onally spoken to
her on passing matters, and would take no notice of the brevity of her
replies. With the same resolve to keep up a show of conversation he
said, about seven o'clock in the evening, "There's an eclipse of the
moon tonight. I am going out to see it." And, putting on his overcoat,
he left her.

The low moon was not as yet visible from the front of the house, and
Yeobright climbed out of the valley until he stood in the full flood
of her light. But even now he walked on, and his steps were in the
direction of Rainbarrow.

In half an hour he stood at the top. The sky was clear from verge to
verge, and the moon flung her rays over the whole heath, but without
sensibly lighting it, except where paths and water-courses had laid bare
the white flints and glistening quartz sand, which made streaks upon the
general shade. After standing awhile he stooped and felt the heather. It
was dry, and he flung himself down upon the barrow, his face towards the
moon, which depicted a small image of herself in each of his eyes.

He had often come up here without stating his purpose to his mother;
but this was the first time that he had been ostensibly frank as to
his purpose while really concealing it. It was a moral situation which,
three months earlier, he could hardly have credited of himself. In
returning to labour in this sequestered spot he had anticipated an
escape from the chafing of social necessities; yet behold they were
here also. More than ever he longed to be in some world where personal
ambition was not the only recognized form of progress--such, perhaps, as
might have been the case at some time or other in the silvery globe then
shining upon him. His eye travelled over the length and breadth of that
distant country--over the Bay of Rainbows, the sombre Sea of Crises,
the Ocean of Storms, the Lake of Dreams, the vast Walled Plains, and
the wondrous Ring Mountains--till he almost felt himself to be voyaging
bodily through its wild scenes, standing on its hollow hills, traversing
its deserts, descending its vales and old sea bottoms, or mounting to
the edges of its craters.

While he watched the far-removed landscape a tawny stain grew into being
on the lower verge--the eclipse had begun. This marked a preconcerted
moment--for the remote celestial phenomenon had been pressed into
sublunary service as a lover's signal. Yeobright's mind flew back to
earth at the sight; he arose, shook himself and listened. Minu