Chapter III
Mr. Riley Gives His Advice Concerning a School for Tom
The gentleman in the ample white cravat and shirt-frill, taking hisbrandy-and-water so pleasantly with his good friend Tulliver, is Mr.Riley, a gentleman with a waxen complexion and fat hands, ratherhighly educated for an auctioneer and appraiser, but large-heartedenough to show a great deal of _bonhomie_ toward simple countryacquaintances of hospitable habits. Mr. Riley spoke of suchacquaintances kindly as ”people of the old school.”
The conversation had come to a pause. Mr. Tulliver, not without aparticular reason, had abstained from a seventh recital of the coolretort by which Riley had shown himself too many for Dix, and howWakem had had his comb cut for once in his life, now the business ofthe dam had been settled by arbitration, and how there never wouldhave been any dispute at all about the height of water if everybodywas what they should be, and Old Harry hadn't made the lawyers.
Mr. Tulliver was, on the whole, a man of safe traditional opinions;but on one or two points he had trusted to his unassisted intellect,and had arrived at several questionable conclusions; amongst the rest,that rats, weevils, and lawyers were created by Old Harry. Unhappilyhe had no one to tell him that this was rampant Manichaeism, else hemight have seen his error. But to-day it was clear that the goodprinciple was triumphant: this affair of the water-power had been atangled business somehow, for all it seemed--look at it one way--asplain as water's water; but, big a puzzle as it was, it hadn't got thebetter of Riley. Mr. Tulliver took his brandy-and-water a littlestronger than usual, and, for a man who might be supposed to have afew hundreds lying idle at his banker's, was rather incautiously openin expressing his high estimate of his friend's business talents.
But the dam was a subject of conversation that would keep; it couldalways be taken up again at the same point, and exactly in the samecondition and there was another subject, as you know, on which Mr.Tulliver was in pressing want of Mr. Riley's advice. This was hisparticular reason for remaining silent for a short space after hislast draught, and rubbing his knees in a meditative manner. He was nota man to make an abrupt transition. This was a puzzling world, as heoften said, and if you drive your wagon in a hurry, you may light onan awkward corner. Mr. Riley, meanwhile, was not impatient. Why shouldhe be? Even Hotspur, one would think, must have been patient in hisslippers on a warm hearth, taking copious snuff, and sippinggratuitous brandy-and-water.
”There's a thing I've got i' my head,” said Mr. Tulliver at last, inrather a lower tone than usual, as he turned his head and lookedsteadfastly at his companion.
”Ah!” said Mr. Riley, in a tone of mild interest. He was a man withheavy waxen eyelids and high-arched eyebrows, looking exactly the sameunder all circumstances. This immovability of face, and the habit oftaking a pinch of snuff before he gave an answer, made him treblyoracular to Mr. Tulliver.
”It's a very particular thing,” he went on ”it's about my boy Tom.”
At the sound of this name, Maggie, who was seated on a low stool closeby the fire, with a large book open on her lap, shook her heavy hairback and looked up eagerly. There were few sounds that roused Maggiewhen she was dreaming over her book, but Tom's name served as well asthe shrillest whistle; in an instant she was on the watch, withgleaming eyes, like a Skye terrier suspecting mischief, or at allevents determined to fly at any one who threatened it toward Tom.
”You see, I want to put him to a new school at Midsummer,” said Mr.Tulliver; ”he's comin' away from the 'cademy at Lady-day, an' I shalllet him run loose for a quarter; but after that I want to send him toa downright good school, where they'll make a scholard of him.”
”Well,” said Mr. Riley, ”there's no greater advantage you can give himthan a good education. Not,” he added, with polite significance,--”notthat a man can't be an excellent miller and farmer, and a shrewd,sensible fellow into the bargain, without much help from theschoolmaster.”
”I believe you,” said Mr. Tulliver, winking, and turning his head onone side; ”but that's where it is. I don't _mean_ Tom to be a millerand farmer. I see no fun i' that. Why, if I made him a miller an'farmer, he'd be expectin' to take to the mill an' the land, an'a-hinting at me as it was time for me to lay by an' think o' my latterend. Nay, nay, I've seen enough o' that wi' sons. I'll never pull mycoat off before I go to bed. I shall give Tom an eddication an' puthim to a business, as he may make a nest for himself, an' not want topush me out o' mine. Pretty well if he gets it when I'm dead an' gone.I sha'n't be put off wi' spoon-meat afore I've lost my teeth.”
