after the experience which had so overwhelmed her for the time. Let
the truth be told--women do as a rule live through such humiliations,
and regain their spirits, and again look about them with an
interested eye. While there's life there's hope is a conviction not
so entirely unknown to the 'betrayed' as some amiable theorists would
have us believe.
Tess Durbeyfield, then, in good heart, and full of zest for life,
descended the Egdon slopes lower and lower towards the dairy of her
pilgrimage.
The marked difference, in the final particular, between the rival
vales now showed itself. The secret of Blackmoor was best discovered
from the heights around; to read aright the valley before her it was
necessary to descend into its midst. When Tess had accomplished this
feat she found herself to be standing on a carpeted level, which
stretched to the east and west as far as the eye could reach.
The river had stolen from the higher tracts and brought in particles
to the vale all this horizontal land; and now, exhausted, aged, and
attenuated, lay serpentining along through the midst of its former
spoils.
Not quite sure of her direction, Tess stood still upon the hemmed
expanse of verdant flatness, like a fly on a billiard-table of
indefinite length, and of no more consequence to the surroundings
than that fly. The sole effect of her presence upon the placid
valley so far had been to excite the mind of a solitary heron, which,
after descending to the ground not far from her path, stood with neck
erect, looking at her.
Suddenly there arose from all parts of the lowland a prolonged and
repeated call--'Waow! waow! waow!'
From the furthest east to the furthest west the cries spread as if by
contagion, accompanied in some cases by the barking of a dog. It was
not the expression of the valley's consciousness that beautiful Tess
had arrived, but the ordinary announcement of milking-time--half-past
four o'clock, when the dairymen set about getting in the cows.
The red and white herd nearest at hand, which had been phlegmatically
waiting for the call, now trooped towards the steading in the
background, their great bags of milk swinging under them as they
walked. Tess followed slowly in their rear, and entered the barton
by the open gate through which they had entered before her. Long
thatched sheds stretched round the enclosure, their slopes encrusted
with vivid green moss, and their eaves supported by wooden posts
rubbed to a glossy smoothness by the flanks of infinite cows
and calves of bygone years, now passed to an oblivion almost
inconceivable in its profundity. Between the post were ranged
the milchers, each exhibiting herself at the present moment to a
whimsical eye in the rear as a circle on two stalks, down the centre
of which a switch moved pendulum-wise; while the sun, lowering itself
behind this patient row, threw their shadows accurately inwards upon
the wall. Thus it threw shadows of these obscure and homely figures
every evening with as much care over each contour as if it had been
the profile of a court beauty on a palace wall; copied them as
