Mr. Tulliver was speaking to his wife, a blond comely5 woman in a fan-shaped cap (I am afraid to think how long it is since fan-shaped caps were worn, they must be so near coming in again. At that time, when Mrs. Tulliver was nearly forty, they were new at St. Ogg’s, and considered sweet things).
“Well, Mr. Tulliver, you know best: I’ve no objections. But hadn’t I better kill a couple o’ fowl6, and have th’ aunts and uncles to dinner next week, so as you may hear what sister Glegg and sister Pullet have got to say about it? There’s a couple o’ fowl wants killing7!”
“You may kill every fowl i’ the yard if you like, Bessy; but I shall ask neither aunt nor uncle what I’m to do wi’ my own lad,” said Mr. Tulliver, defiantly8.
“Dear heart!” said Mrs. Tulliver, shocked at this sanguinary rhetoric9, “how can you talk so, Mr. Tulliver? But it’s your way to speak disrespectful o’ my family; and sister Glegg throws all the blame upo’me, though I’m sure I’m as innocent as the babe unborn. For nobody’s ever heard me say as it wasn’t lucky for my children to have aunts and uncles as can live independent. Howiver, if Tom’s to go to a new school, I should like him to go where I can wash him and mend him; else he might as well have calico as linen10, for they’d be one as yallow as th’ other before they’d been washed half-a-dozen times. And then, when the box is goin’ back’ard and forrard, I could send the lad a cake, or a pork-pie, or an apple; for he can do with an extry bit, bless him! whether they stint11 him at the meals or no. My children can eat as much victuals12 as most, thank God!”
“Well, well, we won’t send him out o’ reach o’ the carrier’s cart, if other things fit in,” said Mr. Tulliver. “But you mustn’t put a spoke13 i’ the wheel about the washin,’ if we can’t get a school near enough. That’s the fault I have to find wi’ you, Bessy; if you see a stick i’ the road, you’re allays14 thinkin’ you can’t step over it. You’d want me not to hire a good wagoner, ‘cause he’d got a mole16 on his face.”
“Dear heart!” said Mrs. Tulliver, in mild surprise, “when did I iver make objections to a man because he’d got a mole on his face? I’m sure I’m rether fond o’ the moles17; for my brother, as is dead an’ gone, had a mole on his brow. But I can’t remember your iver offering to hire a wagoner with a mole, Mr. Tulliver. There was John Gibbs hadn’t a mole on his face no more nor you have, an’ I was all for having you hire him; an’ so you did hire him, an’ if he hadn’t died o’ th’ inflammation, as we paid Dr. Turnbull for attending him, he’d very like ha’ been drivin’ the wagon15 now. He might have a mole somewhere out o’ sight, but how was I to know that, Mr. Tulliver?”
“No, no, Bessy; I didn’t mean justly the mole; I meant it to stand for summat else; but niver mind — it’s puzzling work, talking is. What I’m thinking on, is how to find the right sort o’ school to send Tom to, for I might be ta’en in again, as I’ve been wi’ th’ academy. I’ll have nothing to do wi’ a ‘cademy again: whativer school I send Tom to, it sha’n’t be a ‘cademy; it shall be a place where the lads spend their time i’ summat else besides blacking the family’s shoes, and getting up the potatoes. It’s an uncommon19 puzzling thing to know what school to pick.”
Mr. Tulliver paused a minute or two, and dived with both hands into his breeches pockets as if he hoped to find some suggestion there. Apparently20 he was not disappointed, for he presently said, “I know what I’ll do: I’ll talk it over wi’ Riley; he’s coming to-morrow, t’ arbitrate about the dam.”
“Well, Mr. Tulliver, I’ve put the sheets out for the best bed, and Kezia’s got ’em hanging at the fire. They aren’t the best sheets, but they’re good enough for anybody to sleep in, be he who he will; for as for them best Holland sheets, I should repent21 buying ’em, only they’ll do to lay us out in. An’ if you was to die to-morrow, Mr. Tulliver, they’re mangled22 beautiful, an’ all ready, an’ smell o’ lavender as it ‘ud be a pleasure to lay ’em out; an’ they lie at the left-hand corner o’ the big oak linen-chest at the back: not as I should trust anybody to look ’em out but myself.”
As Mrs. Tulliver uttered the last sentence, she drew a bright bunch of keys from her pocket, and singled out one, rubbing her thumb and finger up and down it with a placid23 smile while she looked at the clear fire. If Mr. Tulliver had been a susceptible24 man in his conjugal25 relation, he might have supposed that she drew out the key to aid her imagination in anticipating the moment when he would be in a state to justify26 the production of the best Holland sheets. Happily he was not so; he was only susceptible in respect of his right to water-power; moreover, he had the marital27 habit of not listening very closely, and since his mention of Mr. Riley, had been apparently occupied in a tactile28 examination of his woollen stockings.
