Far from the Madding Crowd

Notes PREFACE In reprinting this story for a new edition I am reminded that it was in the chapters of “Far from the Madding Crowd,” as they appeared month by month in a popular m...

Description of Farmer Oak—An Incident When Farmer Oak smiled, the corners of his mouth spread till they were within an unimportant distance of his ears, his eyes were reduced to c...

NIGHT—THE FLOCK—AN INTERIOR—ANOTHER INTERIOR It was nearly midnight on the eve of St. Thomas’s, the shortest day in the year. A desolating wind wandered from the north over the hi...

A GIRL ON HORSEBACK—CONVERSATION The sluggish day began to break. Even its position terrestrially is one of the elements of a new interest, and for no particular reason save that ...

GABRIEL’S RESOLVE—THE VISIT—THE MISTAKE The only superiority in women that is tolerable to the rival sex is, as a rule, that of the unconscious kind; but a superiority which recog...

DEPARTURE OF BATHSHEBA—A PASTORAL TRAGEDY The news which one day reached Gabriel, that Bathsheba Everdene had left the neighbourhood, had an influence upon him which might have su...

THE FAIR—THE JOURNEY—THE FIRE Two months passed away. We are brought on to a day in February, on which was held the yearly statute or hiring fair in the county-town of Casterbridg...

RECOGNITION—A TIMID GIRL Bathsheba withdrew into the shade. She scarcely knew whether most to be amused at the singularity of the meeting, or to be concerned at its awkwardness. T...

THE MALTHOUSE—THE CHAT—NEWS Warren’s Malthouse was enclosed by an old wall inwrapped with ivy, and though not much of the exterior was visible at this hour, the character and purp...

THE HOMESTEAD—A VISITOR—HALF-CONFIDENCES By daylight, the bower of Oak’s new-found mistress, Bathsheba Everdene, presented itself as a hoary building, of the early stage of Classi...

MISTRESS AND MEN Half-an-hour later Bathsheba, in finished dress, and followed by Liddy, entered the upper end of the old hall to find that her men had all deposited themselves on...

OUTSIDE THE BARRACKS—SNOW—A MEETING For dreariness nothing could surpass a prospect in the outskirts of a certain town and military station, many miles north of Weatherbury, at a ...

FARMERS—A RULE—AN EXCEPTION The first public evidence of Bathsheba’s decision to be a farmer in her own person and by proxy no more was her appearance the following market-day in ...

SORTES SANCTORUM—THE VALENTINE It was Sunday afternoon in the farmhouse, on the thirteenth of February. Dinner being over, Bathsheba, for want of a better companion, had asked Lid...

EFFECT OF THE LETTER—SUNRISE At dusk, on the evening of St. Valentine’s Day, Boldwood sat down to supper as usual, by a beaming fire of aged logs. Upon the mantel-shelf before him...

A MORNING MEETING—THE LETTER AGAIN The scarlet and orange light outside the malthouse did not penetrate to its interior, which was, as usual, lighted by a rival glow of similar hu...

ALL SAINTS’ AND ALL SOULS’ On a week-day morning a small congregation, consisting mainly of women and girls, rose from its knees in the mouldy nave of a church called All Saints’,...

IN THE MARKET-PLACE On Saturday Boldwood was in Casterbridge market house as usual, when the disturber of his dreams entered and became visible to him. Adam had awakened from his ...

Boldwood in Meditation—Regret Boldwood was tenant of what was called Little Weatherbury Farm, and his person was the nearest approach to aristocracy that this remoter quarter of t...

THE SHEEP-WASHING—THE OFFER Boldwood did eventually call upon her. She was not at home. “Of course not,” he murmured. In contemplating Bathsheba as a woman, he had forgotten the a...

PERPLEXITY—GRINDING THE SHEARS—A QUARREL “He is so disinterested and kind to offer me all that I can desire,” Bathsheba mused. Yet Farmer Boldwood, whether by nature kind or the ...

TROUBLES IN THE FOLD—A MESSAGE Gabriel Oak had ceased to feed the Weatherbury flock for about four-and-twenty hours, when on Sunday afternoon the elderly gentlemen Joseph Poorgras...

THE GREAT BARN AND THE SHEEP-SHEARERS Men thin away to insignificance and oblivion quite as often by not making the most of good spirits when they have them as by lacking good spi...

EVENTIDE—A SECOND DECLARATION For the shearing-supper a long table was placed on the grass-plot beside the house, the end of the table being thrust over the sill of the wide parlo...

THE SAME NIGHT—THE FIR PLANTATION Among the multifarious duties which Bathsheba had voluntarily imposed upon herself by dispensing with the services of a bailiff, was the particul...

THE NEW ACQUAINTANCE DESCRIBED Idiosyncrasy and vicissitude had combined to stamp Sergeant Troy as an exceptional being. He was a man to whom memories were an incumbrance, and an...

SCENE ON THE VERGE OF THE HAY-MEAD “Ah, Miss Everdene!” said the sergeant, touching his diminutive cap. “Little did I think it was you I was speaking to the other night. And yet, ...

HIVING THE BEES The Weatherbury bees were late in their swarming this year. It was in the latter part of June, and the day after the interview with Troy in the hayfield, that Bath...

