The Well-Beloved
by
Thomas Hardy
Web-Books.Com
The Well-Beloved
Preface................................................................................................................................. 3
PART I ................................................................................................................................ 4
A Supposititious Presentment Of Her............................................................................. 4
The Incarnation Is Assumed To Be True........................................................................ 8
The Appointment .......................................................................................................... 13
A Lonely Pedestrian.......................................................................................................... 15
A Charge ....................................................................................................................... 18
On The Brink ................................................................................................................ 23
Her Earlier Incarnations.................................................................................................... 26
'Too Like The Lightning' .............................................................................................. 31
Familiar Phenomena In The Distance........................................................................... 36
PART II............................................................................................................................. 39
The Old Phantom Becomes Distinct............................................................................. 39
She Draws Close And Satisfies..................................................................................... 46
She Becomes An Inaccessible Ghost............................................................................ 51
She Threatens To Resume Corporeal Substance .............................................................. 57
The Resumption Takes Place........................................................................................ 60
The Past Shines In The Present..................................................................................... 63
The New Becomes Established..................................................................................... 68
His Own Soul Confronts Him........................................................................................... 73
Juxtapositions................................................................................................................ 77
She Fails To Vanish Still .............................................................................................. 83
The Image Persists ........................................................................................................ 88
A Grille Descends Between .......................................................................................... 92
She Is Enshrouded From Sight ..................................................................................... 99
PART III ......................................................................................................................... 102
She Returns For The New Season .............................................................................. 102
Misgivings On The Re-Embodiment .......................................................................... 109
The Renewed Image Burns Itself In ........................................................................... 114
A Dash For The Last Incarnation................................................................................ 119
On The Verge Of Possession ...................................................................................... 126
The Well-Beloved Is--Where?.................................................................................... 132
An Old Tabernacle In A New Aspect ......................................................................... 140
'Alas For This Grey Shadow, Once A Man!' .............................................................. 144
Preface
The peninsula carved by Time out of a single stone, whereon most of the following scenes are laid, has been for centuries immemorial the home of a curious and well- nigh distinct people, cherishing strange beliefs and singular customs, now for the most part obsolescent. Fancies, like certain soft-wooded plants which cannot bear the silent inland frosts, but thrive by the sea in the roughest of weather, seem to grow up naturally here, in particular amongst those natives who have no active concern in the labours of the 'Isle.'
Hence it is a spot apt to generate a type of personage like the character imperfectly sketched in these pages--a native of natives--whom some may choose to call a fantast (if they honour him with their consideration so far), but whom others may see only as one that gave objective continuity and a name to a delicate dream which in a vaguer form is more or less common to all men, and is by no means new to Platonic philosophers.
To those who know the rocky coign of England here depicted--overlooking the great Channel Highway with all its suggestiveness, and standing out so far into mid-sea that touches of the Gulf Stream soften the air till February--it is matter of surprise that the place has not been more frequently chosen as the retreat of artists and poets in search of inspiration--for at least a month or two in the year, the tempestuous rather than the fine seasons by preference. To be sure, one nook therein is the retreat, at their country's expense, of other geniuses from a distance; but their presence is hardly discoverable. Yet perhaps it is as well that the artistic visitors do not come, or no more would be heard of little freehold houses being bought and sold there for a couple of hundred pounds--built of solid stone, and dating from the sixteenth century and earlier, with mullions, copings, and corbels complete. These transactions, by the way, are carried out and covenanted, or were till lately, in the parish church, in the face of the congregation, such being the ancient custom of the Isle.