“I think I’ve hit it, Bessy,” was his first remark after a short silence. “Riley’s as likely a man as any to know o’ some school; he’s had schooling29 himself, an’ goes about to all sorts o’ places, arbitratin’ and vallyin’ and that. And we shall have time to talk it over to-morrow night when the business is done. 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 out for him, and knows a good lot o’ words as don’t mean much, so as you can’t lay hold of ’em i’ law; and a good solid knowledge o’ business too.”
“Well,” said Mrs. Tulliver, “so far as talking proper, and knowing everything, and walking with a bend in his back, and setting his hair up, I shouldn’t mind the lad being brought up to that. But them fine-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; I know Riley does. And then, if Tom’s to go and live at Mudport, like Riley, 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 — and be burnt to death before he can get down.”
“No, no,” said Mr. Tulliver, “I’ve no thoughts of his going to Mudport: I mean him to set up his office at St. Ogg’s, close by us, an’ live at home. But,” continued Mr. Tulliver after a pause, “what I’m a bit afraid on is, as Tom hasn’t got the right sort o’ brains for a smart fellow. I doubt he’s a bit slowish. He takes after your family, Bessy.”
“Yes, that he does,” said Mrs. Tulliver, accepting the last proposition entirely30 on its own merits; “he’s wonderful for liking31 a deal o’ salt in his broth18. That was my brother’s way, and my father’s before him.”
“It seems a bit a pity, though,” said Mr. Tulliver, “as the lad should take after the mother’s side instead o’ the little wench. That’s the worst on’t wi’ crossing o’ breeds: you can never justly calkilate what’ll come on’t. The little un takes after my side, now: she’s twice as ‘cute as Tom. Too ‘cute for a woman, I’m afraid,” continued Mr. Tulliver, turning his head dubiously32 first on one side and then on the other. “It’s no mischief33 much while she’s a little un; but an over-‘cute woman’s no better nor a long-tailed sheep — she’ll fetch none the bigger price for that.”
“Yes, it is a mischief while she’s a little un, Mr. Tulliver, for it runs to naughtiness. How to keep her in a clean pinafore two hours together passes my cunning. An’ now you put me i’ mind,” continued Mrs. Tulliver, rising and going to the window, “I don’t know where she is now, an’ it’s pretty nigh tea-time. Ah, I thought so — wanderin’ up an’ down by the water, like a wild thing: She’ll tumble in some day.”
Mrs. Tulliver rapped the window sharply, beckoned34, and shook her head — a process which she repeated more than once before she returned to her chair.
“You talk o’ ‘cuteness, Mr. Tulliver,” she observed as she sat down, “but I’m sure the child’s half an idiot i’ some things; for if I send her upstairs to fetch anything, she forgets what she’s gone for, an’ perhaps ‘ull sit down on the floor i’ the sunshine an’ plait her hair an’ sing to herself like a Bedlam35 creatur’, all the while I’m waiting for her downstairs. That niver run i’ my family, thank God! no more nor a brown skin as makes her look like a mulatter. I don’t like to fly i’ the face o’ Providence36, but it seems hard as I should have but one gell, an’ her so comical.”
“Pooh, nonsense!” said Mr. Tulliver; “she’s a straight, black-eyed wench as anybody need wish to see. I don’t know i’ what she’s behind other folks’s children; and she can read almost as well as the parson.”
“But her hair won’t curl all I can do with it, and she’s so franzy about having it put i’ paper, and I’ve such work as never was to make her stand and have it pinched with th’ irons.”
“Cut it off — cut it off short,” said the father, rashly.
“How can you talk so, Mr. Tulliver? She’s too big a gell — gone nine, and tall of her age — to have her hair cut short; an’ there’s her cousin Lucy’s got a row o’ curls round her head, an’ not a hair out o’ place. It seems hard as my sister Deane should have that pretty child; I’m sure Lucy takes more after me nor my own child does. Maggie, Maggie,” continued the mother, in a tone of half-coaxing fretfulness, as this small mistake of nature entered the room, “where’s the use o’ my telling you to keep away from the water? You’ll tumble in and be drownded some day, an’ then you’ll be sorry you didn’t do as mother told you.”
Maggie’s hair, as she threw off her bonnet37, painfully confirmed her mother’s accusation38. Mrs. Tulliver, desiring her daughter to have a curled crop, “like other folks’s children,” had had it cut too short in front to be pushed behind the ears; and as it was usually straight an hour after it had been taken out of paper, Maggie was incessantly39 tossing her head to keep the dark, heavy locks out of her gleaming black eyes — an action which gave her very much the air of a small Shetland pony40.
