snow, the old grimy
shawl in which it was wrapped trailing behind it, and the queer little
bonnet dangling at its back--toddled on to the open door of Silas
Marner's cottage, and right up to the warm hearth, where there was a
bright fire of logs and sticks, which had thoroughly warmed the old
sack (Silas's greatcoat) spread out on the bricks to dry. The little
one, accustomed to be left to itself for long hours without notice from
its mother, squatted down on the sack, and spread its tiny hands
towards the blaze, in perfect contentment, gurgling and making many
inarticulate communications to the cheerful fire, like a new-hatched
gosling beginning to find itself comfortable. But presently the warmth
had a lulling effect, and the little golden head sank down on the old
sack, and the blue eyes were veiled by their delicate half-transparent
lids.

But where was Silas Marner while this strange visitor had come to his
hearth? He was in the cottage, but he did not see the child. During
the last few weeks, since he had lost his money, he had contracted the
habit of opening his door and looking out from time to time, as if he
thought that his money might be somehow coming back to him, or that
some trace, some news of it, might be mysteriously on the road, and be
caught by the listening ear or the straining eye. It was chiefly at
night, when he was not occupied in his loom, that he fell into this
repetition of an act for which he could have assigned no definite
purpose, and which can hardly be understood except by those who have
undergone a bewildering separation from a supremely loved object. In
the evening twilight, and later whenever the night was not dark, Silas
looked out on that narrow prospect round the Stone-pits, listening and
gazing, not with hope, but with mere yearning and unrest.

This morning he had been told by some of his neighbours that it was New
Year's Eve, and that he must sit up and hear the old year rung out and
the new rung in, because that was good luck, and might bring his money
back again. This was only a friendly Raveloe-way of jesting with the
half-crazy oddities of a miser, but it had perhaps helped to throw
Silas into a more than usually excited state. Since the on-coming of
twilight he had opened his door again and again, though only to shut it
immediately at seeing all distance veiled by the falling snow. But the
last time he opened it the snow had ceased, and the clouds were parting
here