Being a woman with some good sense in reasoning
on subjects wherein her heart was not involved, Bath-
sheba genuinely repented that a freak which had owed
its existence as much to Liddy as to herself, should
ever have been undertaken, to disturb the placidity of
a man she respected too highly to deliberately tease.
She that day nearly formed the intention of begging
his pardon on the very next occasion of their meeting.
The worst features of this arrangement were that, if
he thought she ridiculed him, an apology would in-
crease the offence by being disbelieved; and if he
thought she wanted him to woo her, it would read
like additional evidence of her forwardness.
CHAPTER XVIII
BOLDWOOD IN MEDITATION -- REGRET
BOLDWOOD was tenant of what was called Little
Weatherbury Farm, and his person was the nearest ap-
proach to aristocracy that this remoter quarter of the
parish could boast of. Genteel strangers, whose god
was their town, who might happen to be compelled to
linger about this nook for a day, heard the sound of
light wheels, and prayed to see good society, to the
degree of a solitary lord, or squire at the very least,
but it was only Mr.
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