Adam Bede

G >> George Eliot >> Adam Bede


Family likeness has often a deep sadness in it. Nature, that great
tragic dramatist, knits us together by bone and muscle, and divides us
by the subtler web of our brains; blends yearning and repulsion;
and ties us by our heart-strings to the beings that jar us at every
movement. We hear a voice with the very cadence of our own uttering the
thoughts we despise; we see eyes--ah, so like our mother's!--averted
from us in cold alienation; and our last darling child startles us with
the air and gestures of the sister we parted from in bitterness long
years ago. The father to whom we owe our best heritage--the mechanical
instinct, the keen sensibility to harmony, the unconscious skill of the
modelling hand--galls us and puts us to shame by his daily errors; the
long-lost mother, whose face we begin to see in the glass as our own
wrinkles come, once fretted our young souls with her anxious humours and
irrational persistence.

It is such a fond anxious mother's voice that you hear, as Lisbeth says,
"Well, my lad, it's gone seven by th' clock. Thee't allays stay till the
last child's born. Thee wants thy supper, I'll warrand. Where's Seth?
Gone arter some o's chapellin', I reckon?"

"Aye, aye, Seth's at no harm, mother, thee mayst be sure. But where's
father?" said Adam quickly, as he entered the house and glanced into the
room on the left hand, which was used as a workshop. "Hasn't he done the
coffin for Tholer? There's the stuff standing just as I left it this
morning."

"Done the coffin?" said Lisbeth, following him, and knitting
uninterruptedly, though she looked at her son very anxiously. "Eh, my
lad, he went aff to Treddles'on this forenoon, an's niver come back. I
doubt he's got to th' 'Waggin Overthrow' again."

A deep flush of anger passed rapidly over Adam's face. He said nothing,
but threw off his jacket and began to roll up his shirt-sleeves again.

"What art goin' to do, Adam?" said the mother, with a tone and look
of alarm. "Thee wouldstna go to work again, wi'out ha'in thy bit o'
supper?"

Adam, too angry to speak, walked into the workshop. But his mother threw
down her knitting, and, hurrying after him, took hold of his arm, and
said, in a tone of plaintive remonstrance, "Nay, my lad, my lad, thee
munna go wi'out thy supper; there's the taters wi' the gravy in 'em,
just as thee lik'st 'em. I saved 'em o' purpose for thee. Come an' ha'
thy supper, come."

"Let be!" said Adam impetuously, shaking her off and seizing one of
the planks that stood against the wall. "It's fine talking about having
supper when here's a coffin promised to be ready at Brox'on by seven
o'clock to-morrow morning, and ought to ha' been there now, and not a
nail struck yet. My throat's too full to swallow victuals."

"Why, thee canstna get the coffin ready," said Lisbeth. "Thee't work
thyself to death. It 'ud take thee all night to do't."

"What signifies how long it takes me? Isn't the coffin promised? Can
they bury the man without a coffin? I'd work my right hand off sooner
than deceive people with lies i' that way. It makes me mad to think
on't. I shall overrun these doings before long. I've stood enough of
'em."

Poor Lisbeth did not hear this threat for the first time, and if she had
been wise she would have gone away quietly and said nothing for the next
hour. But one of the lessons a woman most rarely learns is never to talk
to an angry or a drunken man. Lisbeth sat down on the chopping bench
and began to cry, and by the time she had cried enough to make her voice
very piteous, she burst out into words.

