DEPARTURE OF BATHSHEBA -- A PASTORAL TRAGEDY
THE news which one day reached Gabriel, that Bath-sheba Everdene had left the neighbourhood, had aninfluence upon him which might have surprised anywho never suspected that the more emphatic the renun-ciation the less absolute its character.It may have been observed that there is no regulapath for getting out of love as there is for getting in.Some people look upon marriage as a short cut that way,but it has been known to fail. Separation, which wasthe means that chance offered to Gabriel Oak byBathsheba's disappearance though effectual with peopleof certain humours is apt to idealise the removed objectwith others -- notably those whose affection, placid andregular as it may be flows deep and long. Oak belongedto the even-tempered order of humanity, and felt thesecret fusion of himself in Bathsheba to be burning witha finer flame now that she was gone -- that was all.His incipient friendship with her aunt-had beennipped by the failure of his suit, and all that Oak learntof Bathsheba's movements was done indirectly. It ap-peared that she had gone to a place called Weatherbury,more than twenty miles off, but in what capacity --whether as a visitor, or permanently, he could notdiscover.Gabriel had two dogs. George, the elder, exhibitedan ebony-tipped nose, surrounded by a narrow marginof pink flesh, and a coat marked in random splotchesapproximating in colour to white and slaty grey; but thegrey, after years of sun and rain, had been scorched andwashed out of the more prominent locks, leaving themof a reddish-brown, as if the blue component of the greyhad faded, like the indigo from the same kind of colour inTurner's pictures. In substance it had originally beenhair, but long contact with sheep seemed to be turningit by degrees into wool of a poor quality and staple.This dog had originally belonged to a shepherd ofinferior morals and dreadful temper, and the result wasthat George knew the exact degrees of condemnationsignified by cursing and swearing of all descriptionsbetter than the wickedest old man in the neighbourhood.Long experience had so precisely taught the animal thedifference between such exclamations as Come in!and D -- -- ye, come in! that he knew to a hair'sbreadth the rate of trotting back from the ewes' tailsthat each call involved, if a staggerer with the sheepcrook was to be escaped. Though old, he was cleverand trustworthy still.The young dog, George's son, might possibly havebeen the image of his mother, for there was not muchresemblance between him and George. He was learn-ing the sheep-keeping business, so as to follow on atthe flock when the other should die, but had got nofurther than the rudiments as yet -- still finding aninsuperable difficulty in distinguishing between doing athing well enough and doing it too well. So earnestand yet so wrong-headed was this young dog (he had no,name in particular, and answered with perfect readinessto any pleasant interjection), that if sent behind theflock to help them on, he did it so thoroughly that hewould have chased them across the whole county withthe greatest pleasure if not called off or reminded whento step by the example of old George.Thus much for the dogs. On the further side ofNorcombe Hill was a chalk-pit, from which chalk hadbeen drawn for generations, and spread over adjacentfarms. Two hedges converged upon it in the form ofa V, but without quite meeting. The narrow openingleft, which was immediately over the brow of the pit,was protected by a rough railing.One night, when Farmer Oak had returned to, hishouse, believing there would be no further necessity forhis attendance on the down, he called as usual to thedogs, previously to shutting them up in the outhouse tillnext morning. Only one responded -- old George; theother-could not be found, either in the house, lane, orgarden. - Gabriel then remembered that he had left thetwo dogs on the hill eating a dead lamb (a kind of meathe usually kept from them, except when other food-ranfinished his meal, he went indoors to the luxury of a bed,which latterly he had only enjoyed on Sundays.It was a still, moist night. Just before dawn he wasassisted in waking by the abnormal reverberation offamiliar music. To the shepherd, the note of the sheepchronic sound that only makes itself noticed by ceasingever distant, that all is well in the fold. In the solemnThis exceptional ringing may be caused in two ways --by the rapid feeding of the sheep bearing the bell, aswhen the flock breaks into new pasture, which gives itan intermittent rapidity, or by the sheep starting off ina run, when the sound has a regular palpitation. Theexperienced ear of Oak knew the sound he now heardto be caused by the running of the flock with greatvelocity.He jumped