The Mill on the Floss

When Maggie and Tom reach home, law enforcement officers are in the house. Bessy cries to her children about their ruin and declares that she should never have married Mr. Tulliver. Maggie becomes upset with her mother because “She had been blamed all her life, and nothing had come of it but evil tempers. Her father had always defended and excused her, and her loving remembrance of his tenderness was a force within her that would enable her to do or bear anything for his sake” (Page 208). Tom struggles between blaming his father and blaming Mr. Wakem for their new, enormous problem.

Bessy’s sisters and their husbands gather in the Tulliver home. Bessy hopes that her family will help her purchase her belongings. Mrs. Glegg agrees that the sisters should help Bessy, but only in purchasing the most necessary belongings, not the pretty things that Bessy has collected over the years. The sisters note that the Mosses are missing even though Mr. Tulliver has helped them through the years. The aunts ask to see their niece and nephew so they can take part in the conversation about their future. They lecture Maggie and Tom about helping around the house. Tom proposes that the aunts put up the money to save his mother and he can get a job to pay them back. Maggie bursts out in defense of her father and accuses her aunts of selfishness.

Mrs. Moss arrives, upset about her brother’s health and feeling guilty about the three hundred pounds she owes her brother. Tom refers to a conversation he had with his father about providing for Maggie the way Mr. Tulliver provided for Mrs. Moss. Tom decides it’s not right to ask Mrs. Moss to pay back the money. 

Maggie and Mrs. Moss visit the ailing Mr. Tulliver while Mr. Glegg and Tom look for his bank notes and deeds. Mr. Tulliver wakes up, suddenly conscious. He asks what happened to him and notices the peculiar array of family movement around him. Mr. Tulliver tells Tom to take care of his mother and sister if he dies, adding that he hopes that Maggie will marry someone stable.

Tom doesn’t blame his aunts for their coldness towards his mother’s new financial situation. Tom understands why people wouldn’t give money to someone who doesn’t know how to manage that money. He goes to his Uncle Deane for advice on getting a job. Mr. Deane started life poor and became rich with the type of rapidity and stability Tom now dreams of achieving. Mr. Deane notes that Tom’s education in Latin will wear off and that the years spent with Mr. Stelling have been a waste. He recommends that Tom start in a warehouse or wharf but worries that Tom is too spoiled for manual labor. Mr. Deane admires the fact that Tom wants to work hard and says he’ll put in a good word for him with a man he’s recently met who works with Swedish bark.

Back at home, Tom admonishes Maggie for being rude to their aunts and says she should hold her tongue and let Tom, who is not foolish like her, figure things out. Maggie becomes depressed about the cruel world outside of books and worries about her relationship with Tom.

As the house’s furnishings go up for sale, Tom is surprised by an unexpected visit from his old friend Bob. Bob shows him the pocketknife he took from Tom when they were kids. Maggie enters and cries when she sees that her beloved books have been sold. Bob kindly offers Tom a small sum of money, which Tom refuses.

Mr. Tulliver slowly recuperates. Mrs. Tulliver pays a visit to Mr. Wakem. She introduces herself as once a member of the well-respected Dodson family and explains her shock at how her husband, who has always been reliable, has now ruined her. She begs Mr. Wakem not to buy the mill and hopes that her husband can still work in the mill when he’s better.

Mr. Wakem wants to buy Dorlcote Mill because it’s a good investment that can be passed down to his son Philip. He delights in the vindictive idea that he could employ Mr. Tulliver as the mill’s manager.

The family debates the proposal Mr. Wakem has put forth to employ Mr. Tulliver. Maggie and Tom worry it will do irreparable harm to her father’s dignity, while other family members see employment under Wakem as the only option to avoid the poorhouse. In terms of his health, Mr. Tulliver makes progress and then regresses, often needing to relive the revelation that he’s lost everything.

Mr. Tulliver’s condition improves, and he walks around the property his ancestors and family have lived on for generations. He decides to enter into employment under Wakem to keep his family in their house and avoid changing careers at his age. Mr. Tulliver tells his family of his decision but makes them all swear never to forgive Mr. Wakem. He has Tom write it officially in the family Bible: That no Tulliver will forgive a Wakem and that the family wishes ill on Mr. Wakem.

The Dodson family is Protestant but largely irreligious. For them, religion is about reputation in the community. Duty to the Church is important because it upholds the family’s integrity, but their observations of religion are not lofty or emotionally attached to God. The Tullivers were similar, and Mr. Tulliver “considered that church was one thing and common sense another, and he wanted nobody to tell him what common sense was” (Page 279).

The monotony of the Tulliver life starts to eat away at the soul of the family. Mr. Tulliver works for Mr. Wakem while Tom spends his days learning bookkeeping at a warehouse. Mrs. Tulliver has never fully recovered from the shock of losing her possessions and nurtures her resentment that her life is unfair. Maggie worries about her father too, who walks around and does his work in a depressive state. The family continues to pay back their debts, keeping them in a cycle of difficult work without seeing the rewards. Mr. Tulliver’s one joy is still Maggie, but he worries about her future and is anxious that she’ll make a bad marriage like his sister. The Tullivers withdraw from local society and keep to themselves in their depression and shame.

Maggie reads Tom’s old schoolbooks but is distracted by her worries for her parents. Bob stops by unexpectedly to give Maggie a pile of new books. Bob offers Maggie a puppy to help ease her loneliness.

While Maggie still retains her curiosity and thirst for books, no one notices her loneliness. She starts studying Tom’s old schoolbooks to occupy her time, learning the Latin that Tom had hated under Mr. Stelling’s tutelage. Soon, the pleasure Maggie takes in her avid reading is evident in her cheery and pretty disposition. Her mother is proud that she is growing up well despite her childhood of wildness and their newfound poverty.