"Nay, my lad, my lad, thee wouldstna go away an' break thy mother's
heart, an' leave thy feyther to ruin. Thee wouldstna ha' 'em carry me to
th' churchyard, an' thee not to follow me. I shanna rest i' my grave
if I donna see thee at th' last; an' how's they to let thee know as I'm
a-dyin', if thee't gone a-workin' i' distant parts, an' Seth belike gone
arter thee, and thy feyther not able to hold a pen for's hand shakin',
besides not knowin' where thee art? Thee mun forgie thy feyther--thee
munna be so bitter again' him. He war a good feyther to thee afore he
took to th' drink. He's a clever workman, an' taught thee thy trade,
remember, an's niver gen me a blow nor so much as an ill word--no,
not even in 's drink. Thee wouldstna ha' 'm go to the workhus--thy own
feyther--an' him as was a fine-growed man an' handy at everythin' amost
as thee art thysen, five-an'-twenty 'ear ago, when thee wast a baby at
the breast."

Lisbeth's voice became louder, and choked with sobs--a sort of wail,
the most irritating of all sounds where real sorrows are to be borne and
real work to be done. Adam broke in impatiently.

"Now, Mother, don't cry and talk so. Haven't I got enough to vex me
without that? What's th' use o' telling me things as I only think too
much on every day? If I didna think on 'em, why should I do as I do, for
the sake o' keeping things together here? But I hate to be talking where
it's no use: I like to keep my breath for doing i'stead o' talking."

"I know thee dost things as nobody else 'ud do, my lad. But thee't
allays so hard upo' thy feyther, Adam. Thee think'st nothing too much
to do for Seth: thee snapp'st me up if iver I find faut wi' th' lad. But
thee't so angered wi' thy feyther, more nor wi' anybody else."

"That's better than speaking soft and letting things go the wrong way,
I reckon, isn't it? If I wasn't sharp with him he'd sell every bit o'
stuff i' th' yard and spend it on drink. I know there's a duty to be
done by my father, but it isn't my duty to encourage him in running
headlong to ruin. And what has Seth got to do with it? The lad does no
harm as I know of. But leave me alone, Mother, and let me get on with
the work."

Lisbeth dared not say any more; but she got up and called Gyp, thinking
to console herself somewhat for Adam's refusal of the supper she had
spread out in the loving expectation of looking at him while he ate it,
by feeding Adam's dog with extra liberality. But Gyp was watching his
master with wrinkled brow and ears erect, puzzled at this unusual course
of things; and though he glanced at Lisbeth when she called him, and
moved his fore-paws uneasily, well knowing that she was inviting him to
supper, he was in a divided state of mind, and remained seated on his
haunches, again fixing his eyes anxiously on his master. Adam noticed
Gyp's mental conflict, and though his anger had made him less tender
than usual to his mother, it did not prevent him from caring as much as
usual for his dog. We are apt to be kinder to the brutes that love us
than to the women that love us. Is it because the brutes are dumb?

"Go, Gyp; go, lad!" Adam said, in a tone of encouraging command; and
Gyp, apparently satisfied that duty and pleasure were one, followed
Lisbeth into the house-place.

But no sooner had he licked up his supper than he went back to his
master, while Lisbeth sat down alone to cry over her knitting. Women
who are never bitter and resentful are often the most querulous; and
if Solomon was as wise as he is reputed to be, I feel sure that when
he compared a contentious woman to a continual dropping on a very rainy
day, he had not a vixen in his eye--a fury with long nails, acrid and
selfish. Depend upon it, he meant a good creature, who had no joy but
in the happiness of the loved ones whom she contributed to make
uncomfortable, putting by all the tid-bits for them and spending nothing
on herself. Such a woman as Lisbeth, for example--at once patient and
complaining, self-renouncing and exacting, brooding the livelong day
over what happened yesterday and what is likely to happen to-morrow,
and crying very readily both at the good and the evil. But a certain
awe mingled itself with her idolatrous love of Adam, and when he said,
"Leave me alone," she was always silenced.

So the hours passed, to the loud ticking of the old day-clock and the
sound of Adam's tools. At last he called for a light and a draught
of water (beer was a thing only to be drunk on holidays), and Lisbeth
ventured to say as she took it in, "Thy supper stan's ready for thee,
when thee lik'st."

