What are some of Squire Cass's characteristics in Silas Marner?

Squire Cass is the wealthiest man in Raveloe. He is complacent, indolent, slovenly, neglectful of his sons, and short-tempered. The father of Godfrey and Dunstan, he is inconsistent in his treatment of his sons, vacillating between strictness and indulgence.

In Chapter III, Squire Cass is introduced as the "greatest man in Raveloe." But, he does not deserve the title bestowed upon him, although he is a landlord and collects rents. In Chapter IX he comes to breakfast at his home called Red House. He is described as

...a tall, stout man of sixty, with a face in which the knit brow and rather hard glance seemed contradicted by the slack and feeble mouth. His person showed marks of habitual neglect, his dress was slovenly; and yet there was something in the presence of the old Squire distinguishable from that of the ordinary farmer in the parish...

Squire Cass has a certain authoritativeness to his voice and self-confidence and way of carrying himself that sets him apart from the villagers. Accustomed to "parish homage all his life," the Squire considers himself as higher in social stature and character than the villagers. While he has numerous faults, he never associates with the other gentry so "his opinion was not disturbed by comparison."
In Chapter IX, when his son Godfrey enters the breakfast room one day, the Squire offers no pleasant morning greeting; instead, he sits "indifferently" in his chair and tells his older son to ring the bell for ale as he dismisses Godfrey's business as mostly his own: "There's no hurry in it for anybody but yourselves." But, when Godfrey confesses that he has spent one of the rents, the Squire becomes angry and sends his son to bring up his horse as though he were a servant.

Every New Year's Eve, Squire Cass extends his hospitality to all the society of Raveloe and Tarley. But, the villagers mainly watch the others. When Silas Marner enters the party, Squire Cass asks angrily, "How's this?--what's this?-what do you do coming in this way?" But, then, he sees that Marner has in his possession a very small child, and he informs the party that he has been robbed.

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...

nouns - what do you call the person who passes the trophies to the prize giver/presenter?

The person who gives out the trophies to the winners are called award presenters. So what do u call the person who passes the trophies to the presenter? Thanks!

Is 'efficate' a word in English?

I routinely hear the word "efficate" being used. For example, "The most powerful way to efficate a change in the system is to participate." I do not find entries for this word in common English dictionaries, but I do not have an unabridged dictionary. I have checked the OED (I'm not sure if it is considered unabridged), and it has no entry for "efficate". It does have an entry for "efficiate", which is used in the same way. Wordnik has an entry for "efficate" with over 1800 hits, thus providing some evidence for the frequency of use. I personally like the word and find the meaning very clear and obvious when others use it. If it's not currently an "officially documented" word, perhaps its continued use will result in it being better documented.

Notes

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