All this Jem swore he had seen,
more by token, that it was the very day he had been mole-catching on
Squire Cass's land, down by the old saw-pit. Some said Marner must
have been in a 'fit', a word which seemed to explain things
otherwise incredible; but the argumentative Mr Macey, clerk of the
parish, shook his head, and asked if anybody was ever known to go
off in a fit and not fall down. A fit was a stroke, wasn't it? and
it was in the nature of a stroke to partly take away the use of a
man's limbs and throw him on the parish, if he'd got no children to
look to. No, no; it was no stroke that would let a man stand on his
legs, like a horse between the shafts, and then walk off as soon as
you can say 'Gee!' But there might be such a thing as a man's soul
being loose from his body, and going out and in, like a bird out of
its nest and back; and that was how folks got overwise, for they
went to school in this shell-less state to those who could teach
them more than their neighbours could learn with their five senses and
the parson. And where did Master Marner get his knowledge of herbs
from- and charms, too, if he liked to give them away? Jem Rodney's
story was no more than what might have been expected by anybody who
had seen how Marner had cured Sally Oates, and made her sleep like a
baby, when her heart had been beating enough to burst her body, for
two months and more, while she had been under the doctor's care.
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