“Oh, dear, oh, dear, Maggie, what are you thinkin’of, to throw your bonnet down there? Take it upstairs, there’s a good gell, an’ let your hair be brushed, an’ put your other pinafore on, an’ change your shoes, do, for shame; an’ come an’ go on with your patchwork41, like a little lady.”
“Oh, mother,” said Maggie, in a vehemently42 cross tone, “I don’t want to do my patchwork.”
“What! not your pretty patchwork, to make a counterpane for your aunt Glegg?”
“It’s foolish work,” said Maggie, with a toss of her mane — “tearing things to pieces to sew ’em together again. And I don’t want to do anything for my aunt Glegg. I don’t like her.”
Exit Maggie, dragging her bonnet by the string, while Mr. Tulliver laughs audibly.
“I wonder at you, as you’ll laugh at her, Mr. Tulliver,” said the mother, with feeble fretfulness in her tone. “You encourage her i’ naughtiness. An’ her aunts will have it as it’s me spoils her.”
Mrs. Tulliver was what is called a good-tempered person — never cried, when she was a baby, on any slighter ground than hunger and pins; and from the cradle upward had been healthy, fair, plump, and dull-witted; in short, the flower of her family for beauty and amiability43. But milk and mildness are not the best things for keeping, and when they turn only a little sour, they may disagree with young stomachs seriously. I have often wondered whether those early Madonnas of Raphael, with the blond faces and somewhat stupid expression, kept their placidity44 undisturbed when their strong-limbed, strong-willed boys got a little too old to do without clothing. I think they must have been given to feeble remonstrance45, getting more and more peevish46 as it became more and more ineffectual.
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1
miller
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| n.磨坊主 | |
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2
lawsuits
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| n.诉讼( lawsuit的名词复数 ) | |
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3
arbitrations
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| n.仲裁，公断( arbitration的名词复数 ) | |
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4
outlay
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| n.费用，经费，支出；v.花费 | |
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5
comely
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| adj.漂亮的，合宜的 | |
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6
fowl
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| n.家禽，鸡，禽肉 | |
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7
killing
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| n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财 | |
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8
defiantly
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| adv.挑战地，大胆对抗地 | |
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9
rhetoric
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| n.修辞学，浮夸之言语 | |
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10
linen
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| n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的 | |
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11
stint
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| v.节省，限制，停止；n.舍不得化，节约，限制；连续不断的一段时间从事某件事 | |
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12
victuals
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| n.食物；食品 | |
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13
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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14
allays
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| v.减轻，缓和( allay的第三人称单数 ) | |
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15
wagon
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| n.四轮马车，手推车，面包车；无盖运货列车 | |
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16
mole
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| n.胎块；痣；克分子 | |
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17
moles
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| 防波堤( mole的名词复数 )； 鼹鼠； 痣； 间谍 | |
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18
broth
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| n.原(汁)汤(鱼汤、肉汤、菜汤等) | |
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19
uncommon
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| adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的 | |
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20
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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repent
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| v.悔悟，悔改，忏悔，后悔 | |
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22
mangled
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| vt.乱砍（mangle的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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23
placid
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| adj.安静的，平和的 | |
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24
susceptible
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| adj.过敏的，敏感的；易动感情的，易受感动的 | |
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25
conjugal
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| adj.婚姻的，婚姻性的 | |
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26
justify
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| vt.证明…正当(或有理)，为…辩护 | |
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marital
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| adj.婚姻的，夫妻的 | |
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28
tactile
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| adj.触觉的，有触觉的，能触知的 | |
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29
schooling
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| n.教育；正规学校教育 | |
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30
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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31
liking
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| n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢 | |
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32
dubiously
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| adv.可疑地，怀疑地 | |
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33
mischief
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| n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹 | |
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34
beckoned
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| v.（用头或手的动作）示意，召唤( beckon的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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35
bedlam
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| n.混乱，骚乱；疯人院 | |
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36
providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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37
bonnet
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| n.无边女帽；童帽 | |
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38
accusation
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| n.控告，指责，谴责 | |
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39
incessantly
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| ad.不停地 | |
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40
pony
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| adj.小型的；n.小马 | |
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41
patchwork
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| n.混杂物；拼缝物 | |
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42
vehemently
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| adv. 热烈地 | |
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43
amiability
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| n.和蔼可亲的，亲切的，友善的 | |
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44
placidity
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| n.平静，安静，温和 | |
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45
remonstrance
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| n抗议，抱怨 | |
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46
peevish
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| adj.易怒的，坏脾气的 | |
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