Tom and Maggie Tulliver Read online

  Produced by Al Haines

  Cover art]

  [Frontispiece: Tom came running to prevent Maggie from snatching herline away.]

  TOM AND MAGGIE TULLIVER

  TOLD FROM GEORGE ELIOT'S

  "THE MILL ON THE FLOSS"

  THOMAS NELSON AND SONS, LTD.

  LONDON, EDINBURGH, AND NEW YORK

  1909

  CONTENTS.

  I. TOM MUST GO TO SCHOOL II. THE CHOICE OF A SCHOOL III. TOM COMES HOME IV. ALL ABOUT A JAM PUFF V. THE FAMILY PARTY VI. THE MAGIC MUSIC VII. MAGGIE IS VERY NAUGHTY VIII. MAGGIE AND THE GIPSIES IX. THE GIPSY QUEEN ABDICATES X. TOM AT SCHOOL XI. THE NEW SCHOOLFELLOW XII. THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON XIII. PHILIP AND MAGGIE

  LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

  TOM CAME RUNNING TO PREVENT MAGGIE FROM SNATCHING HER LINE AWAY . . . . . . . . . . . . _Frontispiece_

  "MY PRETTY LADY, ARE YOU COME TO STAY WITH US?"

  "HERE, MAGGIE, COME AND HEAR IF I CAN SAY THIS"

  "O TOM, PLEASE DON'T," CRIED MAGGIE

  MAGGIE AND TOM TULLIVER.

  Chapter I.

  TOM MUST GO TO SCHOOL.

  "What I want, you know," said Mr. Tulliver of Dorlcote Mill--"what Iwant is to give Tom a good eddication. That was what I was thinking ofwhen I gave notice for him to leave th' academy at Lady Day. I meantto put him to a downright good school at Midsummer.

  "The two years at th' academy 'ud ha' done well enough," the millerwent on, "if I'd meant to make a miller and farmer of him like myself.But I should like Tom to be a bit of a scholard, so as he might be upto the tricks o' these fellows as talk fine and write with a flourish.It 'ud be a help to me wi' these lawsuits and things."

  Mr. Tulliver was speaking to his wife, a blond, comely woman in afan-shaped cap.

  "Well, Mr. Tulliver," said she, "you know best. But hadn't I betterkill a couple o' fowl, and have th' aunts and uncles to dinner nextweek, so as you may hear what Sister Glegg and Sister Pullet have gotto say about it? There's a couple o' fowl _wants_ killing!"

  "You may kill every fowl i' the yard if you like, Bessy, but I shallask neither aunt nor uncle what I'm to do wi' my own lad," said Mr.Tulliver.

  "Dear heart!" said Mrs. Tulliver, "how can you talk so, Mr. Tulliver?However, if Tom's to go to a new school, I should like him to go whereI can wash him and mend him; else he might as well have calico aslinen, for they'd be one as yallow as th' other before they'd beenwashed half a dozen times. And then, when the box is goin' backardsand forrards, I could send the lad a cake, or a pork-pie, or an apple."

  "Well, well, we won't send him out o' reach o' the carrier's cart, ifother things fit in," said Mr. Tulliver. "But you mustn't put a spokei' the wheel about the washin' if we can't get a school near enough.But it's an uncommon puzzling thing to know what school to pick."

  Mr. Tulliver paused a minute or two, and dived with both hands into hispockets, as if he hoped to find some idea there. Then he said, "I knowwhat I'll do, I'll talk it over wi' Riley. He's coming to-morrow."

  "Well, Mr. Tulliver, I've put the sheets out for the best bed, andKezia's got 'em hanging at the fire. They aren't the best sheets, butthey're good enough for anybody to sleep in, be he who he will."

  As Mrs. Tulliver spoke she drew a bright bunch of keys from her pocket,and singled out one, rubbing her thumb and finger up and down it with aplacid smile while she looked at the clear fire.

  "I think I've hit it, Bessy," said Mr. Tulliver, after a short silence."Riley's as likely a man as any to know o' some school; he's hadschooling himself, an' goes about to all sorts o' places--auctioneeringand vallyin' and that. I want Tom to be such a sort o' man as Riley,you know--as can talk pretty nigh as well as if it was all wrote outfor him, and a good solid knowledge o' business too."

  "Well," said Mrs. Tulliver, "so far as talking proper, and knowingeverything, and walking with a bend in his back, and setting his hairup, I shouldn't mind the lad being brought up to that. But themfine-talking men from the big towns mostly wear the false shirt-fronts;they wear a frill till it's all a mess, and then hide it with a bib;--Iknow Riley does. And then, if Tom's to go and live at Mudport, likeRiley, he'll have a house with a kitchen hardly big enough to turn in,an' niver get a fresh egg for his breakfast, an' sleep up three pair o'stairs--or four, for what I know--an' be burnt to death before he canget down."