he accomplishments they
learn at boarding schools, how they would despise me! Better sell all
this finery and buy myself grammar-books and dictionaries and a history
of all the philosophies!"

She looked from the window and saw Henchard and Farfrae in the hay-yard
talking, with that impetuous cordiality on the Mayor's part, and genial
modesty on the younger man's, that was now so generally observable
in their intercourse. Friendship between man and man; what a rugged
strength there was in it, as evinced by these two. And yet the seed that
was to lift the foundation of this friendship was at that moment taking
root in a chink of its structure.

It was about six o'clock; the men were dropping off homeward one by one.
The last to leave was a round-shouldered, blinking young man of nineteen
or twenty, whose mouth fell ajar on the slightest provocation, seemingly
because there was no chin to support it. Henchard called aloud to him as
he went out of the gate, "Here--Abel Whittle!"

Whittle turned, and ran back a few steps. "Yes, sir," he said, in
breathless deprecation, as if he knew what was coming next.

"Once more--be in time to-morrow morning. You see what's to be done, and
you hear what I say, and you know I'm not going to be trifled with any
longer."

"Yes, sir." Then Abel Whittle left, and Henchard and Farfrae; and
Elizabeth saw no more of them.

Now there was good reason for this command on Henchard's part. Poor
Abel, as he was called, had an inveterate habit of over-sleeping himself
and coming late to his work. His anxious will was to be among the
earliest; but if his comrades omitted to pull the string that he always
tied round his great toe and left hanging out the window for that
purpose, his will was as wind. He did not arrive in time.

As he was often second hand at the hay-weighing, or at the crane which
lifted the sacks, or was one of those who had to accompany the waggons
into the country to fetch away stacks that had been purchased, this
affliction of Abel's was productive of much inconvenience. For two
mornings in the present week he had kept the others waiting nearly an
hour; hence Henchard's threat. It now remained to be seen what would
happen to-morrow.

Six o'clock struck, and there was no Whittle. At half-past six Henchard
entered the yard; the waggon was horsed that Abel was to accompany; and
the other man had been waiting twenty minutes. Then Henchard swore, and
Whittle coming up breathles