Holt, Felix

A Radical; a young watchmaker of superior education and strong opinions, who devotes his life to the service of the poor and unfortunate. "The minister, accustomed to the respectable air of provincial townsmen, and especially to the sleek well-clipped gravity of his own male congregation, felt a slight shock as his glasses made perfectly clear to him the shaggyheaded, large-eyed, strong-limbed person of this questionable young man, without waistcoat or cravat. . . . he was a peculiar-looking person, but not insignificant, which was the quality that most hopelessly consigned a man to perdition. He was massively built. The striking points in his face were large clear grey eyes and full lips." "His strong health, his renunciation of selfish claims, his habitual preoccupation with large thoughts and with purposes in dependent of everyday casualties, secured him a fine and even temper, free from moodiness or irritability. He was full of longsuffering towards his unwise mother ... he had chosen to fill his days in a way that required the utmost exertion of patience, that required those little rill-like out-flowings of goodness which in minds of great energy must be fed from deep sources of thought and passionate devotedness. In this way his energies served to make him gentle; and now, in this twenty-sixth year of his life, they had ceased to make him angry, except in the presence of something that roused his deep indignation." He has been well educated and could live in comfortalbe and "respectable" circumstances, but prefers to give up outside refinements to live in poverty among the people whom he wishes to serve. His father had invented some quack medicines upon the sale of which his widowed mother lived comfortably, but Felix, who knows that the medicines are worthless, forces her to give up selling them, and provides for her himself. Mrs. Holt, who objects strongly to giving up the medicines, asks the Reverend Mr. Lyon to reason with Felix, and through the minister Felix meets Esther, with whom he soon falls in love, although at first he sees only surface qualities and faults about which he lectures her. He is interested in the parliamentary campaign in which Harold Transome is the Radical candidate, and fears that some of the practices which he has seen will result in trouble. When a serious election riot does occur, Felix tries to turn the mob and unintentionally kills a constable. He is tried for manslaughter and sentenced to four years' imprisonment in spite of the testimony of his friends, including Esther Lyon, who is now known to be the rightful possessor of the Transome estates. Eventually he is pardoned and learns that Esther has given up wealth and position because she returns his love. The two are married and move away from Treby. Some features of Felix Holt were drawn from Gerald Massey.the socialist-poet. (See Collins, Studies, p. 148; Diet, nat. biog.) Another original has been suggested in John Farn, of the vicinity of Nuneaton, a ribbon weaver and labour agitator with a gift for oratory. See article in Great Thoughts from Master Minds, March, 1901, pp. 369-70. The description of the election riot was suggested by a riot in Nuneaton which George Eliot herself saw when she was thirteen years old. (See Cross, George Eliot's Life, vol. l, pp. 27-9.)

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

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