"Why, they're Lunnon chaps, I reckon," said Hiram, who had a dimnotion of London as a centre of hostility to the country.
"Ay, to be sure. And in some parts against Brassing, by what I'veheard say, the folks fell on 'em when they were spying, and broke theirpeep-holes as they carry, and drove 'em away, so as they knew betterthan come again."
"It war good foon, I'd be bound," said Hiram, whose fun was muchrestricted by circumstances.
"Well, I wouldn't meddle with 'em myself," said Solomon. "But somesay this country's seen its best days, and the sign is, as it's being overrunwith these fellows trampling right and left, and wanting to cut it up intorailways; and all for the big traffic to swallow up the little, so as thereshan't be a team left on the land, nor a whip to crack."
"I'll crack my whip about their ear'n, afore they bring it to that,though," said Hiram, while Mr. Solomon, shaking his bridle, movedonward.
Nettle-seed needs no digging. The ruin of this countryside byrailroads was discussed, not only at the "Weights and Scales," but in thehay-field, where the muster of working hands gave opportunities for talksuch as were rarely had through the rural year.
One morning, not long after that interview between Mr. Farebrotherand Mary Garth, in which she confessed to him her feeling for FredVincy, it happened that her father had some business which took him toYoddrell's farm in the direction of Frick: it was to measure and value anoutlying piece of land belonging to Lowick Manor, which Caleb expectedto dispose of advantageously for Dorothea (it must be confessed that hisbias was towards getting the best possible terms from railroadcompanies). He put up his gig at Yoddrell's, and in walking with hisassistant and measuring-chain to the scene of his work, he encounteredthe party of the company's agents, who were adjusting their spirit-level.After a little chat he left them, observing that by-and-by they wouldreach him again where he was going to measure. It was one of those graymornings after light rains, which become delicious about twelve o'clock,when the clouds part a little, and the scent of the earth is sweet alongthe lanes and by the hedgerows.
The scent would have been sweeter to Fred Vincy, who was comingalong the lanes on horseback, if his mind had not been worried byunsuccessful efforts to imagine what he was to do, with his father on oneside expecting him straightway to enter the Church, with Mary on theother threatening to forsake him if he did enter it, and with the working-day world showing no eager need whatever of a young gentlemanwithout capital and generally unskilled. It was the harder to Fred'sdisposition because his father, satisfied that he was no longer rebellious,was in good humor with him, and had sent him on this pleasant ride tosee after some greyhounds. Even when he had fixed on what he shoulddo, there would be the task of telling his father. But it must be admittedthat the fixing, which had to come first, was the more difficult task:—what secular avocation on earth was there for a young man (whosefriends could not get him an "appointment") which was at oncegentlemanly, lucrative, and to be followed without special knowledge?Riding along the lanes by Frick in this mood, and slackening his pacewhile he reflected whether he should venture to go round by LowickParsonage to call on Mary, he could see over the hedges from one field toanother. Suddenly a noise roused his attention, and on the far side of afield on his left hand he could see six or seven men in smock-frocks withhay-forks in their hands making an offensive approach towards the fourrailway agents who were facing them, while Caleb Garth and hisassistant were hastening across the field to join the threatened group.Fred, delayed a few moments by having to find the gate, could not gallopup to the spot before the party in smock-frocks, whose work of turningthe hay had not been too pressing after swallowing their mid-day beer,were driving the men in coats before them with their hay-forks; whileCaleb Garth's assistant, a lad of seventeen, who had snatched up thespirit-level at Caleb's order, had been knocked down and seemed to belying helpless. The coated men had the advantage as runners, and Fredcovered their retreat by getting in front of the smock-frocks and chargingthem suddenly enough to throw their chase into confusion. "What do youconfounded fools mean?" shouted Fred, pursuing the divided group in azigzag, and cutting right and left with his whip. "I'll swear to every one ofyou before the magistrate. You've knocked the lad down and killed him,for what I know. You'll every one of you be hanged at the next assizes, ifyou don't mind," said Fred, who afterwards laughed heartily as heremembered his own phrases.
The laborers had been driven through the gate-way into their hay-field, and Fred had checked his horse, when Hiram Ford, observinghimself at a safe challenging distance, turned back and shouted adefiance which he did not know to be Homeric.
