his
neighbors. He repeated them to his wife, not realizing that the little
daughter who listened so attentively was gifted with a marvelous
memory, or that she possessed a genius that could transform a simple
tale into a novel of dramatic power. Mary Ann Evans had moved to
Coventry sixteen years before, and was therefore scarcely known in
Nuneaton at the time the stories appeared. She then had no literary
fame, and was no more likely to be thought of in this connection than
any one of a hundred other school-girls."

In her journal she records on October 22, 1857,--"Began my new novel,
_Adam Bede_." For it her publishers offered her L800 for the copyright
for four years; later they added L400, and still later Blackwoods,
finding a ready sale for their numerous editions, proposed to pay L800
above the original price. And for the appearance of _Romola_ in the
_Cornhill Magazine_, Mr. George Smith offered L10,000, but L7000 was
accepted. For _Middlemarch_, which appeared in separate publication,
that is, independent of a magazine, she received a still larger
amount. Middlemarch is considered by many critics her best work. It
was very popular from the first. In a letter to John Blackwood,
November, 1873, George Eliot writes,--"I had a letter from Mr.
Bancroft (the American ambassador at Berlin) the other day, in which
he says that everybody in Berlin reads _Middlemarch_. He had to buy
two copies for his house, and he found the rector of the university, a
stupendous mathematician, occupied with it in the solid part of the
day."

The public may prefer _Adam Bede_ or _Middlemarch_ but it is reported
that George Eliot herself preferred _Silas Marner_. This is the report
of Justin McCarthy, who was a frequent visitor on Sunday afternoons at
the Priory, the home of George Eliot, where many distinguished
visitors, such as Herbert Spencer, Tyndall, and Huxley, loved to
gather. "There is a legend," writes Mr. McCarthy, "that George Eliot
never liked to talk about her novels. I can only say that she started
the subject with me one day. It was, to be sure, about a picture some
painter had sent her, representing a scene in _Silas Marner_, and she
called my attention to it, and said that of all her novels _Silas
Marner_ was her favorite. I ventured to disagree with her, and to say
that the _Mill on the Floss_ was my favorite. She entered into the
discussion quite genially, just as if she were talking of the works of
some stranger, wh