In Book George Elliot makes use of imagery that describes Maggie's hugs "Maggie hung on his neck in rather a strangling fashion" this gives a weak tone to their relationship and shows how Maggie is craving for them to be the best brother and sister. Although Tom is affectionate and loving towards Maggie, we also see that he does not encourage her intelligence, as her father does this may be because he is jealous or simply because he doesn’t want to waste time talking to her or using his intelligence with her because she is a ‘girl’. Tom immediately cuts off Maggie's imaginings and ideas about Tom's bravery when faced with a lion. Despite the fact that Tom shares Maggie's fantasy of the two of them always living together happily, part of his fantasy involves applying authority over her by always "punishing her when she did wrong."
Undeniably, the portrayal of Maggie and Tom's childhood relationship in Book First raises an important theme of forgiveness and justice. Tom is characterized as a stubborn boy who always has a code of fairness in his dealings and judgments of others. We see this code of his has caused great pain to others around him for example Maggie's puzzlement over proper conduct in the matter of the pastry. Maggie operates in relation to feelings unlike Tom who always feels he is right in what he does. Maggie continuously craves forgiveness. We also spot that unlike Tom Maggie does not easily forgive herself "Maggie was always wishing she had done something different."
George Elliot creates child characters and places language in their mouths more applicable for an adult. Eliot seeks to make Tom and Maggie seem realistic by focusing precisely on their immaturity.
Plague her in these chapters, with a new element added—the presence of Lucy Deane, of whom Maggie is jealous. Lucy Deane is everything that Maggie is not—demure, pretty, blond, light-skinned, and doted on by Mrs. Tulliver. Maggie's malicious behaviour toward Lucy, especially given Lucy's good humour and love of Maggie, is another instance in which Eliot creates distance, rather than , between Maggie and the reader.
form almost a character in their own right as the novel begins to focus on Maggie's and Tom's respective coming-of-ages in relation to their community. In addition to her detailed renderings of individual consciousnesses and tendencies, Eliot attentively traces accumulations of cultural and social characteristics that weigh on her characters. This particular description of St. Ogg's indirectly focuses on one of the main dichotomies of Eliot's novel—the traditional versus the changing. As they are described in Chapter XII, the Glegg's certainly fit into the strata of St. Ogg's society that values all that is static and traditional, yet the history of the town itself foregrounds the inevitable movement of change through the region. Part of The Mill on the Floss will concentrate on the diminishment of traditional provincial life in the face of newly materialistic, entrepreneurial forces. The end of Chapter XIII highlights this movement, as Mr. Tulliver must go outside his family structure to borrow five hundred pounds from a client of 's. Here Wakem symbolizes these new forces, and Mr. Tulliver must subsume himself to them as part of his "destiny." The ominous reporting of this situation at the end of Chapter XIII, at the end of Book First, points to the importance of Mr. Tulliver's actions to Book First (his name appears in several of the Book First Chapter titles), as well as the importance of these themes of provincialism versus materialistic capitalism to come.
The portrait of Mr. and Mrs. Glegg in Chapter XII further fills out the extensive description of the Dodson women through Book First—as a unified front, but also as distinguished by quirky, detailed differences. One of the themes that unifies the Dodson women, is their respect for, and attention to, the state of death. We have already seen Mrs. Pullet's deep interest in terminal maladies and funerals. This interest is shared by Mrs. Tulliver, if in a more off-hand way, such as her comment to Mr. Tulliver about the family bedsheets back in Chapter II, "An' if you was to die tomorrow, Mr. Tulliver, they're mangled beautiful, an' all ready, an' smell o' lavender as it 'ud be a pleasure to lay 'em out." In Chapters XII and XIII, Mrs. Glegg is described partially in terms of her frequent hypothetical considerations of the state of things after her own (or Mr. Glegg's) death. Death stands as an ideal state for Mrs. Glegg—a time during which true affection can be felt for her husband and when her standing as a respectable member of the community will be vindicated through the generous terms of her will. This reverential desire for the state of death dictates Mrs. Glegg's particular morality, a sense of duty in relation to legacy, instead of living relations. Thus she will not cut Tom and Maggie out of her will in Chapter XIII despite their father's poor behavior.
The discussion between Mrs. Glegg and Mrs. Pullet in Chapter XIII about Maggie's vices serves to emphasize, at the end of Book First, the overwhelming negative pressure that Maggie has faced throughout the first book. Maggie's spontaneous, non-conforming, and imaginative sense of self must continuously run against outside censure of her appearance, behavior, and talents. Only Maggie's father is depicted as loving her unconditionally, but even his love excuses her personality, rather than supporting it.
