All cleverness, whether in the rapid use of
that difficult instrument the tongue, or in some other art
unfamiliar to villagers, was in itself suspicious: honest folks,
born and bred in a visible manner, were mostly not overwise or clever-
at least, not beyond such a matter as knowing the signs of the
weather; and the process by which rapidity and dexterity of any kind
were acquired was so wholly hidden, that they partook of the nature of
conjuring. In this way it came to pass that those scattered
linen-weavers- emigrants from the town into the country- were to the
last regarded as aliens by their rustic neighbours, and usually
contracted the eccentric habits which belong to a state of loneliness.
In the early years of this century, such a linen-weaver, named
Silas Marner, worked at his vocation in a stone cottage that stood
among the nutty hedgerows near the village of Raveloe, and not far
from the edge of a deserted stone-pit. The questionable sound of
Silas's loom, so unlike the natural cheerful trotting of the winnowing
machine, or the simple rhythm of the flail, had a half-fearful
fascination for the Raveloe boys, who would often leave off their
nutting or birds'-nesting to peep in at the window of the stone
cottage, counter-balancing a certain awe at the mysterious action of
the loom, by a pleasant sense of scornful superiority, drawn from
the mockery of its alternating noises, along with the bent,
treadmill attitude of the weaver.
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