s smock-frock burnt into holes and dripping with water,
the ash stem of his sheep-crook charred six inches shorter, advanced
with the humility stern adversity had thrust upon him up to the
slight female form in the saddle. He lifted his hat with respect,
and not without gallantry: stepping close to her hanging feet he said
in a hesitating voice,--

"Do you happen to want a shepherd, ma'am?"

She lifted the wool veil tied round her face, and looked all
astonishment. Gabriel and his cold-hearted darling, Bathsheba
Everdene, were face to face.

Bathsheba did not speak, and he mechanically repeated in an abashed
and sad voice,--

"Do you want a shepherd, ma'am?"

CHAPTER VII

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. There was room for a little pity, also for a very
little exultation: the former at his position, the latter at her own.
Embarrassed she was not, and she remembered Gabriel's declaration of
love to her at Norcombe only to think she had nearly forgotten it.

"Yes," she murmured, putting on an air of dignity, and turning again
to him with a little warmth of cheek; "I do want a shepherd. But--"

"He's the very man, ma'am," said one of the villagers, quietly.

Conviction breeds conviction. "Ay, that 'a is," said a second,
decisively.

"The man, truly!" said a third, with heartiness.

"He's all there!" said number four, fervidly.

"Then will you tell him to speak to the bailiff," said Bathsheba.

All was practical again now. A summer eve and loneliness would have
been necessary to give the meeting its proper fulness of romance.

The bailiff was pointed out to Gabriel, who, checking the palpitation
within his breast at discovering that this Ashtoreth of strange
report was only a modification of Venus the well-known and admired,
retired with him to talk over the necessary preliminaries of hiring.

The fire before them wasted away. "Men," said Bathsheba, "you shall
take a little refreshment after this extra work. Will you come to
the house?"

"We could knock in a bit and a drop a good deal freer, Miss, if so be
ye'd send it to Warren's Malthouse," replied the spokesman.

Bathsheba then rode off into the darkness, and the men straggled on
to the village in twos and threes--Oak and the bailiff being left by
the rick alone.

"And now," said the