p deep red
mouth to which this syllable was native had hardly as yet settled
into its definite shape, and her lower lip had a way of thrusting the
middle of her top one upward, when they closed together after a word.

Phases of her childhood lurked in her aspect still. As she walked
along to-day, for all her bouncing handsome womanliness, you could
sometimes see her twelfth year in her cheeks, or her ninth sparkling
from her eyes; and even her fifth would flit over the curves of her
mouth now and then.

Yet few knew, and still fewer considered this. A small minority,
mainly strangers, would look long at her in casually passing by, and
grow momentarily fascinated by her freshness, and wonder if they
would ever see her again: but to almost everybody she was a fine and
picturesque country girl, and no more.

Nothing was seen or heard further of Durbeyfield in his triumphal
chariot under the conduct of the ostleress, and the club having
entered the allotted space, dancing began. As there were no men in
the company, the girls danced at first with each other, but when the
hour for the close of labour drew on, the masculine inhabitants of
the village, together with other idlers and pedestrians, gathered
round the spot, and appeared inclined to negotiate for a partner.

Among these on-lookers were three young men of a superior class,
carrying small knapsacks strapped to their shoulders, and stout
sticks in their hands. Their general likeness to each other, and
their consecutive ages, would almost have suggested that they might
be, what in fact they were, brothers. The eldest wore the white tie,
high waistcoat, and thin-brimmed hat of the regulation curate; the
second was the normal undergraduate; the appearance of the third and
youngest would hardly have been sufficient to characterize him; there
was an uncribbed, uncabined aspect in his eyes and attire, implying
that he had hardly as yet found the entrance to his professional
groove. That he was a desultory tentative student of something and
everything might only have been predicted of him.

These three brethren told casual acquaintance that they were spending
their Whitsun holidays in a walking tour through the Vale of
Blackmoor, their course being south-westerly from the town of Shaston
on the north-east.

They leant over the gate by the highway, and inquired as to the
meaning of the dance and the white-frocked maids. The two elder of
the brothers were plainly