ELIOT, GEORGE. 



241 



With the exception of the Maxim, which has 

 been introduced in some places of business in 

 New York City, none of the incandescent lamps 

 have yet gone into use ; but, as they have 

 reached a commercial form, the next few years 

 will probably witness their somewhat extended 

 introduction. 



ELIOT, GEORGE, the nom de plume of the 

 English novelist Marian Evans, who died on 

 December 23, 1880. As she was herself curi- 

 ously reticent on all biographical details con- 

 cerning herself, the actual facts of her early 

 life are but little known. It is certain that the 

 published sketches abound in inaccuracies. It 

 is even disputed whether her original name was 

 Mary Anne or Marian, and the exact date and 

 place of her birth have never been authorita- 

 tively made known. She was not, as has often 

 been stated, the daughter of a poor clergyman, 

 nor is it true that she was adopted in early 

 life by another clergyman of greater wealth, 

 who gave her a first-class education. She was 

 born about 1820. Her father, Robert Evans, 

 was a land agent and surveyor, who lived in the 

 neighborhood of Nuneaton, near Coventry, and 

 served for many years as agent for the estates 

 of more than one old Warwickshire family. 

 He is still remembered as a man of rare worth 

 and character by many neighbors in the mid- 

 lands. The father of George Eliot is the pro- 

 totype of more than one character in the writ- 

 ings of his daughter. Of these, Caleb Garth, 

 in " Middlemarch," will be recognized as the 

 chief example ; but the same note of character 

 the craftsman's keen delight in perfect work 

 is struck in "AdamBede," and the little 

 poem of " Stradivarius." George Eliot's early 

 years were spent in the country of Shakespeare. 

 It is not very clear when she left her father's 

 home, nor where her education was acquired, 

 but she seems to have come to London almost 

 as a girl, and to have devoted herself to serious 

 literature. She became associated with many 

 of the writers in the "Westminster Review," 

 with John Stuart Mill, Mr. Herbert Spencer, 

 George Henry Lewes, Mr. John Chapman, and 

 others, and was herself a frequent contributor 

 to that " Review." Her first serious work was 

 a translation of the celebrated Strauss's " Life 

 of Jesus," published in 1846, when she was 

 only about twenty-six years of age. In 1853 

 Miss Evans published a translation of Feuer- 

 bach's " Essence of Christianity," the inter- 

 vening period being that of her greatest activ- 

 ity as contributor to the u Westminster Re- 

 view." The nom de plume, George Eliot, she 

 assumed for the first time in her contributions 

 to " Blackwood's Magazine." The manuscript 

 of her first imaginative work, " Scenes of Cleri- 

 cal Life," was sent anonymously to " Black- 

 wood's Magazine " in 1857, by George Henry 

 Lewes, and eagerly accepted by tlie editor, 

 who discerned in it the promise of rare and 

 preeminent genius. Her next work, "Adam 

 Bede/' which was published in 1859, is proba- 

 bly still the best known and most widely ap- 

 vofc. xx. 16 A 



preciated of all her works, and impressed the 

 world at large with the conviction that a new 

 novelist of the first rank had appeared. "Adam 

 Bede " made the name of George Eliot a house- 

 hold word throughout England and the United 

 States, where it was at once republished, and, 

 like others of her late books, it was quickly 

 translated into French and German, and subse- 

 quently into Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Russian, 

 and other languages. Although George Eliot 

 was anxious to conceal her name and her sex, 

 the secret soon leaked out, and before " The 

 Mill on the Floss," the second great novel of 

 the series which has immortalized her name, 

 was published in 1860, it was well known, in 

 literary circles at least, that George Eliot was 

 none other than Marian Evans, the contributor 

 to the " Westminster Review." To her inti- 

 mate friends she was already known as Mrs. 

 Lewes, for by this time was established that 

 close association and literary friendship with 

 the gifted George Henry Lewes, which only 

 terminated with the death of Lewes in 1878. 

 As Mr. Lewes had been unable to obtain a 

 legal divorce from his first, erring wife, the 

 quasi-marital union between the philosopher 

 and the authoress could not be legalized by 

 either church or state, but it was sanctioned 

 by the approval of a large circle of personal 

 friends. In 1861 she published" Silas Marner," 

 the shortest but, as many think, the most per- 

 fect of all George Eliot's novels. " Romola," 

 a masterly study of Florentine life in the days of 

 Savonarola, originally written for the " Corn- 

 hill," followed in 1863 ; "Felix Holt, the Radi- 

 cal," in which she returned to the description 

 of English life, in 1866 ; and "Middlemarch," 

 the most popular of all her works, in 1871. 

 Meanwhile she had given to the world a poem, 

 "The Spanish Gypsy" (1868); and another 

 was issued in 1874, entitled " The Legend of 

 Jubal." After another long interval of silence 

 she published her last novel, " Daniel De- 

 ronda," in 1876 ; the profound and instructive 

 character of this work was generally acknowl- 

 edged, but as a novel it was thought to have 

 committed the unpardonable sin of failing to 

 entertain. Her last work, published in 1879, 

 " The Life and Opinions of Theophrastus 

 Such," disappointed the public. After eighteen 

 months of virtual widowhood, she was married, 

 May 6, 1880, at St. George's, Hanover Square, 

 London, to Mr. John Walter Cross, of Wey- 

 bridge, Surrey, a London banker, formerly resi- 

 dent in New York. Mr. Cross was many years 

 younger than his bride, and had long been an in- 

 timate friend both of herself and of Mr. Lewes. 

 The attainments of George Eliot were almost 

 universal. To the chief classical and modern 

 tongues she added an acquaintance with Rus- 

 sian and modern Greek. She knew all the 

 physical sciences, all arts and philosophies, and 

 was deeply versed in the history of thought on 

 the most vital topics. In her literary avocation 

 she was extremely laborious, often injuring her 

 health by intense application. She composed 



