Once out of the
farm, the approach of poverty would be sure.
Hence Bathsheba lived in a perception that her
purposes were broken of. She was not a woman who
could hope on without good materials for the process,
differing thus from the less far-Sighted and energetic,
though more petted ones of the sex, with whom hope
goes on as a sort of clockwork which the merest food
and shelter are sufficient to wind up; and perceiving
clearly that her mistake had been a fatal one, she
accepted her position, and waited coldly for the end.
The first Saturday after Troy's departure she went
to Casterbridge alone, a journey she had not before
taken since her marriage. On this Saturday Bathsheba
was passing slowly on foot through the crowd of rural
business-men gathered as usual in front of the market-
house, who were as usual gazed upon by the burghers
with feelings that those healthy lives were dearly paid
for by exclusion from possible aldermanship, when a
man, who had apparently been following her, said some
words to another on her left hand. Bathsheba's ears
were keen as those of any wild animal, and she dis-
tinctly heard what the speaker said, though her back
was towards him
"I am looking for Mrs.
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