"Donna thee sit up, mother," said Adam, in a gentle tone. He had worked
off his anger now, and whenever he wished to be especially kind to his
mother, he fell into his strongest native accent and dialect, with which
at other times his speech was less deeply tinged. "I'll see to Father
when he comes home; maybe he wonna come at all to-night. I shall be
easier if thee't i' bed."

"Nay, I'll bide till Seth comes. He wonna be long now, I reckon."

It was then past nine by the clock, which was always in advance of
the days, and before it had struck ten the latch was lifted and Seth
entered. He had heard the sound of the tools as he was approaching.

"Why, Mother," he said, "how is it as Father's working so late?"

"It's none o' thy feyther as is a-workin'--thee might know that well
anoof if thy head warna full o' chapellin'--it's thy brother as does
iverything, for there's niver nobody else i' th' way to do nothin'."

Lisbeth was going on, for she was not at all afraid of Seth, and usually
poured into his ears all the querulousness which was repressed by her
awe of Adam. Seth had never in his life spoken a harsh word to his
mother, and timid people always wreak their peevishness on the gentle.
But Seth, with an anxious look, had passed into the workshop and said,
"Addy, how's this? What! Father's forgot the coffin?"

"Aye, lad, th' old tale; but I shall get it done," said Adam, looking up
and casting one of his bright keen glances at his brother. "Why, what's
the matter with thee? Thee't in trouble."

Seth's eyes were red, and there was a look of deep depression on his
mild face.

"Yes, Addy, but it's what must be borne, and can't be helped. Why,
thee'st never been to the school, then?"

"School? No, that screw can wait," said Adam, hammering away again.

"Let me take my turn now, and do thee go to bed," said Seth.

"No, lad, I'd rather go on, now I'm in harness. Thee't help me to carry
it to Brox'on when it's done. I'll call thee up at sunrise. Go and eat
thy supper, and shut the door so as I mayn't hear Mother's talk."

Seth knew that Adam always meant what he said, and was not to be
persuaded into meaning anything else. So he turned, with rather a heavy
heart, into the house-place.

"Adam's niver touched a bit o' victual sin' home he's come," said
Lisbeth. "I reckon thee'st hed thy supper at some o' thy Methody folks."

"Nay, Mother," said Seth, "I've had no supper yet."

"Come, then," said Lisbeth, "but donna thee ate the taters, for Adam
'ull happen ate 'em if I leave 'em stannin'. He loves a bit o' taters
an' gravy. But he's been so sore an' angered, he wouldn't ate 'em, for
all I'd putten 'em by o' purpose for him. An' he's been a-threatenin'
to go away again," she went on, whimpering, "an' I'm fast sure he'll go
some dawnin' afore I'm up, an' niver let me know aforehand, an' he'll
niver come back again when once he's gone. An' I'd better niver ha'
had a son, as is like no other body's son for the deftness an' th'
handiness, an' so looked on by th' grit folks, an' tall an' upright like
a poplar-tree, an' me to be parted from him an' niver see 'm no more."

"Come, Mother, donna grieve thyself in vain," said Seth, in a soothing
voice. "Thee'st not half so good reason to think as Adam 'ull go away
as to think he'll stay with thee. He may say such a thing when he's in
wrath--and he's got excuse for being wrathful sometimes--but his heart
'ud never let him go. Think how he's stood by us all when it's been none
so easy--paying his savings to free me from going for a soldier, an'
turnin' his earnin's into wood for father, when he's got plenty o' uses
for his money, and many a young man like him 'ud ha' been married and
settled before now. He'll never turn round and knock down his own work,
and forsake them as it's been the labour of his life to stand by."

"Donna talk to me about's marr'in'," said Lisbeth, crying afresh. "He's
set's heart on that Hetty Sorrel, as 'ull niver save a penny, an' 'ull
toss up her head at's old mother. An' to think as he might ha' Mary
Burge, an' be took partners, an' be a big man wi' workmen under him,
like Mester Burge--Dolly's told me so o'er and o'er again--if it warna
as he's set's heart on that bit of a wench, as is o' no more use nor the
gillyflower on the wall. An' he so wise at bookin' an' figurin', an' not
to know no better nor that!"