This was evidently a point on which Mr. Tulliver felt strongly; andthe impetus which had given unusual rapidity and emphasis to hisspeech showed itself still unexhausted for some minutes afterward in adefiant motion of the head from side to side, and an occasional ”Nay,nay,” like a subsiding growl.
These angry symptoms were keenly observed by Maggie, and cut her tothe quick. Tom, it appeared, was supposed capable of turning hisfather out of doors, and of making the future in some way tragic byhis wickedness. This was not to be borne; and Maggie jumped up fromher stool, forgetting all about her heavy book, which fell with a bangwithin the fender, and going up between her father's knees, said, in ahalf-crying, half-indignant voice,--
”Father, Tom wouldn't be naughty to you ever; I know he wouldn't.”
Mrs. Tulliver was out of the room superintending a choice supper-dish,and Mr. Tulliver's heart was touched; so Maggie was not scolded aboutthe book. Mr. Riley quietly picked it up and looked at it, while thefather laughed, with a certain tenderness in his hard-lined face, andpatted his little girl on the back, and then held her hands and kepther between his knees.
”What! they mustn't say any harm o' Tom, eh?” said Mr. Tulliver,looking at Maggie with a twinkling eye. Then, in a lower voice,turning to Mr. Riley, as though Maggie couldn't hear, ”She understandswhat one's talking about so as never was. And you should hear herread,--straight off, as if she knowed it all beforehand. And allays ather book! But it's bad--it's bad,” Mr. Tulliver added sadly, checkingthis blamable exultation. ”A woman's no business wi' being so clever;it'll turn to trouble, I doubt. But bless you!”--here the exultationwas clearly recovering the mastery,--”she'll read the books andunderstand 'em better nor half the folks as are growed up.”
Maggie's cheeks began to flush with triumphant excitement. She thoughtMr. Riley would have a respect for her now; it had been evident thathe thought nothing of her before.
Mr. Riley was turning over the leaves of the book, and she could makenothing of his face, with its high-arched eyebrows; but he presentlylooked at her, and said,--
”Come, come and tell me something about this book; here are somepictures,--I want to know what they mean.”
Maggie, with deepening color, went without hesitation to Mr. Riley'selbow and looked over the book, eagerly seizing one corner, andtossing back her mane, while she said,--
”Oh, I'll tell you what that means. It's a dreadful picture, isn't it?But I can't help looking at it. That old woman in the water's awitch,--they've put her in to find out whether she's a witch or no;and if she swims she's a witch, and if she's drowned--and killed, youknow--she's innocent, and not a witch, but only a poor silly oldwoman. But what good would it do her then, you know, when she wasdrowned? Only, I suppose, she'd go to heaven, and God would make it upto her. And this dreadful blacksmith with his arms akimbo,laughing,--oh, isn't he ugly?--I'll tell you what he is. He's theDevil _really_” (here Maggie's voice became louder and more emphatic),”and not a right blacksmith; for the Devil takes the shape of wickedmen, and walks about and sets people doing wicked things, and he'softener in the shape of a bad man than any other, because, you know,if people saw he was the Devil, and he roared at 'em, they'd run away,and he couldn't make 'em do what he pleased.”
Mr. Tulliver had listened to this exposition of Maggie's withpetrifying wonder.
”Why, what book is it the wench has got hold on?” he burst out atlast.
”The 'History of the Devil,' by Daniel Defoe,--not quite the rightbook for a little girl,” said Mr. Riley. ”How came it among yourbooks, Mr. Tulliver?”
Maggie looked hurt and discouraged, while her father said,--
”Why, it's one o' the books I bought at Partridge's sale. They was allbound alike,--it's a good binding, you see,--and I thought they'd beall good books. There's Jeremy Taylor's 'Holy Living and Dying' among'em. I read in it often of a Sunday” (Mr. Tulliver felt somehow afamiliarity with that great writer, because his name was Jeremy); ”andthere's a lot more of 'em,--sermons mostly, I think,--but they've allgot the same covers, and I thought they were all o' one sample, as youmay say. But it seems one mustn't judge by th' outside. This is apuzzlin' world.”
”Well,” said Mr. Riley, in an admonitory, patronizing tone as hepatted Maggie on the head, ”I advise you to put by the 'History of theDevil,' and read some prettier book. Have you no prettier books?”
”Oh, yes,” said Maggie, reviving a little in the desire to vindicatethe variety of her reading. ”I know the reading in this book isn'tpretty; but I like the pictures, and I make stories to the picturesout of my own head, you know. But I've got 'AEsop's Fables,' and a bookabout Kangaroos and things, and the 'Pilgrim's Progress.'”
