Come here, Lizzy, my dear, and let your uncle see you; he hardly knows you, you grow so fast." Lizzy, a black-eyed child of seven, looked very shy when her mother drew her forward, for the small Mosses were much in awe of their uncle from Dorlcote Mill.

She was inferior enough to Maggie in fire and strength of expression to make the resemblance between the two entirely flattering to Mr.Tulliver's fatherly love.
"Ay, they're a bit alike," he said, looking kindly at the little figure in the soiled pinafore.

"They both take after our mother.
You've got enough o' gells, Gritty," he added, in a tone half compassionate, half reproachful.
"Four of 'em, bless 'em!" said Mrs.Moss, with a sigh, stroking Lizzy's hair on each side of her forehead; "as many as there's boys.
They've got a brother apiece." "Ah, but they must turn out and fend for themselves," said Mr.
Tulliver, feeling that his severity was relaxing and trying to brace it by throwing out a wholesome hint "They mustn't look to hanging on their brothers." "No; but I hope their brothers 'ull love the poor things, and remember they came o' one father and mother; the lads 'ull never be the poorer for that," said Mrs.Moss, flashing out with hurried timidity, like a half-smothered fire.
Mr.Tulliver gave his horse a little stroke on the flank, then checked it, and said angrily, "Stand still with you!" much to the astonishment of that innocent animal.
"And the more there is of 'em, the more they must love one another," Mrs.Moss went on, looking at her children with a didactic purpose.
But she turned toward her brother again to say, "Not but what I hope your boy 'ull allays be good to his sister, though there's but two of 'em, like you and me, brother." The arrow went straight to Mr.Tulliver's heart.

He had not a rapid imagination, but the thought of Maggie was very near to him, and he was not long in seeing his relation to his own sister side by side with Tom's relation to Maggie.

Would the little wench ever be poorly off, and Tom rather hard upon her?
"Ay, ay, Gritty," said the miller, with a new softness in his tone; "but I've allays done what I could for you," he added, as if vindicating himself from a reproach.
"I'm not denying that, brother, and I'm noways ungrateful," said poor Mrs.Moss, too fagged by toil and children to have strength left for any pride.