out of bed, dressed, tore down the lanethrough a foggy dawn, and ascended the hill. Theforward ewes were kept apart from those among whichthe fall of lambs would be later, there being two hundredof the latter class in Gabriel's flock. These two hundredseemed to have absolutely vanished from the hill. Therewere the fifty with their lambs, enclosed at the other endas he had left them, but the rest, forming the bulk ofthe flock, were nowhere. Gabriel called at the top ofhis voice the shepherd's call.Ovey, ovey, ovey!Not a single bleat. He went to the hedge -- a gaphad been broken through it, and in the gap were thefootprints of the sheep. Rather surprised to findthem break fence at this season, yet putting it downinstantly to their great fondness for ivy in winter-time,of which a great deal grew in the plantation, he followedthrough the hedge. They were not in the plantation.He called again: the valleys and farthest hills resoundedas when the sailors invoked the lost Hylas on the Mysianshore; but no sheep. He passed through the trees andalong the ridge of the hill. On the extreme summit,where the ends of the two converging hedges of whichwe have spoken were stopped short by meeting the browof the chalk-pit, he saw the younger dog standing againstthe sky -- dark and motionless as Napoleon at St.Helena.A horrible conviction darted through Oak. Witha sensation of bodily faintness he advanced: at onepoint the rails were broken through, and there he sawthe footprints of his ewes. The dog came up, lickedhis hand, and made signs implying that he expectedsome great reward for signal services rendered. Oaklooked over the precipice. The ewes lay dead and dyingat its foot -- a heap of two hundred mangled carcasses,representing in their condition just now at least twohundred more.Oak was an intensely humane man: indeed, hishumanity often tore in pieces any politic intentions ofhis which bordered on strategy, and carried him on asby gravitation. A shadow in his life had always beenthat his flock ended in mutton -- that a day came andfound every shepherd an arrant traitor to his defenselesssheep. His first feeling now was one of pity for theuntimely fate of these gentle ewes and their unbornlambs.It was a second to remember another phase of thematter. The sheep were not insured. All the savingsof a frugal life had been dispersed at a blow; his hopesof being an independent farmer were laid low -- possiblyfor ever. Gabriel's energies, patience, and industry hadbeen so severely taxed during the years of his life betweeneighteen and eight-and-twenty, to reach his present stageof progress that no more seemed to be left in him. Hehands.Stupors, however, do not last for ever, and FarmerOak recovered from his. It was as remarkable as it wascharacteristic that the one sentence he uttered was inthankfulness: --Thank God I am not married: what would she havedone in the poverty now coming upon me!Oak raised his head, and wondering what he coulddo listlessly surveyed the scene. By the outer marginof the Pit was an oval pond, and over it hung theattenuated skeleton of a chrome-yellow moon whichhad only a few days to last -- the morning star doggingher on the left hand. The pool glittered like a deadman's eye, and as the world awoke a breeze blew,shaking and elongating the reflection of the moonwithout breaking it, and turning the image of the starto a phosphoric streak upon the water. All this Oaksaw and remembered.As far as could be learnt it appeared that the pooryoung dog, still under the impression that since he waskept for running after sheep, the more he ran afterthem the better, had at the end of his meal off thedead lamb, which may have given him additional energyand spirits, collected all the ewes into a corner, driventhe timid creatures through the hedge, across the upperfield, and by main force of worrying had given themmomentum enough to break down a portion of therotten railing, and so hurled them over the edge.George's son had done his work so thoroughly thathe was considered too good a workman to live, and was,in fact, taken and tragically shot at twelve o'clock thatsame day -- another instance of the untoward fate whichso often attends dogs and other philosophers whofollow out a train of reasoning to its logical conclusion,and attempt perfectly consistent conduct in a worldmade up so largely of compromise.Gabriel's farm had been stocked by a dealer -- on thestrength of Oak's promising look and character -- whowas receiving a percentage from the farmer till suchtime as the advance should be cleared off Oak found-that the value of stock, plant, and implements whichwere really his own would be about sufficient to pay hisdebts, leaving himself a free man with the clothes hestood up in, and nothing more.
CHAPTER VI