the highway. But there was no need for caution; not a soul was at
hand, and Tess went onward with fortitude, her recollection of the
birds' silent endurance of their night of agony impressing upon her
the relativity of sorrows and the tolerable nature of her own, if she
could once rise high enough to despise opinion. But that she could
not do so long as it was held by Clare.
She reached Chalk-Newton, and breakfasted at an inn, where several
young men were troublesomely complimentary to her good looks.
Somehow she felt hopeful, for was it not possible that her husband
also might say these same things to her even yet? She was bound to
take care of herself on the chance of it, and keep off these casual
lovers. To this end Tess resolved to run no further risks from her
appearance. As soon as she got out of the village she entered a
thicket and took from her basket one of the oldest field-gowns, which
she had never put on even at the dairy--never since she had worked
among the stubble at Marlott. She also, by a felicitous thought,
took a handkerchief from her bundle and tied it round her face under
her bonnet, covering her chin and half her cheeks and temples, as if
she were suffering from toothache. Then with her little scissors,
by the aid of a pocket looking-glass, she mercilessly nipped her
eyebrows off, and thus insured against aggressive admiration, she
went on her uneven way.
'What a mommet of a maid!' said the next man who met her to a
companion.
Tears came into her eyes for very pity of herself as she heard him.
'But I don't care!' she said. 'O no--I don't care! I'll always be
ugly now, because Angel is not here, and I have nobody to take care
of me. My husband that was is gone away, and never will love me any
more; but I love him just the same, and hate all other men, and like
to make 'em think scornfully of me!'
Thus Tess walks on; a figure which is part of the landscape; a
fieldwoman pure and simple, in winter guise; a gray serge cape, a
red woollen cravat, a stuff skirt covered by a whitey-brown rough
wrapper, and buff-leather gloves. Every thread of that old attire
has become faded and thin under the stroke of raindrops, the burn of
sunbeams, and the stress of winds. There is no sign of young passion
in her now--
The maiden's mouth is cold
. . .
Fold over simple fold
Binding her head.
Inside this exterior, over which the eye might have roved as over a
thing scarcely percipient, almost inorganic, there was the record of
a pulsing life which had learnt too well, for its years, of the dust
and ashes of things, of the cruelty of lust and the fragility of
love.
Next day the weather was bad, but she trudged on, the honesty,
directness, and impartiality of elemental enmity disconcerting her
but little. Her object being a winter's occupation and a winter's
