they hunted everywhere: and he was so withered and yellow, that,
though he was not yet forty, the children always called him "Old
Master Marner".

Yet even in this stage of withering a little incident happened,
which showed that the sap of affection was not all gone. It was one
of his daily tasks to fetch his water from a well a couple of fields
off, and for this purpose, ever since he came to Raveloe, he had had
a brown earthenware pot, which he held as his most precious utensil
among the very few conveniences he had granted himself. It had been
his companion for twelve years, always standing on the same spot,
always lending its handle to him in the early morning, so that its
form had an expression for him of willing helpfulness, and the
impress of its handle on his palm gave a satisfaction mingled with
that of having the fresh clear water. One day as he was returning
from the well, he stumbled against the step of the stile, and his
brown pot, falling with force against the stones that overarched the
ditch below him, was broken in three pieces. Silas picked up the
pieces and carried them home with grief in his heart. The brown pot
could never be of use to him any more, but he stuck the bits
together and propped the ruin in its old place for a memorial.

This is the history of Silas Marner, until the fifteenth year after
he came to Raveloe. The livelong day he sat in his loom, his ear
filled with its monotony, his eyes bent close down on the slow
growth of sameness in the brownish web, his muscles moving with such
even repetition that their pause seemed almost as much a constraint
as the holding of his breath. But at night came his revelry: at
night he closed his shutters, and made fast his doors, and drew
forth his gold. Long ago the heap of coins had become too large for