"But, Mother, thee know'st we canna love just where other folks 'ud have
us. There's nobody but God can control the heart of man. I could ha'
wished myself as Adam could ha' made another choice, but I wouldn't
reproach him for what he can't help. And I'm not sure but what he tries
to o'ercome it. But it's a matter as he doesn't like to be spoke to
about, and I can only pray to the Lord to bless and direct him."

"Aye, thee't allays ready enough at prayin', but I donna see as thee
gets much wi' thy prayin'. Thee wotna get double earnin's o' this side
Yule. Th' Methodies 'll niver make thee half the man thy brother is, for
all they're a-makin' a preacher on thee."

"It's partly truth thee speak'st there, Mother," said Seth, mildly;
"Adam's far before me, an's done more for me than I can ever do for him.
God distributes talents to every man according as He sees good. But thee
mustna undervally prayer. Prayer mayna bring money, but it brings us
what no money can buy--a power to keep from sin and be content with
God's will, whatever He may please to send. If thee wouldst pray to God
to help thee, and trust in His goodness, thee wouldstna be so uneasy
about things."

"Unaisy? I'm i' th' right on't to be unaisy. It's well seen on THEE what
it is niver to be unaisy. Thee't gi' away all thy earnin's, an' niver be
unaisy as thee'st nothin' laid up again' a rainy day. If Adam had been
as aisy as thee, he'd niver ha' had no money to pay for thee. Take
no thought for the morrow--take no thought--that's what thee't allays
sayin'; an' what comes on't? Why, as Adam has to take thought for thee."

"Those are the words o' the Bible, Mother," said Seth. "They don't
mean as we should be idle. They mean we shouldn't be overanxious and
worreting ourselves about what'll happen to-morrow, but do our duty and
leave the rest to God's will."

"Aye, aye, that's the way wi' thee: thee allays makes a peck o' thy own
words out o' a pint o' the Bible's. I donna see how thee't to know as
'take no thought for the morrow' means all that. An' when the Bible's
such a big book, an' thee canst read all thro't, an' ha' the pick o' the
texes, I canna think why thee dostna pick better words as donna mean so
much more nor they say. Adam doesna pick a that'n; I can understan' the
tex as he's allays a-sayin', 'God helps them as helps theirsens.'"

"Nay, Mother," said Seth, "that's no text o' the Bible. It comes out of
a book as Adam picked up at the stall at Treddles'on. It was wrote by
a knowing man, but overworldly, I doubt. However, that saying's partly
true; for the Bible tells us we must be workers together with God."

"Well, how'm I to know? It sounds like a tex. But what's th' matter wi'
th' lad? Thee't hardly atin' a bit o' supper. Dostna mean to ha' no more
nor that bit o' oat-cake? An' thee lookst as white as a flick o' new
bacon. What's th' matter wi' thee?"

"Nothing to mind about, Mother; I'm not hungry. I'll just look in at
Adam again, and see if he'll let me go on with the coffin."

"Ha' a drop o' warm broth?" said Lisbeth, whose motherly feeling now got
the better of her "nattering" habit. "I'll set two-three sticks a-light
in a minute."

"Nay, Mother, thank thee; thee't very good," said Seth, gratefully; and
encouraged by this touch of tenderness, he went on: "Let me pray a
bit with thee for Father, and Adam, and all of us--it'll comfort thee,
happen, more than thee thinkst."

"Well, I've nothin' to say again' it."

Lisbeth, though disposed always to take the negative side in her
conversations with Seth, had a vague sense that there was some comfort
and safety in the fact of his piety, and that it somehow relieved her
from the trouble of any spiritual transactions on her own behalf.

