Lyon, Esther

A beautiful and charming girl who gives up the wealth and social position that she might claim in order to marry Felix Holt. "A very delicate scent, the faint suggestion of a garden, was wafted as she went. He would not observe her, but he had a sense of an elastic walk, the tread of small feet, a long neck, and a high crown of shining brown plaits with curls that floated backward — things, in short, that suggested a fine lady . . . Esther had that excellent thing in woman, a soft voice with a clear fluent utterance. Her sauciness was always charming, because it was without emphasis, and was accompanied with graceful little turns of the head." "She had one of those exceptional organizations which are quick and sensitive without being in the least morbid ; she was alive to the finest shades of manner, to the nicest distinctions of tone and accent . . . Her own pretty instep, clad in a silk stocking, her little heel, just rising from a kid slipper, her irreproachable nails and delicate wrist, were the objects of delighted consciousness to her; and she felt that it was her superiority which made her unable to use without disgust any but the finest cambric handkerchiefs and freshest gloves. Her money all went in the gratification of these nice tastes, and she saved nothing from her earnings . . . she hated all meanness, would empty her purse impulsively on some sudden appeal to her pity, and if she found out that her father had a want she would supply it with some pretty device of a surprise." She had been brought up as the daughter of Rufus Lyon, the Independent minister, and while fond of her father has little sympathy with his simple tastes and life. Through her father she meets Felix Holt. and while at first repelled by his surface roughness, soon becomes interested in him and in the lectures that he gives her. Fearing that she may hear the story from someone else, Rufus Lyon tells her that he is not her real father, and that she is the daughter of Maurice Christian Bycliffe. She is much touched by his story of his devotion and marriage to her mother, and gains a different appreciation of his life and character. Later, after she learns that she is the rightful owner of the Transome estates, she goes to Transome Court to visit Mrs. Transome, and there is courted by Harold Transome. What she sees at Transome Court shows her that wealth does not necessarily bring happiness, and as Felix Holt's trial for manslaughter has opened her eyes to the strength of her real feeling for him, she gives up her claim to the estate to marry Felix. While George Eliot's portrait of Esther Lyon is not autobiographic to anything like the same extent as that of the character of Maggie Tulliver (in Mill on the Floss), there are some things in it--the fastidiousness, niceness about dress, etc.-for which the author's own tastes and habits supplied the original. (See Parkinson, Scenes from the George Eliot Country, p. 85; Timmins, History of Warwickshire, p. 151.)

<em>Felix Holt, the Radical</em>

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