”Ah, a beautiful book,” said Mr. Riley; ”you can't read a better.”
”Well, but there's a great deal about the Devil in that,” said Maggie,triumphantly, ”and I'll show you the picture of him in his true shape,as he fought with Christian.”
Maggie ran in an instant to the corner of the room, jumped on a chair,and reached down from the small bookcase a shabby old copy of Bunyan,which opened at once, without the least trouble of search, at thepicture she wanted.
”Here he is,” she said, running back to Mr. Riley, ”and Tom coloredhim for me with his paints when he was at home last holidays,--thebody all black, you know, and the eyes red, like fire, because he'sall fire inside, and it shines out at his eyes.”
”Go, go!” said Mr. Tulliver, peremptorily, beginning to feel ratheruncomfortable at these free remarks on the personal appearance of abeing powerful enough to create lawyers; ”shut up the book, and let'shear no more o' such talk. It is as I thought--the child 'ull learnmore mischief nor good wi' the books. Go, go and see after yourmother.”
Maggie shut up the book at once, with a sense of disgrace, but notbeing inclined to see after her mother, she compromised the matter bygoing into a dark corner behind her father's chair, and nursing herdoll, toward which she had an occasional fit of fondness in Tom'sabsence, neglecting its toilet, but lavishing so many warm kisses onit that the waxen cheeks had a wasted, unhealthy appearance.
”Did you ever hear the like on't?” said Mr. Tulliver, as Maggieretired. ”It's a pity but what she'd been the lad,--she'd ha' been amatch for the lawyers, _she_ would. It's the wonderful'st thing”--herehe lowered his voice--”as I picked the mother because she wasn't o'er'cute--bein' a good-looking woman too, an' come of a rare family formanaging; but I picked her from her sisters o' purpose, 'cause she wasa bit weak like; for I wasn't agoin' to be told the rights o' thingsby my own fireside. But you see when a man's got brains himself,there's no knowing where they'll run to; an' a pleasant sort o' softwoman may go on breeding you stupid lads and 'cute wenches, till it'slike as if the world was turned topsy-turvy. It's an uncommon puzzlin'thing.”
Mr. Riley's gravity gave way, and he shook a little under theapplication of his pinch of snuff before he said,--
”But your lad's not stupid, is he? I saw him, when I was here last,busy making fishing-tackle; he seemed quite up to it.”
”Well, he isn't not to say stupid,--he's got a notion o' things out o'door, an' a sort o' common sense, as he'd lay hold o' things by theright handle. But he's slow with his tongue, you see, and he reads butpoorly, and can't abide the books, and spells all wrong, they tell me,an' as shy as can be wi' strangers, an' you never hear him say 'cutethings like the little wench. Now, what I want is to send him to aschool where they'll make him a bit nimble with his tongue and hispen, and make a smart chap of him. I want my son to be even wi' thesefellows as have got the start o' me with having better schooling. Notbut what, if the world had been left as God made it, I could ha' seenmy way, and held my own wi' the best of 'em; but things have got sotwisted round and wrapped up i' unreasonable words, as aren't a bitlike 'em, as I'm clean at fault, often an' often. Everything windsabout so--the more straightforrad you are, the more you're puzzled.”
Mr. Tulliver took a draught, swallowed it slowly, and shook his headin a melancholy manner, conscious of exemplifying the truth that aperfectly sane intellect is hardly at home in this insane world.
”You're quite in the right of it, Tulliver,” observed Mr. Riley.”Better spend an extra hundred or two on your son's education, thanleave it him in your will. I know I should have tried to do so by ason of mine, if I'd had one, though, God knows, I haven't your readymoney to play with, Tulliver; and I have a houseful of daughters intothe bargain.”
”I dare say, now, you know of a school as 'ud be just the thing forTom,” said Mr. Tulliver, not diverted from his purpose by any sympathywith Mr. Riley's deficiency of ready cash.
Mr. Riley took a pinch of snuff, and kept Mr. Tulliver in suspense bya silence that seemed deliberative, before he said,--
”I know of a very fine chance for any one that's got the necessarymoney and that's what you have, Tulliver. The fact is, I wouldn'trecommend any friend of mine to send a boy to a regular school, if hecould afford to do better. But if any one wanted his boy to getsuperior instruction and training, where he would be the companion ofhis master, and that master a first rate fellow, I know his man. Iwouldn't mention the chance to everybody, because I don't thinkeverybody would succeed in getting it, if he were to try; but Imention it to you, Tulliver, between ourselves.”