So the mother and son knelt down together, and Seth prayed for the poor
wandering father and for those who were sorrowing for him at home. And
when he came to the petition that Adam might never be called to set
up his tent in a far country, but that his mother might be cheered and
comforted by his presence all the days of her pilgrimage, Lisbeth's
ready tears flowed again, and she wept aloud.

When they rose from their knees, Seth went to Adam again and said, "Wilt
only lie down for an hour or two, and let me go on the while?"

"No, Seth, no. Make Mother go to bed, and go thyself."

Meantime Lisbeth had dried her eyes, and now followed Seth, holding
something in her hands. It was the brown-and-yellow platter containing
the baked potatoes with the gravy in them and bits of meat which she had
cut and mixed among them. Those were dear times, when wheaten bread
and fresh meat were delicacies to working people. She set the dish down
rather timidly on the bench by Adam's side and said, "Thee canst pick a
bit while thee't workin'. I'll bring thee another drop o' water."

"Aye, Mother, do," said Adam, kindly; "I'm getting very thirsty."

In half an hour all was quiet; no sound was to be heard in the house but
the loud ticking of the old day-clock and the ringing of Adam's tools.
The night was very still: when Adam opened the door to look out at
twelve o'clock, the only motion seemed to be in the glowing, twinkling
stars; every blade of grass was asleep.

Bodily haste and exertion usually leave our thoughts very much at the
mercy of our feelings and imagination; and it was so to-night with Adam.
While his muscles were working lustily, his mind seemed as passive as a
spectator at a diorama: scenes of the sad past, and probably sad
future, floating before him and giving place one to the other in swift
succession.

He saw how it would be to-morrow morning, when he had carried the coffin
to Broxton and was at home again, having his breakfast: his father
perhaps would come in ashamed to meet his son's glance--would sit down,
looking older and more tottering than he had done the morning before,
and hang down his head, examining the floor-quarries; while Lisbeth
would ask him how he supposed the coffin had been got ready, that he had
slinked off and left undone--for Lisbeth was always the first to utter
the word of reproach, although she cried at Adam's severity towards his
father.

"So it will go on, worsening and worsening," thought Adam; "there's no
slipping uphill again, and no standing still when once you 've begun
to slip down." And then the day came back to him when he was a little
fellow and used to run by his father's side, proud to be taken out
to work, and prouder still to hear his father boasting to his
fellow-workmen how "the little chap had an uncommon notion o'
carpentering." What a fine active fellow his father was then! When
people asked Adam whose little lad he was, he had a sense of distinction
as he answered, "I'm Thias Bede's lad." He was quite sure everybody
knew Thias Bede--didn't he make the wonderful pigeon-house at Broxton
parsonage? Those were happy days, especially when Seth, who was three
years the younger, began to go out working too, and Adam began to be a
teacher as well as a learner. But then came the days of sadness, when
Adam was someway on in his teens, and Thias began to loiter at the
public-houses, and Lisbeth began to cry at home, and to pour forth her
plaints in the hearing of her sons. Adam remembered well the night of
shame and anguish when he first saw his father quite wild and foolish,
shouting a song out fitfully among his drunken companions at the "Waggon
Overthrown." He had run away once when he was only eighteen, making
his escape in the morning twilight with a little blue bundle over
his shoulder, and his "mensuration book" in his pocket, and saying
to himself very decidedly that he could bear the vexations of home no
longer--he would go and seek his fortune, setting up his stick at the
crossways and bending his steps the way it fell. But by the time he got
to Stoniton, the thought of his mother and Seth, left behind to endure
everything without him, became too importunate, and his resolution
failed him. He came back the next day, but the misery and terror his
mother had gone through in those two days had haunted her ever since.

