. Having for
some time known the want of a satisfactory form to fill an increasing
void within him, his position moreover affording the widest scope for
his fancy, he painted her a beauty.

By one of those whimsical coincidences in which Nature, like a busy
mother, seems to spare a moment from her unremitting labours to turn
and make her children smile, the girl now dropped the cloak, and
forth tumbled ropes of black hair over a red jacket. Oak knew
her instantly as the heroine of the yellow waggon, myrtles, and
looking-glass: prosily, as the woman who owed him twopence.

They placed the calf beside its mother again, took up the lantern,
and went out, the light sinking down the hill till it was no more
than a nebula. Gabriel Oak returned to his flock.

CHAPTER III

A GIRL ON HORSEBACK--CONVERSATION

The sluggish day began to break. Even its position terrestrially is
one of the elements of a new interest, and for no particular reason
save that the incident of the night had occurred there Oak went again
into the plantation. Lingering and musing here, he heard the steps of
a horse at the foot of the hill, and soon there appeared in view an
auburn pony with a girl on its back, ascending by the path leading
past the cattle-shed. She was the young woman of the night before.
Gabriel instantly thought of the hat she had mentioned as having
lost in the wind; possibly she had come to look for it. He hastily
scanned the ditch and after walking about ten yards along it found
the hat among the leaves. Gabriel took it in his hand and returned
to his hut. Here he ensconced himself, and peeped through the
loophole in the direction of the rider's approach.

She came up and looked around--then on the other side of the hedge.
Gabriel was about to advance and restore the missing article when
an unexpected performance induced him to suspend the action for
the present. The path, after passing the cowshed, bisected the
plantation. It was not a bridle-path--merely a pedestrian's track,
and the boughs spread horizontally at a height not greater than seven
feet above the ground, which made it impossible to ride erect beneath
them. The girl, who wore no riding-habit, looked around for a
moment, as if to assure herself that all humanity was out of view,
then dexterously dropped backwards flat upon the pony's back, her
head over its tail, her feet against its shoulders, and her eyes to
the sky. The rapidity of her gli