The fixed inquiring glance with which Mr. Tulliver had been watchinghis friend's oracular face became quite eager.
”Ay, now, let's hear,” he said, adjusting himself in his chair withthe complacency of a person who is thought worthy of importantcommunications.
”He's an Oxford man,” said Mr. Riley, sententiously, shutting hismouth close, and looking at Mr. Tulliver to observe the effect of thisstimulating information.
”What! a parson?” said Mr. Tulliver, rather doubtfully.
”Yes, and an M.A. The bishop, I understand, thinks very highly of him:why, it was the bishop who got him his present curacy.”
”Ah?” said Mr. Tulliver, to whom one thing was as wonderful as anotherconcerning these unfamiliar phenomena. ”But what can he want wi' Tom,then?”
”Why, the fact is, he's fond of teaching, and wishes to keep up hisstudies, and a clergyman has but little opportunity for that in hisparochial duties. He's willing to take one or two boys as pupils tofill up his time profitably. The boys would be quite of thefamily,--the finest thing in the world for them; under Stelling's eyecontinually.”
”But do you think they'd give the poor lad twice o' pudding?” saidMrs. Tulliver, who was now in her place again. ”He's such a boy forpudding as never was; an' a growing boy like that,--it's dreadful tothink o' their stintin' him.”
”And what money 'ud he want?” said Mr. Tulliver, whose instinct toldhim that the services of this admirable M.A. would bear a high price.
”Why, I know of a clergyman who asks a hundred and fifty with hisyoungest pupils, and he's not to be mentioned with Stelling, the man Ispeak of. I know, on good authority, that one of the chief people atOxford said, Stelling might get the highest honors if he chose. But hedidn't care about university honors; he's a quiet man--not noisy.”
”Ah, a deal better--a deal better,” said Mr. Tulliver; ”but a hundredand fifty's an uncommon price. I never thought o' paying so much asthat.”
”A good education, let me tell you, Tulliver,--a good education ischeap at the money. But Stelling is moderate in his terms; he's not agrasping man. I've no doubt he'd take your boy at a hundred, andthat's what you wouldn't get many other clergymen to do. I'll write tohim about it, if you like.”
Mr. Tulliver rubbed his knees, and looked at the carpet in ameditative manner.
”But belike he's a bachelor,” observed Mrs. Tulliver, in the interval;”an' I've no opinion o' housekeepers. There was my brother, as is deadan' gone, had a housekeeper once, an' she took half the feathers outo' the best bed, an' packed 'em up an' sent 'em away. An' it's unknownthe linen she made away with--Stott her name was. It 'ud break myheart to send Tom where there's a housekeeper, an' I hope you won'tthink of it, Mr. Tulliver.”
”You may set your mind at rest on that score, Mrs. Tulliver,” said Mr.Riley, ”for Stelling is married to as nice a little woman as any manneed wish for a wife. There isn't a kinder little soul in the world; Iknow her family well. She has very much your complexion,--light curlyhair. She comes of a good Mudport family, and it's not every offerthat would have been acceptable in that quarter. But Stelling's not anevery-day man; rather a particular fellow as to the people he choosesto be connected with. But I _think_ he would have no objection to takeyour son I _think_ he would not, on my representation.”
”I don't know what he could have _against_ the lad,” said Mrs.Tulliver, with a slight touch of motherly indignation ”a nicefresh-skinned lad as anybody need wish to see.”
”But there's one thing I'm thinking on,” said Mr. Tulliver, turninghis head on one side and looking at Mr. Riley, after a long perusal ofthe carpet. ”Wouldn't a parson be almost too high-learnt to bring up alad to be a man o' business? My notion o' the parsons was as they'dgot a sort o' learning as lay mostly out o' sight. And that isn't whatI want for Tom. I want him to know figures, and write like print, andsee into things quick, and know what folks mean, and how to wrapthings up in words as aren't actionable. It's an uncommon fine thing,that is,” concluded Mr. Tulliver, shaking his head, ”when you can leta man know what you think of him without paying for it.”
”Oh, my dear Tulliver,” said Mr. Riley, ”you're quite under a mistakeabout the clergy; all the best schoolmasters are of the clergy. Theschoolmasters who are not clergymen are a very low set of mengenerally.”
”Ay, that Jacobs is, at the 'cademy,” interposed Mr. Tulliver.
