her to do so now. Newson might return at any moment, and what
Elizabeth would think of him for his deception it were best to bear
apart from her.

When they had breakfasted his stepdaughter still lingered, till the
moment arrived at which Henchard was accustomed to go to his daily work.
Then she arose, and with assurance of coming again soon went up the hill
in the morning sunlight.

"At this moment her heart is as warm towards me as mine is towards her,
she would live with me here in this humble cottage for the asking! Yet
before the evening probably he will have come, and then she will scorn
me!"

This reflection, constantly repeated by Henchard to himself, accompanied
him everywhere through the day. His mood was no longer that of the
rebellious, ironical, reckless misadventurer; but the leaden gloom of
one who has lost all that can make life interesting, or even tolerable.
There would remain nobody for him to be proud of, nobody to fortify him;
for Elizabeth-Jane would soon be but as a stranger, and worse. Susan,
Farfrae, Lucetta, Elizabeth--all had gone from him, one after one,
either by his fault or by his misfortune.

In place of them he had no interest, hobby, or desire. If he could have
summoned music to his aid his existence might even now have been borne;
for with Henchard music was of regal power. The merest trumpet or organ
tone was enough to move him, and high harmonies transubstantiated him.
But hard fate had ordained that he should be unable to call up this
Divine spirit in his need.

The whole land ahead of him was as darkness itself; there was nothing
to come, nothing to wait for. Yet in the natural course of life he might
possibly have to linger on earth another thirty or forty years--scoffed
at; at best pitied.

The thought of it was unendurable.

To the east of Casterbridge lay moors and meadows through which much
water flowed. The wanderer in this direction who should stand still
for a few moments on a quiet night, might hear singular symphonies from
these waters, as from a lampless orchestra, all playing in their sundry
tones from near and far parts of the moor. At a hole in a rotten weir
they executed a recitative; where a tributary brook fell over a stone
breastwork they trilled cheerily; under an arch they performed a
metallic cymballing, and at Durnover Hole they hissed. The spot at
which their instrumentation rose loudest was a place called Ten Hatches,
whence during high springs ther