cheapen the repairs. It’s a fine bit of work, Susan! A man without a family would be glad to do it for nothing.”
“Mind you don’t, though,” said his wife, lifting up her finger.
“No, no; but it’s a fine thing to come to a man when he's seen into the nature of business: to have the chance of getting a bit of the country into good fettle, as they say, and putting men into the right way with their farming, and getting a bit of good contriving and solid building done—that those who are living and those who come after will be the better for. I'd sooner have it than a fortune. I hold it the most honourable work that is.” Here Caleb laid down his letters, thrust his fingers between the buttons of his waistcoat, and sat upright, but presently proceeded with some awe in his voice and moving his head slowly aside—“It’s a great gift of God, Susan.”
“That it is, Caleb,” said his wife, with answering fervour. “And it will be a blessing to your children to have had a father who did such work: a father whose good work remains though his name may be forgotten.” She could not say any more to him then about the pay.
In the evening, when Caleb, rather tired with his day’s work, was seated in silence with his pocket-book open on his knee, while Mrs Garth and Mary were at their sewing, and Letty in a corner was whispering a dialogue with her doll, Mr Farebrother came up the orchard walk, dividing the bright August lights and shadows with the tufted grass and the apple-tree boughs. We know that he was fond of his parishioners the Garths, and had thought Mary worth mentioning to Lydgate. He used to the full the clergyman’s privilege of disregarding the Middlemarch discrimination of ranks, and always told his mother that Mrs Garth was more of a lady than any matron in the town. Still, you see, he spent his evenings at the Vincys’, where the matron, though less of a lady, presided over a well-lit drawing-room and whist. In those days human intercourse was not determined solely by respect. But the Vicar did heartily respect the Garths, and a visit from him was no surprise to that family. Nevertheless he accounted for it even while he was shaking hands, by saying, “I come as an envoy, Mrs Garth: I have something to say to you and Garth on behalf of Fred Vincy. The fact is, poor fellow,” he continued, as he seated himself and looked round with his bright glance at the three who were listening to him, “he has taken me into his confidence.”
Mary’s heart beat rather quickly: she wondered how far Fred’s confidence had gone.
“We haven’t seen the lad for months,” said Caleb. “I couldn’t think what was become of him.”
“He has been away on a visit,” said the Vicar, “because home was a little too hot for him, and Lydgate told his mother that the poor fellow must not begin to study yet. But yesterday he came and poured himself out to me. I am very glad he did, because I have seen him grow up from a youngster of fourteen, and I am so much at