”To be sure,--men who have failed in other trades, most likely. Now, aclergyman is a gentleman by profession and education and besidesthat, he has the knowledge that will ground a boy, and prepare him forentering on any career with credit. There may be some clergymen whoare mere bookmen; but you may depend upon it, Stelling is not one ofthem,--a man that's wide awake, let me tell you. Drop him a hint, andthat's enough. You talk of figures, now; you have only to say toStelling, 'I want my son to be a thorough arithmetician,' and you mayleave the rest to him.”
Mr. Riley paused a moment, while Mr. Tulliver, some-what reassured asto clerical tutorship, was inwardly rehearsing to an imaginary Mr.Stelling the statement, ”I want my son to know 'rethmetic.”
”You see, my dear Tulliver,” Mr. Riley continued, ”when you get athoroughly educated man, like Stelling, he's at no loss to take up anybranch of instruction. When a workman knows the use of his tools, hecan make a door as well as a window.”
”Ay, that's true,” said Mr. Tulliver, almost convinced now that theclergy must be the best of schoolmasters.
”Well, I'll tell you what I'll do for you,” said Mr. Riley, ”and Iwouldn't do it for everybody. I'll see Stelling's father-in-law, ordrop him a line when I get back to Mudport, to say that you wish toplace your boy with his son-in-law, and I dare say Stelling will writeto you, and send you his terms.”
”But there's no hurry, is there?” said Mrs. Tulliver; ”for I hope, Mr.Tulliver, you won't let Tom begin at his new school before Midsummer.He began at the 'cademy at the Lady-day quarter, and you see whatgood's come of it.”
”Ay, ay, Bessy, never brew wi' bad malt upo' Michael-masday, elseyou'll have a poor tap,” said Mr. Tulliver, winking and smiling at Mr.Riley, with the natural pride of a man who has a buxom wifeconspicuously his inferior in intellect. ”But it's true there's nohurry; you've hit it there, Bessy.”
”It might be as well not to defer the arrangement too long,” said Mr.Riley, quietly, ”for Stelling may have propositions from otherparties, and I know he would not take more than two or three boarders,if so many. If I were you, I think I would enter on the subject withStelling at once: there's no necessity for sending the boy beforeMidsummer, but I would be on the safe side, and make sure that nobodyforestalls you.”
”Ay, there's summat in that,” said Mr. Tulliver.
”Father,” broke in Maggie, who had stolen unperceived to her father'selbow again, listening with parted lips, while she held her dolltopsy-turvy, and crushed its nose against the wood of thechair,--”father, is it a long way off where Tom is to go? Sha'n't weever go to see him?”
”I don't know, my wench,” said the father, tenderly. ”Ask Mr. Riley;he knows.”
Maggie came round promptly in front of Mr. Riley, and said, ”How faris it, please, sir?”
”Oh, a long, long way off,” that gentleman answered, being of opinionthat children, when they are not naughty, should always be spoken tojocosely. ”You must borrow the seven-leagued boots to get to him.”
”That's nonsense!” said Maggie, tossing her head haughtily, andturning away, with the tears springing in her eyes. She began todislike Mr. Riley; it was evident he thought her silly and of noconsequence.
”Hush, Maggie! for shame of you, asking questions and chattering,”said her mother. ”Come and sit down on your little stool, and holdyour tongue, do. But,” added Mrs. Tulliver, who had her own alarmawakened, ”is it so far off as I couldn't wash him and mend him?”
”About fifteen miles; that's all,” said Mr. Riley. ”You can drivethere and back in a day quite comfortably. Or--Stelling is ahospitable, pleasant man--he'd be glad to have you stay.”
”But it's too far off for the linen, I doubt,” said Mrs. Tulliver,sadly.
The entrance of supper opportunely adjourned this difficulty, andrelieved Mr. Riley from the labor of suggesting some solution orcompromise,--a labor which he would otherwise doubtless haveundertaken; for, as you perceive, he was a man of very obligingmanners. And he had really given himself the trouble of recommendingMr. Stelling to his friend Tulliver without any positive expectationof a solid, definite advantage resulting to himself, notwithstandingthe subtle indications to the contrary which might have misled atoo-sagacious observer. For there is nothing more widely misleadingthan sagacity if it happens to get on a wrong scent; and sagacity,persuaded that men usually act and speak from distinct motives, with aconsciously proposed end in view, is certain to waste its energies onimaginary game.