"Yo're a coward, yo are. Yo git off your horse, young measter, and I'llhave a round wi' ye, I wull. Yo daredn't come on wi'out your hoss an'whip. I'd soon knock the breath out on ye, I would."
"Wait a minute, and I'll come back presently, and have a round withyou all in turn, if you like," said Fred, who felt confidence in his powerof boxing with his dearly beloved brethren. But just now he wanted tohasten back to Caleb and the prostrate youth.
The lad's ankle was strained, and he was in much pain from it, buthe was no further hurt, and Fred placed him on the horse that he mightride to Yoddrell's and be taken care of there.
"Let them put the horse in the stable, and tell the surveyors they cancome back for their traps," said Fred. "The ground is clear now."
"No, no," said Caleb, "here's a breakage. They'll have to give up forto-day, and it will be as well. Here, take the things before you on thehorse, Tom. They'll see you coming, and they'll turn back."
"I'm glad I happened to be here at the right moment, Mr. Garth,"said Fred, as Tom rode away. "No knowing what might have happened ifthe cavalry had not come up in time."
"Ay, ay, it was lucky," said Caleb, speaking rather absently, andlooking towards the spot where he had been at work at the moment ofinterruption. "But—deuce take it—this is what comes of men beingfools—I'm hindered of my day's work. I can't get along without somebodyto help me with the measuring-chain. However!" He was beginning tomove towards the spot with a look of vexation, as if he had forgottenFred's presence, but suddenly he turned round and said quickly, "Whathave you got to do to-day, young fellow?"
"Nothing, Mr. Garth. I'll help you with pleasure—can I?" said Fred,with a sense that he should be courting Mary when he was helping herfather.
"Well, you mustn't mind stooping and getting hot."
"I don't mind anything. Only I want to go first and have a round withthat hulky fellow who turned to challenge me. It would be a good lessonfor him. I shall not be five minutes."
"Nonsense!" said Caleb, with his most peremptory intonation. "I shallgo and speak to the men myself. It's all ignorance. Somebody has beentelling them lies. The poor fools don't know any better."
"I shall go with you, then," said Fred.
"No, no; stay where you are. I don't want your young blood. I cantake care of myself."
Caleb was a powerful man and knew little of any fear except the fearof hurting others and the fear of having to speechify. But he felt it hisduty at this moment to try and give a little harangue. There was astriking mixture in him—which came from his having always been ahard-working man himself—of rigorous notions about workmen andpractical indulgence towards them. To do a good day's work and to do itwell, he held to be part of their welfare, as it was the chief part of hisown happiness; but he had a strong sense of fellowship with them. Whenhe advanced towards the laborers they had not gone to work again, butwere standing in that form of rural grouping which consists in eachturning a shoulder towards the other, at a distance of two or three yards.They looked rather sulkily at Caleb, who walked quickly with one handin his pocket and the other thrust between the buttons of his waistcoat,and had his every-day mild air when he paused among them.
"Why, my lads, how's this?" he began, taking as usual to briefphrases, which seemed pregnant to himself, because he had manythoughts lying under them, like the abundant roots of a plant that justmanages to peep above the water. "How came you to make such amistake as this? Somebody has been telling you lies. You thought thosemen up there wanted to do mischief."
"Aw!" was the answer, dropped at intervals by each according to hisdegree of unreadiness.
"Nonsense! No such thing! They're looking out to see which way therailroad is to take. Now, my lads, you can't hinder the railroad: it will bemade whether you like it or not. And if you go fighting against it, you'llget yourselves into trouble. The law gives those men leave to come hereon the land. The owner has nothing to say against it, and if you meddlewith them you'll have to do with the constable and Justice Blakesley, andwith the handcuffs and Middlemarch jail. And you might be in for itnow, if anybody informed against you."
Caleb paused here, and perhaps the greatest orator could not havechosen either his pause or his images better for the occasion.
"But come, you didn't mean any harm. Somebody told you therailroad was a bad thing. That was a lie. It may do a bit of harm hereand there, to this and to that; and so does the sun in heaven. But therailway's a good thing."
