"Mother, I hate the flashy business.Talk about men who deserve the name, can any man deserving the name waste his time in that effeminate way, when he sees half the world going to ruin for want of somebody to buckle to and teach them how to breast the misery they are born to? I get up every morning and see the whole creation groaning and travailing in pain, as St.Paul says, and yet there am I, trafficking in glittering splendours with wealthy women and titled libertines, and pandering to the meanest vanities--I, who have health and strength enough for anything.I have been troubled in my mind about it all the year, and the end is that I cannot do it any more.""Why can't you do it as well as others?"
"I don't know, except that there are many things other people care for which I don't; and that's partly why Ithink I ought to do this.For one thing, my body does not require much of me.I cannot enjoy delicacies;good things are wasted upon me.Well, I ought to turn that defect to advantage, and by being able to do without what other people require I can spend what such things cost upon anybody else."Now, Yeobright, having inherited some of these very instincts from the woman before him, could not fail to awaken a reciprocity in her through her feelings, if not by arguments, disguise it as she might for his good.
She spoke with less assurance."And yet you might have been a wealthy man if you had only persevered.
Manager to that large diamond establishment--what better can a man wish for? What a post of trust and respect!
I suppose you will be like your father; like him, you are getting weary of doing well.""No," said her son, "I am not weary of that, though I am weary of what you mean by it.Mother, what is doing well?"Mrs.Yeobright was far too thoughtful a woman to be content with ready definitions, and, like the "What is wisdom?" of Plato's Socrates, and the "What is truth?"of Pontius Pilate, Yeobright's burning question received no answer.
The silence was broken by the clash of the garden gate, a tap at the door, and its opening.Christian Cantle appeared in the room in his Sunday clothes.
It was the custom on Egdon to begin the preface to a story before absolutely entering the house, so as to be well in for the body of the narrative by the time visitor and visited stood face to face.Christian had been saying to them while the door was leaving its latch, "To think that I, who go from home but once in a while, and hardly then, should have been there this morning!""'Tis news you have brought us, then, Christian?"said Mrs.Yeobright.
"Ay, sure, about a witch, and ye must overlook my time o'
day; for, says I, 'I must go and tell 'em, though they won't have half done dinner.' I assure ye it made me shake like a driven leaf.Do ye think any harm will come o't?""Well--what?"
"This morning at church we was all standing up, and the pa'son said, 'Let us pray.' 'Well,' thinks I, 'one may as well kneel as stand'; so down I went; and, more than that, all the rest were as willing to oblige the man as I.We hadn't been hard at it for more than a minute when a most terrible screech sounded through church, as if somebody had just gied up their heart's blood.
All the folk jumped up and then we found that Susan Nunsuch had pricked Miss Vye with a long stocking-needle, as she had threatened to do as soon as ever she could get the young lady to church, where she don't come very often.She've waited for this chance for weeks, so as to draw her blood and put an end to the bewitching of Susan's children that has been carried on so long.
Sue followed her into church, sat next to her, and as soon as she could find a chance in went the stocking-needle into my lady's arm.""Good heaven, how horrid!" said Mrs.Yeobright.
"Sue pricked her that deep that the maid fainted away;and as I was afeard there might be some tumult among us, I got behind the bass viol and didn't see no more.
But they carried her out into the air, 'tis said;but when they looked round for Sue she was gone.
What a scream that girl gied, poor thing! There were the pa'son in his surplice holding up his hand and saying, 'Sit down, my good people, sit down!' But the deuce a bit would they sit down.O, and what d'ye think I found out, Mrs.Yeobright? The pa'son wears a suit of clothes under his surplice!--I could see his black sleeves when he held up his arm.""'Tis a cruel thing," said Yeobright.
"Yes," said his mother.
"The nation ought to look into it," said Christian.
"Here's Humphrey coming, I think."
In came Humphrey."Well, have ye heard the news?
But I see you have.'Tis a very strange thing that whenever one of Egdon folk goes to church some rum job or other is sure to be doing.The last time one of us was there was when neighbour Fairway went in the fall;and that was the day you forbad the banns, Mrs.Yeobright.""Has this cruelly treated girl been able to walk home?"said Clym.
"They say she got better, and went home very well.
And now I've told it I must be moving homeward myself.""And I," said Humphrey."Truly now we shall see if there's anything in what folks say about her."When they were gone into the heath again Yeobright said quietly to his mother, "Do you think I have turned teacher too soon?""It is right that there should be schoolmasters, and missionaries, and all such men," she replied.
"But it is right, too, that I should try to lift you out of this life into something richer, and that you should not come back again, and be as if I had not tried at all."Later in the day Sam, the turf-cutter, entered.
"I've come a-borrowing, Mrs.Yeobright.I suppose you have heard what's been happening to the beauty on the hill?""Yes, Sam: half a dozen have been telling us.""Beauty?" said Clym.
"Yes, tolerably well-favoured," Sam replied."Lord! all the country owns that 'tis one of the strangest things in the world that such a woman should have come to live up there.""Dark or fair?"
"Now, though I've seen her twenty times, that's a thing I cannot call to mind.""Darker than Tamsin," murmured Mrs.Yeobright.
