s plenty o’ the same way o’ thinking
i’ this parish and the next to ’t, for your name’s no better than a
brimstone match in everybody’s nose—if it isna two-three old folks as
you think o’ saving your soul by giving ’em a bit o’ flannel and a drop
o’ porridge. An’ you may be right i’ thinking it’ll take but little to
save your soul, for it’ll be the smallest savin’ y’ iver made, wi’ all
your scrapin’.”
There are occasions on which two servant-girls and a waggoner may be a
formidable audience, and as the squire rode away on his black pony,
even the gift of short-sightedness did not prevent him from being aware
that Molly and Nancy and Tim were grinning not far from him. Perhaps he
suspected that sour old John was grinning behind him—which was also the
fact. Meanwhile the bull-dog, the black-and-tan terrier, Alick’s
sheep-dog, and the gander hissing at a safe distance from the pony’s
heels carried out the idea of Mrs. Poyser’s solo in an impressive
quartet.
Mrs. Poyser, however, had no sooner seen the pony move off than she
turned round, gave the two hilarious damsels a look which drove them
into the back kitchen, and unspearing her knitting, began to knit again
with her usual rapidity as she re-entered the house.
“Thee’st done it now,” said Mr. Poyser, a little alarmed and uneasy,
but not without some triumphant amusement at his wife’s outbreak.
“Yes, I know I’ve done it,” said Mrs. Poyser; “but I’ve had my say out,
and I shall be th’ easier for’t all my life. There’s no pleasure i’
living if you’re to be corked up for ever, and only dribble your mind
out by the sly, like a leaky barrel. I shan’t repent saying what I
think, if I live to be as old as th’ old squire; and there’s little
likelihood—for it seems as if them as aren’t wanted here are th’ only
folks as aren’t wanted i’ th’ other world.”
“But thee wutna like moving from th’ old place, this Michaelmas
twelvemonth,” said Mr. Poyser, “and going into a strange parish, where
thee know’st nobody. It’ll be hard upon us both, and upo’ Father too.”
“Eh, it’s no use worreting; there’s plenty o’ things may happen between
this and Michaelmas twelvemonth. The captain may be master afore then,
for what we know,” said Mrs. Poyser, inclined to take an unusually
hopeful view of an embarrassment which had been brought about by her
own merit and not by other people’s fault.
“_I’m_ none for worreting,” said Mr. Poyser, rising from his
three-cornered chair and walking slowly towards the door; “but I should
be loath to leave th’ old place, and the parish where I was bred and
born, and Father afore me. We should leave our roots behind us, I
doubt, and niver thrive again.”
Chapter XXXIII
More Links
The barley was all carried at last, and the harvest suppers went by
without waiting for the dismal black crop of beans. The apples and nuts
were gathered and stored; the scent of whey departed from the
farm-houses, and the scent of brewing came in its stead. The woods
behind the Chase, and all the hedgerow trees, took on a solemn
splendour under the dark low-hanging skies. Michaelmas was come, with
its fragrant basketfuls of purple damsons, and its paler purple
daisies, and its lads and lasses leaving or seeking service and winding
along between the yellow hedges, with their bundles under their arms.
But though Michaelmas was come, Mr. Thurle, that desirable tenant, did
not come to the Chase Farm, and the old squire, after all, had been
obliged to put in a new bailiff. It was known throughout the two
parishes that the squire’s plan had been frustrated because the Poysers
had refused to be “put upon,” and Mrs. Poyser’s outbreak was discussed
in all the farm-houses with a zest which was only heightened by
frequent repetition. The news that “Bony” was come back from Egypt was
comparatively insipid, and the repulse of the French in Italy was
nothing to Mrs. Poyser’s repulse of the old squire. Mr. Irwine had
heard a version of it in every parishioner’s house, with the one
exception of the Chase. But since he had always, with marvellous skill,
avoided any quarrel with Mr. Donnithorne, he could not allow himself
the pleasure of laughing at the old gentleman’s discomfiture with any
one besides his mother, who declared that if she were rich she should
like to allow Mrs. Poyser a pension for life, and wanted to invite her
to the parsonage that she might hear an account of the scene from Mrs.
Poyser’s own lips.