"No!" Adam said to himself to-night, "that must never happen again. It
'ud make a poor balance when my doings are cast up at the last, if my
poor old mother stood o' the wrong side. My back's broad enough and
strong enough; I should be no better than a coward to go away and leave
the troubles to be borne by them as aren't half so able. 'They that are
strong ought to bear the infirmities of those that are weak, and not to
please themselves.' There's a text wants no candle to show't; it shines
by its own light. It's plain enough you get into the wrong road i' this
life if you run after this and that only for the sake o' making things
easy and pleasant to yourself. A pig may poke his nose into the trough
and think o' nothing outside it; but if you've got a man's heart and
soul in you, you can't be easy a-making your own bed an' leaving the
rest to lie on the stones. Nay, nay, I'll never slip my neck out o' the
yoke, and leave the load to be drawn by the weak uns. Father's a sore
cross to me, an's likely to be for many a long year to come. What then?
I've got th' health, and the limbs, and the sperrit to bear it."

At this moment a smart rap, as if with a willow wand, was given at the
house door, and Gyp, instead of barking, as might have been expected,
gave a loud howl. Adam, very much startled, went at once to the door
and opened it. Nothing was there; all was still, as when he opened it
an hour before; the leaves were motionless, and the light of the stars
showed the placid fields on both sides of the brook quite empty of
visible life. Adam walked round the house, and still saw nothing except
a rat which darted into the woodshed as he passed. He went in again,
wondering; the sound was so peculiar that the moment he heard it it
called up the image of the willow wand striking the door. He could not
help a little shudder, as he remembered how often his mother had told
him of just such a sound coming as a sign when some one was dying. Adam
was not a man to be gratuitously superstitious, but he had the blood of
the peasant in him as well as of the artisan, and a peasant can no
more help believing in a traditional superstition than a horse can help
trembling when he sees a camel. Besides, he had that mental combination
which is at once humble in the region of mystery and keen in the region
of knowledge: it was the depth of his reverence quite as much as
his hard common sense which gave him his disinclination to doctrinal
religion, and he often checked Seth's argumentative spiritualism by
saying, "Eh, it's a big mystery; thee know'st but little about it." And
so it happened that Adam was at once penetrating and credulous. If a
new building had fallen down and he had been told that this was a divine
judgment, he would have said, "May be; but the bearing o' the roof and
walls wasn't right, else it wouldn't ha' come down"; yet he believed
in dreams and prognostics, and to his dying day he bated his breath a
little when he told the story of the stroke with the willow wand. I
tell it as he told it, not attempting to reduce it to its natural
elements--in our eagerness to explain impressions, we often lose our
hold of the sympathy that comprehends them.

But he had the best antidote against imaginative dread in the necessity
for getting on with the coffin, and for the next ten minutes his hammer
was ringing so uninterruptedly, that other sounds, if there were any,
might well be overpowered. A pause came, however, when he had to take
up his ruler, and now again came the strange rap, and again Gyp howled.
Adam was at the door without the loss of a moment; but again all was
still, and the starlight showed there was nothing but the dew-laden
grass in front of the cottage.

Adam for a moment thought uncomfortably about his father; but of late
years he had never come home at dark hours from Treddleston, and
there was every reason for believing that he was then sleeping off his
drunkenness at the "Waggon Overthrown." Besides, to Adam, the conception
of the future was so inseparable from the painful image of his father
that the fear of any fatal accident to him was excluded by the deeply
infixed fear of his continual degradation. The next thought that
occurred to him was one that made him slip off his shoes and tread
lightly upstairs, to listen at the bedroom doors. But both Seth and his
mother were breathing regularly.

Adam came down and set to work again, saying to himself, "I won't open
the door again. It's no use staring about to catch sight of a sound.
Maybe there's a world about us as we can't see, but th' ear's quicker
than the eye and catches a sound from't now and then. Some people think
they get a sight on't too, but they're mostly folks whose eyes are not
much use to 'em at anything else. For my part, I think it's better to
see when your perpendicular's true than to see a ghost."