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Silas Marner - Conclusion

1. Part I, Chapter 1

2. Chapter 2

3. Chapter 3

4. Chapter 4

5. Chapter 5

6. Chapter 6

7. Chapter 7

8. Chapter 8

9. Chapter 9

10. Chapter 10

11. Chapter 11

12. Chapter 12

13. Chapter 13

14. Chapter 14

15. Chapter 15

16. Part II, Chapter 16

17. Chapter 17

18. Chapter 18

19. Chapter 19

20. Chapter 20

21. Chapter 21

22. Conclusion







CONCLUSION.

There was one time of the year which was held in Raveloe to be
especially suitable for a wedding. It was when the great lilacs and
laburnums in the old-fashioned gardens showed their golden and
purple wealth above the lichen-tinted walls, and when there were
calves still young enough to want bucketfuls of fragrant milk.
People were not so busy then as they must become when the full
cheese-making and the mowing had set in; and besides, it was a time
when a light bridal dress could be worn with comfort and seen to
advantage.

Happily the sunshine fell more warmly than usual on the lilac tufts
the morning that Eppie was married, for her dress was a very light
one. She had often thought, though with a feeling of renunciation,
that the perfection of a wedding-dress would be a white cotton, with
the tiniest pink sprig at wide intervals; so that when Mrs. Godfrey
Cass begged to provide one, and asked Eppie to choose what it should
be, previous meditation had enabled her to give a decided answer at
once.

Seen at a little distance as she walked across the churchyard and
down the village, she seemed to be attired in pure white, and her
hair looked like the dash of gold on a lily. One hand was on her
husband's arm, and with the other she clasped the hand of her father
Silas.

"You won't be giving me away, father," she had said before they
went to church; "you'll only be taking Aaron to be a son to you."

Dolly Winthrop walked behind with her husband; and there ended the
little bridal procession.

There were many eyes to look at it, and Miss Priscilla Lammeter was
glad that she and her father had happened to drive up to the door of
the Red House just in time to see this pretty sight. They had come
to keep Nancy company to-day, because Mr. Cass had had to go away to
Lytherley, for special reasons. That seemed to be a pity, for
otherwise he might have gone, as Mr. Crackenthorp and Mr. Osgood
certainly would, to look on at the wedding-feast which he had
ordered at the Rainbow, naturally feeling a great interest in the
weaver who had been wronged by one of his own family.

"I could ha' wished Nancy had had the luck to find a child like
that and bring her up," said Priscilla to her father, as they sat
in the gig; "I should ha' had something young to think of then,
besides the lambs and the calves."

"Yes, my dear, yes," said Mr. Lammeter; "one feels that as one
gets older. Things look dim to old folks: they'd need have some
young eyes about 'em, to let 'em know the world's the same as it
used to be."

Nancy came out now to welcome her father and sister; and the wedding
group had passed on beyond the Red House to the humbler part of the
village.

Dolly Winthrop was the first to divine that old Mr. Macey, who had
been set in his arm-chair outside his own door, would expect some
special notice as they passed, since he was too old to be at the
wedding-feast.

"Mr. Macey's looking for a word from us," said Dolly; "he'll be
hurt if we pass him and say nothing--and him so racked with
rheumatiz."

So they turned aside to shake hands with the old man. He had looked
forward to the occasion, and had his premeditated speech.

"Well, Master Marner," he said, in a voice that quavered a good
deal, "I've lived to see my words come true. I was the first to
say there was no harm in you, though your looks might be again' you;
and I was the first to say you'd get your money back. And it's
nothing but rightful as you should. And I'd ha' said the "Amens",
and willing, at the holy matrimony; but Tookey's done it a good
while now, and I hope you'll have none the worse luck."

In the open yard before the Rainbow the party of guests were already
assembled, though it was still nearly an hour before the appointed
feast time. But by this means they could not only enjoy the slow
advent of their pleasure; they had also ample leisure to talk of
Silas Marner's strange history, and arrive by due degrees at the
conclusion that he had brought a blessing on himself by acting like
a father to a lone motherless child. Even the farrier did not
negative this sentiment: on the contrary, he took it up as
peculiarly his own, and invited any hardy person present to
contradict him. But he met with no contradiction; and all
differences among the company were merged in a general agreement
with Mr. Snell's sentiment, that when a man had deserved his good
luck, it was the part of his neighbours to wish him joy.

As the bridal group approached, a hearty cheer was raised in the
Rainbow yard; and Ben Winthrop, whose jokes had retained their
acceptable flavour, found it agreeable to turn in there and receive
congratulations; not requiring the proposed interval of quiet at the
Stone-pits before joining the company.

Eppie had a larger garden than she had ever expected there now; and
in other ways there had been alterations at the expense of Mr. Cass,
the landlord, to suit Silas's larger family. For he and Eppie had
declared that they would rather stay at the Stone-pits than go to
any new home. The garden was fenced with stones on two sides, but
in front there was an open fence, through which the flowers shone
with answering gladness, as the four united people came within sight
of them.

"O father," said Eppie, "what a pretty home ours is! I think
nobody could be happier than we are."




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