The company at the Rainbow serve as a sort of chorus to comment on the action. These characters also help to round out the local society as a background for the main characters. The discussion before Silas' entry is not strictly essential to the plot, but it modifies our response to the other characters and gives wider meaning and application to the main events.
Raveloe society, which has already been commented on by Eliot, is now seen in the flesh. Both these and the central characters are conceived as being fully a part of the social structure. Eliot depicts character as being rooted in environment or defined within one social structure. These people cannot be uprooted: it would be hard to imagine Mr. Macey, for example, in any other surroundings. Yet there is very little description of these characters; the emphasis is on their psychology and moral nature. They are visualized through their reactions to other people and events. Their reactions are distinct enough that different characters are fully distinguished, but they fall well short of caricature.
The background of the story (and of the village) is filled in during the conversation. A good deal is said of the character of the Lammeter family, and this pertains directly to the relationship of Godfrey and Nancy. There is also a renewal of the examination of Raveloe religion. Of superstition there is plenty, but no great amount of religious thought or feeling. Christianity is semi-magical here. For example, Macey is much concerned with just which element of the ceremony makes a wedding valid.
The choosing of a deputy constable plays on the importance of ceremony by taking a mock-ceremonial form. It is based on the ritual of nolo episcopari — that is, the ceremony preceding the consecration of a bishop, in which the candidate formally denies any desire to become bishop.
