frae and his bride, he alighted here,
with his bundle and bird-cage, and was soon left as a lonely figure on
the broad white highway.

It was the hill near which he had waited to meet Farfrae, almost two
years earlier, to tell him of the serious illness of his wife Lucetta.
The place was unchanged; the same larches sighed the same notes; but
Farfrae had another wife--and, as Henchard knew, a better one. He only
hoped that Elizabeth-Jane had obtained a better home than had been hers
at the former time.

He passed the remainder of the afternoon in a curious highstrung
condition, unable to do much but think of the approaching meeting with
her, and sadly satirize himself for his emotions thereon, as a Samson
shorn. Such an innovation on Casterbridge customs as a flitting of
bridegroom and bride from the town immediately after the ceremony, was
not likely, but if it should have taken place he would wait till their
return. To assure himself on this point he asked a market-man when near
the borough if the newly-married couple had gone away, and was promptly
informed that they had not; they were at that hour, according to all
accounts, entertaining a houseful of guests at their home in Corn
Street.

Henchard dusted his boots, washed his hands at the riverside, and
proceeded up the town under the feeble lamps. He need have made no
inquiries beforehand, for on drawing near Farfrae's residence it was
plain to the least observant that festivity prevailed within, and that
Donald himself shared it, his voice being distinctly audible in the
street, giving strong expression to a song of his dear native country
that he loved so well as never to have revisited it. Idlers were
standing on the pavement in front; and wishing to escape the notice of
these Henchard passed quickly on to the door.

It was wide open, the hall was lighted extravagantly, and people were
going up and down the stairs. His courage failed him; to enter footsore,
laden, and poorly dressed into the midst of such resplendency was to
bring needless humiliation upon her he loved, if not to court repulse
from her husband. Accordingly he went round into the street at the back
that he knew so well, entered the garden, and came quietly into the
house through the kitchen, temporarily depositing the bird and cage
under a bush outside, to lessen the awkwardness of his arrival.

Solitude and sadness had so emolliated Henchard that he now feared
circumstances he would formerl