THE HOLLOW AMID THE FERNS The hill opposite Bathsheba’s dwelling extended, a mile off, into an uncultivated tract of land, dotted at this season with tall thickets of brake fern, ...

PARTICULARS OF A TWILIGHT WALK We now see the element of folly distinctly mingling with the many varying particulars which made up the character of Bathsheba Everdene. It was almo...

HOT CHEEKS AND TEARFUL EYES Half an hour later Bathsheba entered her own house. There burnt upon her face when she met the light of the candles the flush and excitement which were...

BLAME—FURY The next evening Bathsheba, with the idea of getting out of the way of Mr. Boldwood in the event of his returning to answer her note in person, proceeded to fulfil an e...

NIGHT—HORSES TRAMPING The village of Weatherbury was quiet as the graveyard in its midst, and the living were lying well-nigh as still as the dead. The church clock struck eleven....

IN THE SUN—A HARBINGER A week passed, and there were no tidings of Bathsheba; nor was there any explanation of her Gilpin’s rig. Then a note came for Maryann, stating that the bu...

HOME AGAIN—A TRICKSTER That same evening at dusk Gabriel was leaning over Coggan’s garden-gate, taking an up-and-down survey before retiring to rest. A vehicle of some kind was s...

AT AN UPPER WINDOW It was very early the next morning—a time of sun and dew. The confused beginnings of many birds’ songs spread into the healthy air, and the wan blue of the heav...

WEALTH IN JEOPARDY—THE REVEL One night, at the end of August, when Bathsheba’s experiences as a married woman were still new, and when the weather was yet dry and sultry, a man st...

THE STORM—THE TWO TOGETHER A light flapped over the scene, as if reflected from phosphorescent wings crossing the sky, and a rumble filled the air. It was the first move of the ap...

RAIN—ONE SOLITARY MEETS ANOTHER It was now five o’clock, and the dawn was promising to break in hues of drab and ash. The air changed its temperature and stirred itself more vigo...

COMING HOME—A CRY On the turnpike road, between Casterbridge and Weatherbury, and about three miles from the former place, is Yalbury Hill, one of those steep long ascents which p...

ON CASTERBRIDGE HIGHWAY For a considerable time the woman walked on. Her steps became feebler, and she strained her eyes to look afar upon the naked road, now indistinct amid the ...

SUSPICION—FANNY IS SENT FOR Bathsheba said very little to her husband all that evening of their return from market, and he was not disposed to say much to her. He exhibited the un...

JOSEPH AND HIS BURDEN—BUCK’S HEAD A wall bounded the site of Casterbridge Union-house, except along a portion of the end. Here a high gable stood prominent, and it was covered lik...

FANNY’S REVENGE “Do you want me any longer ma’am?” inquired Liddy, at a later hour the same evening, standing by the door with a chamber candlestick in her hand and addressing Bat...

UNDER A TREE—REACTION Bathsheba went along the dark road, neither knowing nor caring about the direction or issue of her flight. The first time that she definitely noticed her pos...

TROY’S ROMANTICISM When Troy’s wife had left the house at the previous midnight his first act was to cover the dead from sight. This done he ascended the stairs, and throwing hims...

THE GURGOYLE: ITS DOINGS The tower of Weatherbury Church was a square erection of fourteenth-century date, having two stone gurgoyles on each of the four faces of its parapet. Of ...

ADVENTURES BY THE SHORE Troy wandered along towards the south. A composite feeling, made up of disgust with the, to him, humdrum tediousness of a farmer’s life, gloomy images of h...

DOUBTS ARISE—DOUBTS LINGER Bathsheba underwent the enlargement of her husband’s absence from hours to days with a slight feeling of surprise, and a slight feeling of relief; yet n...

OAK’S ADVANCEMENT—A GREAT HOPE The later autumn and the winter drew on apace, and the leaves lay thick upon the turf of the glades and the mosses of the woods. Bathsheba, having p...

THE SHEEP FAIR—TROY TOUCHES HIS WIFE’S HAND Greenhill was the Nijni Novgorod of South Wessex; and the busiest, merriest, noisiest day of the whole statute number was the day of th...

BATHSHEBA TALKS WITH HER OUTRIDER The arrangement for getting back again to Weatherbury had been that Oak should take the place of Poorgrass in Bathsheba’s conveyance and drive he...

CONVERGING COURSES I Christmas-eve came, and a party that Boldwood was to give in the evening was the great subject of talk in Weatherbury. It was not that the rarity of Christma...

CONCURRITUR—HORÆ MOMENTO Outside the front of Boldwood’s house a group of men stood in the dark, with their faces towards the door, which occasionally opened and closed for the pa...

AFTER THE SHOCK Boldwood passed into the high road and turned in the direction of Casterbridge. Here he walked at an even, steady pace over Yalbury Hill, along the dead level beyo...

THE MARCH FOLLOWING—“BATHSHEBA BOLDWOOD” We pass rapidly on into the month of March, to a breezy day without sunshine, frost, or dew. On Yalbury Hill, about midway between Weather...

BEAUTY IN LONELINESS—AFTER ALL Bathsheba revived with the spring. The utter prostration that had followed the low fever from which she had suffered diminished perceptibly when all...

A FOGGY NIGHT AND MORNING—CONCLUSION “The most private, secret, plainest wedding that it is possible to have.” Those had been Bathsheba’s words to Oak one evening, some time afte...