Plotting covetousness and deliberate contrivance, in order to compassa selfish end, are nowhere abundant but in the world of the dramatist:they demand too intense a mental action for many of ourfellow-parishioners to be guilty of them. It is easy enough to spoilthe lives of our neighbors without taking so much trouble; we can doit by lazy acquiescence and lazy omission, by trivial falsities forwhich we hardly know a reason, by small frauds neutralized by smallextravagances, by maladroit flatteries, and clumsily improvisedinsinuations. We live from hand to mouth, most of us, with a smallfamily of immediate desires; we do little else than snatch a morsel tosatisfy the hungry brood, rarely thinking of seed-corn or the nextyear's crop.
Mr. Riley was a man of business, and not cold toward his own interest,yet even he was more under the influence of small promptings than offar-sighted designs. He had no private understanding with the Rev.Walter Stelling; on the contrary, he knew very little of that M.A. andhis acquirements,--not quite enough, perhaps, to warrant so strong arecommendation of him as he had given to his friend Tulliver. But hebelieved Mr. Stelling to be an excellent classic, for Gadsby had saidso, and Gadsby's first cousin was an Oxford tutor; which was betterground for the belief even than his own immediate observation wouldhave been, for though Mr. Riley had received a tincture of theclassics at the great Mudport Free School, and had a sense ofunderstanding Latin generally, his comprehension of any particularLatin was not ready. Doubtless there remained a subtle aroma from hisjuvenile contact with the ”De Senectute” and the fourth book of the”AEneid,” but it had ceased to be distinctly recognizable as classical,and was only perceived in the higher finish and force of hisauctioneering style. Then, Stelling was an Oxford man, and the Oxfordmen were always--no, no, it was the Cambridge men who were always goodmathematicians. But a man who had had a university education couldteach anything he liked; especially a man like Stelling, who had madea speech at a Mudport dinner on a political occasion, and hadacquitted himself so well that it was generally remarked, thisson-in-law of Timpson's was a sharp fellow. It was to be expected of aMudport man, from the parish of St. Ursula, that he would not omit todo a good turn to a son-in-law of Timpson's, for Timpson was one ofthe most useful and influential men in the parish, and had a good dealof business, which he knew how to put into the right hands. Mr. Rileyliked such men, quite apart from any money which might be diverted,through their good judgment, from less worthy pockets into his own;and it would be a satisfaction to him to say to Timpson on his returnhome, ”I've secured a good pupil for your son-in-law.” Timpson had alarge family of daughters; Mr. Riley felt for him; besides, LouisaTimpson's face, with its light curls, had been a familiar object tohim over the pew wainscot on a Sunday for nearly fifteen years; it wasnatural her husband should be a commendable tutor. Moreover, Mr. Rileyknew of no other schoolmaster whom he had any ground for recommendingin preference; why, then, should he not recommend Stelling? His friendTulliver had asked him for an opinion it is always chilling, infriendly intercourse, to say you have no opinion to give. And if youdeliver an opinion at all, it is mere stupidity not to do it with anair of conviction and well-founded knowledge. You make it your own inuttering it, and naturally get fond of it. Thus Mr. Riley, knowing noharm of Stelling to begin with, and wishing him well, so far as he hadany wishes at all concerning him, had no sooner recommended him thanhe began to think with admiration of a man recommended on such highauthority, and would soon have gathered so warm an interest on thesubject, that if Mr. Tulliver had in the end declined to send Tom toStelling, Mr. Riley would have thought his ”friend of the old school”a thoroughly pig-headed fellow.
If you blame Mr. Riley very severely for giving a recommendation onsuch slight grounds, I must say you are rather hard upon him. Whyshould an auctioneer and appraiser thirty years ago, who had as goodas forgotten his free-school Latin, be expected to manifest a delicatescrupulosity which is not always exhibited by gentlemen of the learnedprofessions, even in our present advanced stage of morality?
Besides, a man with the milk of human kindness in him can scarcelyabstain from doing a good-natured action, and one cannot begood-natured all round. Nature herself occasionally quarters aninconvenient parasite on an animal toward whom she has otherwise noill will. What then? We admire her care for the parasite. If Mr. Rileyhad shrunk from giving a recommendation that was not based on validevidence, he would not have helped Mr. Stelling to a paying pupil, andthat would not have been so well for the reverend gentleman. Consider,too, that all the pleasant little dim ideas and complacencies--ofstanding well with Timpson, of dispensing advice when he was asked forit, of impressing his friend Tulliver with additional respect, ofsaying something, and saying it emphatically, with other inappreciablyminute ingredients that went along with the warm hearth and thebrandy-and-water to make up Mr. Riley's consciousness on thisoccasion--would have been a mere blank.