about her
future as a deserted wife were at an end. The worst had once been matter
of trembling conjecture; it was now matter of reason only, a limited
badness. Her chief interest, the little Eustacia, still remained. There
was humility in her grief, no defiance in her attitude; and when this is
the case a shaken spirit is apt to be stilled.

Could Thomasin's mournfulness now and Eustacia's serenity during life
have been reduced to common measure, they would have touched the same
mark nearly. But Thomasin's former brightness made shadow of that which
in a sombre atmosphere was light itself.

The spring came and calmed her; the summer came and soothed her; the
autumn arrived, and she began to be comforted, for her little girl
was strong and happy, growing in size and knowledge every day. Outward
events flattered Thomasin not a little. Wildeve had died intestate, and
she and the child were his only relatives. When administration had been
granted, all the debts paid, and the residue of her husband's uncle's
property had come into her hands, it was found that the sum waiting to
be invested for her own and the child's benefit was little less than ten
thousand pounds.

Where should she live? The obvious place was Blooms-End. The old rooms,
it is true, were not much higher than the between-decks of a frigate,
necessitating a sinking in the floor under the new clock-case she
brought from the inn, and the removal of the handsome brass knobs on its
head, before there was height for it to stand; but, such as the rooms
were, there were plenty of them, and the place was endeared to her by
every early recollection. Clym very gladly admitted her as a tenant,
confining his own existence to two rooms at the top of the back
staircase, where he lived on quietly, shut off from Thomasin and the
three servants she had thought fit to indulge in now that she was a
mistress of money, going his own ways, and thinking his own thoughts.

His sorrows had made some change in his outward appearance; and yet the
alteration was chiefly within. It might have been said that he had a
wrinkled mind. He had no enemies, and he could get nobody to reproach
him, which was why he so bitterly reproached himself.

He did sometimes think he had been ill-used by fortune, so far as to say
that to be born is a palpable dilemma, and that instead of men aiming to
advance in life with glory they should calculate how to retreat out
of it without shame. But that he a