Eliot, George (1819-1880)

The Mill on the Floss

Edinburgh and London

William Blackwood and Sons

1860

"The thoughts and temptations of the last month should all be flung away into an unvisited chamber of memory: there was nothing to allure her now; duty would be easy, and all the old calm purposes would reign peacefully once more."

Maggie, too, was not long before she re-entered. All the pride of her nature was stung into activity: the hateful weakness which had dragged her within reach of this wound to her self-respect, had at least wrought its own cure. The thoughts and temptations of the last month should all be flung away into an unvisited chamber of memory: there was nothing to allure her now; duty would be easy, and all the old calm purposes would reign peacefully once more. She re-entered the drawing-room still with some excited brightness in her face, but with a sense of proud self-command that defied anything to agitate her. She refused to dance again, but she talked quite readily and calmly with every one who addressed her. And when they got home that night, she kissed Lucy with a free heart, almost exulting [end page 461] in this scorching moment which had delivered her from the possibility of another word or look that would have the stamp of treachery towards that gentle, unsuspicious sister. (pp. 461-2)

Architecture::Chamber::Unvisited Chamber

Reading A.S. Byatt's edition for Penguin Classics and searching at <http://www.princeton.edu/~batke/eliot/mill/>

See The Mill on the Floss (Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1860). <Vol. I in Google Books><Vol. II><Vol. III>

Interiority

06/25/2007