, it
appears, has undertaken the task of retribution for us; and really, by an
agreeable constitution of things, our enemies somehow don't prosper.
    Wakem was not without this parenthetic vindictiveness towards the
uncomplimentary miller; and now Mrs. Tulliver had put the notion into his head,
it presented itself to him as a pleasure to do the very thing that would cause
Mr. Tulliver the most deadly mortification, - and a pleasure of a complex kind,
not made up of crude malice, but mingling with it the relish of
self-approbation. To see an enemy humiliated gives a certain contentment, but
this is jejune compared with the highly blent satisfaction of seeing him
humiliated by your benevolent action or concession on his behalf. That is a sort
of revenge which falls into the scale of virtue, and Wakem was not without an
intention of keeping that scale respectably filled. He had once had the pleasure
of putting an old enemy of his into one of the St Ogg's alms-houses, to the
rebuilding of which he had given a large subscription; and here was an
opportunity of providing for another by making him his own servant. Such things
give a completeness to prosperity, and contribute elements of agreeable
consciousness that are not dreamed of by that short-sighted, over-heated
vindictiveness, which goes out of its way to wreak itself in direct injury. And
Tulliver, with his rough tongue filed by a sense of obligation, would make a
better servant than any chance-fellow who was cap-in-hand for a situation.
Tulliver was known to be a man of proud honesty, and Wakem was too acute not to
believe in the existence of honesty. He was given to observing individuals, not
to judging of them according to maxims, and no one knew better than he that all
men were not like himself. Besides, he intended to overlook the whole business
of land and mill pretty closely: he was fond of these practical rural matters.
But there were good reasons for purchasing Dorlcote Mill, quite apart from any
benevolent vengeance on the miller. It was really a capital investment; besides,
Guest &amp; Co. were going to bid for it. Mr. Guest and Mr. Wakem were on
friendly dining terms, and the attorney liked to predominate over a ship-owner
and mill-owner who was a little too loud in the town affairs as well as in his
table-talk. For Wakem was not a mere man of business: he was considered a
pleasant fellow in the upper circles of St Ogg's - chatted amusingly over his
port
