Life did change for Tom and Maggie; and yet they were
not wrong in believing that the thoughts and loves
of these first years would always make part of their
lives. We could never have loved the earth so
well if we had had no childhood in it,—if
it were not the earth where the same flowers come
up again every spring that we used to gather with
our tiny fingers as we sat lisping to ourselves on
the grass; the same hips and haws on the autumn’s
hedgerows; the same redbreasts that we used to call
“God’s birds,” because they did no
harm to the precious crops. What novelty is worth
that sweet monotony where everything is known, and
loved because it is known?
The wood I walk in on this mild May day, with the
young yellow-brown foliage of the oaks between me
and the blue sky, the white star-flowers and the blue-eyed
speedwell and the ground ivy at my feet, what grove
of tropic palms, what strange ferns or splendid broad-petalled
blossoms, could ever thrill such deep and delicate
fibres within me as this home scene? These familiar
flowers, these well-remembered bird-notes, this sky,
with its fitful brightness, these furrowed and grassy
fields, each with a sort of personality given to it
by the capricious hedgerows,—such things
as these are the mother-tongue of our imagination,
the language that is laden with all the subtle, inextricable
associations the fleeting hours of our childhood left
behind them. Our delight in the sunshine on the
deep-bladed grass to-day might be no more than the
faint perception of wearied souls, if it were not
for the sunshine and the grass in the far-off years
which still live in us, and transform our perception
into love.
Chapter VI
The Aunts and Uncles Are Coming
It was Easter week, and Mrs. Tulliver’s cheesecakes
were more exquisitely light than usual. “A
puff o’ wind ’ud make ’em blow about
like feathers,” Kezia the housemaid said, feeling
proud to live under a mistress who could make such
pastry; so that no season or circumstances could have
been more propitious for a family party, even if it
had not been advisable to consult sister Glegg and
sister Pullet about Tom’s going to school.
“I’d as lief not invite sister Deane this
time,” said Mrs. Tulliver, “for she’s
as jealous and having as can be, and’s allays
trying to make the worst o’ my poor children
to their aunts and uncles.”
“Yes, yes,” said Mr. Tulliver, “ask
her to come. I never hardly get a bit o’
talk with Deane now; we haven’t had him this
six months. What’s it matter what she says?
My children need be beholding to nobody.”
“That’s what you allays say, Mr. Tulliver;
but I’m sure there’s nobody o’ your
side, neither aunt nor uncle, to leave ’em so
much as a five-pound note for a leggicy. And
there’s sister Glegg, and sister Pullet too,
saving money unknown, for they put by all their own
interest and butter-money too; their husbands buy ’em
everything.” Mrs. Tulliver was a mild woman,
but even a sheep will face about a little when she
has lambs.