"Aw! good for the big folks to make money out on," said old TimothyCooper, who had stayed behind turning his hay while the others hadbeen gone on their spree;—"I'n seen lots o' things turn up sin' I war ayoung un—the war an' the peace, and the canells, an' the oald KingGeorge, an' the Regen', an' the new King George, an' the new un as hasgot a new ne-ame—an' it's been all aloike to the poor mon. What's thecanells been t' him? They'n brought him neyther me-at nor be-acon, norwage to lay by, if he didn't save it wi' clemmin' his own inside. Times ha'got wusser for him sin' I war a young un. An' so it'll be wi' the railroads.They'll on'y leave the poor mon furder behind. But them are fools asmeddle, and so I told the chaps here. This is the big folks's world, this is.But yo're for the big folks, Muster Garth, yo are."
Timothy was a wiry old laborer, of a type lingering in those times—who had his savings in a stocking-foot, lived in a lone cottage, and wasnot to be wrought on by any oratory, having as little of the feudal spirit,and believing as little, as if he had not been totally unacquainted withthe Age of Reason and the Rights of Man. Caleb was in a difficultyknown to any person attempting in dark times and unassisted by miracleto reason with rustics who are in possession of an undeniable truthwhich they know through a hard process of feeling, and can let it fall likea giant's club on your neatly carved argument for a social benefit whichthey do not feel. Caleb had no cant at command, even if he could havechosen to use it; and he had been accustomed to meet all suchdifficulties in no other way than by doing his "business" faithfully. Heanswered—
"If you don't think well of me, Tim, never mind; that's neither herenor there now. Things may be bad for the poor man—bad they are; but Iwant the lads here not to do what will make things worse for themselves.The cattle may have a heavy load, but it won't help 'em to throw it overinto the roadside pit, when it's partly their own fodder."
"We war on'y for a bit o' foon," said Hiram, who was beginning to seeconsequences. "That war all we war arter."
"Well, promise me not to meddle again, and I'll see that nobodyinforms against you."
"I'n ne'er meddled, an' I'n no call to promise," said Timothy.
"No, but the rest. Come, I'm as hard at work as any of you to-day,and I can't spare much time. Say you'll be quiet without the constable."
"Aw, we wooant meddle—they may do as they loike for oos"—werethe forms in which Caleb got his pledges; and then he hastened back toFred, who had followed him, and watched him in the gateway.
They went to work, and Fred helped vigorously. His spirits hadrisen, and he heartily enjoyed a good slip in the moist earth under thehedgerow, which soiled his perfect summer trousers. Was it hissuccessful onset which had elated him, or the satisfaction of helpingMary's father? Something more. The accidents of the morning had helpedhis frustrated imagination to shape an employment for himself which hadseveral attractions. I am not sure that certain fibres in Mr. Garth's mindhad not resumed their old vibration towards the very end which nowrevealed itself to Fred. For the effective accident is but the touch of firewhere there is oil and tow; and it al ways appeared to Fred that therailway brought the needed touch. But they went on in silence exceptwhen their business demanded speech. At last, when they had finishedand were walking away, Mr. Garth said—
"A young fellow needn't be a B. A. to do this sort of work, eh, Fred?"
"I wish I had taken to it before I had thought of being a B. A.," saidFred. He paused a moment, and then added, more hesitatingly, "Do youthink I am too old to learn your business, Mr. Garth?"
"My business is of many sorts, my boy," said Mr. Garth, smiling. "Agood deal of what I know can only come from experience: you can't learnit off as you learn things out of a book. But you are young enough to laya foundation yet." Caleb pronounced the last sentence emphatically, butpaused in some uncertainty. He had been under the impression latelythat Fred had made up his mind to enter the Church.
"You do think I could do some good at it, if I were to try?" said Fred,more eagerly.
"That depends," said Caleb, turning his head on one side andlowering his voice, with the air of a man who felt himself to be sayingsomething deeply religious. "You must be sure of two things: you mustlove your work, and not be always looking over the edge of it, wantingyour play to begin. And the other is, you must not be ashamed of yourwork, and think it would be more honorable to you to be doingsomething else. You must have a pride in your own work and in learningto do it well, and not be always saying, There's this and there's that—if Ihad this or that to do, I might make something of it. No matter what aman is—I wouldn't give twopence for him"—here Caleb's mouth lookedbitter, and he snapped his fingers—"whether he was the prime ministeror the rick-thatcher, if he didn't do well what he undertook to do."