“No, no, Mother,” said Mr. Irwine; “it was a little bit of irregular
justice on Mrs. Poyser’s part, but a magistrate like me must not
countenance irregular justice. There must be no report spread that I
have taken notice of the quarrel, else I shall lose the little good
influence I have over the old man.”
“Well, I like that woman even better than her cream-cheeses,” said Mrs.
Irwine. “She has the spirit of three men, with that pale face of hers.
And she says such sharp things too.”
“Sharp! Yes, her tongue is like a new-set razor. She’s quite original
in her talk too; one of those untaught wits that help to stock a
country with proverbs. I told you that capital thing I heard her say
about Craig—that he was like a cock, who thought the sun had risen to
hear him crow. Now that’s an Æsop’s fable in a sentence.”
“But it will be a bad business if the old gentleman turns them out of
the farm next Michaelmas, eh?” said Mrs. Irwine.
“Oh, that must not be; and Poyser is such a good tenant that
Donnithorne is likely to think twice, and digest his spleen rather than
turn them out. But if he should give them notice at Lady Day, Arthur
and I must move heaven and earth to mollify him. Such old parishioners
as they are must not go.”
“Ah, there’s no knowing what may happen before Lady day,” said Mrs.
Irwine. “It struck me on Arthur’s birthday that the old man was a
little shaken: he’s eighty-three, you know. It’s really an
unconscionable age. It’s only women who have a right to live as long as
that.”
“When they’ve got old-bachelor sons who would be forlorn without them,”
said Mr. Irwine, laughing, and kissing his mother’s hand.
Mrs. Poyser, too, met her husband’s occasional forebodings of a notice
to quit with “There’s no knowing what may happen before Lady day”—one
of those undeniable general propositions which are usually intended to
convey a particular meaning very far from undeniable. But it is really
too hard upon human nature that it should be held a criminal offence to
imagine the death even of the king when he is turned eighty-three. It
is not to be believed that any but the dullest Britons can be good
subjects under that hard condition.
Apart from this foreboding, things went on much as usual in the Poyser
household. Mrs. Poyser thought she noticed a surprising improvement in
Hetty. To be sure, the girl got “closer tempered, and sometimes she
seemed as if there’d be no drawing a word from her with cart-ropes,”
but she thought much less about her dress, and went after the work
quite eagerly, without any telling. And it was wonderful how she never
wanted to go out now—indeed, could hardly be persuaded to go; and she
bore her aunt’s putting a stop to her weekly lesson in fine-work at the
Chase without the least grumbling or pouting. It must be, after all,
that she had set her heart on Adam at last, and her sudden freak of
wanting to be a lady’s maid must have been caused by some little pique
or misunderstanding between them, which had passed by. For whenever
Adam came to the Hall Farm, Hetty seemed to be in better spirits and to
talk more than at other times, though she was almost sullen when Mr.
Craig or any other admirer happened to pay a visit there.
Adam himself watched her at first with trembling anxiety, which gave
way to surprise and delicious hope. Five days after delivering Arthur’s
letter, he had ventured to go to the Hall Farm again—not without dread
lest the sight of him might be painful to her. She was not in the
house-place when he entered, and he sat talking to Mr. and Mrs. Poyser
for a few minutes with a heavy fear on his heart that they might
presently tell him Hetty was ill. But by and by there came a light step
that he knew, and when Mrs. Poyser said, “Come, Hetty, where have you
been?” Adam was obliged to turn round, though he was afraid to see the
changed look there must be in her face. He almost started when he saw
her smiling as if she were pleased to see him—looking the same as ever
at a first glance, only that she had her cap on, which he had never
seen her in before when he came of an evening. Still, when he looked at
her again and again as she moved about or sat at her work, there was a
change: the cheeks were as pink as ever, and she smiled as much as she
had ever done of late, but there was something different in her eyes,
in the expression of her face, in all her movements, Adam
thought—something harder, older, less child-like. “Poor thing!” he said
to himself, “that’s allays likely. It’s because she’s had her first
heartache. But she’s got a spirit to bear up under it. Thank God for
that.”
As the weeks went by, and he saw her always looking pleased to see
him—turning up her lovely face towards him as if she meant him to
understand that she was glad for him to come—and going about her work
in the same equable way, making no sign of sorrow, he began to believe
that her feeling towards Arthur must have been much slighter than he
had imagined in his first indignation and alarm, and that she had been