Twenty One: Far From The Madding Crowd: Thomas Hardy - Reconciliation

The Upper Farm. 

The house of Bathsheba. 

Sunday afternoon. Joseph Poorgrass, Mathew Moon, Henery Fray and half a dozen others came running up. 

Bathsheba was coming out on her way to church; and ceasing for a moment, she pulled on her gloves with her red lips.  

"Sixty!" said Joseph Poorgrass. 

"Seventy!" said Moon.

"Fifty-nine!" said Susan Tall's husband.

"Sheep have broke fence," said Fray. 

"And got into a field of clover," said Tall. 

"Young clover," said Moon. 

"Clover," said Joseph Poorgrass.

"And they be getting blasted," said Henery Fray.

"That they be," said Joseph.

"All will die as dead as door nits, if they baint got out and cured," said Tall.

Joseph's countenance was drawn into lines and puckers by his concern. Fray'a forehead was wrinkled both perpendicularly and crosswise after the pattern of portcullis expressive of a big concern. Laban Tall's lips were thin, and his face was rigid, Mathew's lower jaw sank, and his eyes turned left, right and round and round.

With Bathsheba it was a moment when thought was speech and speech was exclamation.  She had already lost her calm and composure owing to the heated argument she had with Gabriel Oak.

"That's enough, that's enough! Oh, you fools!" she cried, throwing the parasol and prayer-book into the passage, and running out of doors in the direction of clover field, exclaiming, "Come to me, and not go and get them out directly! Oh, the stupid numskulls." Bathsheba looked more beautiful in her anger, and the dashing velvet dress she was wearing added to her beauty.  All the men ran in a jumbled throng after her to the clover field.  Having received the stimulus by her presence, they went round among the sheep with a will. Most of the afflicted animals were lying down, and could not be stirred.  These were bodily lifted out, and others driven into the adjoining field. Here, after a lapse of few minutes more fell down and lay helpless. Bathsheba looked at these with a bursting heart. They were part of her prime flock.

Many of them foamed at the mouth, their breathing being quick and short, while the bodies fearfully distended.

"Oh, what can I do, what can I do!" said Bathsheba helplessly.  "Sheep are such unfortunate animals! -- there's always something happening to them!  I never knew a flock pass a year without getting into some scrape or other." 

" There's only one way of saving them," said Tall.

"What way? Tell me quick!"

"They must be pierced in the side with a thing made on purpose."

"Can you do it?  Can I?"

"No, ma'am.  We can't, nor you. It must be done in a particular spot.  If you go to the right or left but an inch you stab the ewe and kill her.  Not even a shepherd can do it, as a rule."

"Then they must die," said Bathsheba 

"Only one man in the neighborhood knows the way," said Joseph Poorgrass. "He could cure all if he were here," continued he.

"Who is he?  Let us get him."

"Shepherd Oak," said Mathew Moon, "Ah! he has clever talents."

"True, he's the man," said Laban Tall.

"How dare you name that man in my presence !" she said excitedly.  "I have told you never to allude to him, nor shall you if you stay with me.  "Ah!"  she added brightening, "Farmer Boldwood knows!" 

"Oh no, ma'am," said Mathew Moon. "Two of his ewes got into some vetches the other day, and were just like these.  He sent immediately a man on horseback here, for Gabriel, and Gabriel sent and saved them. Farmer Boldwood got the thing with which they do it. It's a hollow pipe, with a sharp pricker inside.  Isn't it Joseph?" 

"Aye, that's what it's," echoed Joseph Poorgrass.

"Aye, sure, that's the machine," chimed in Henery Fray.

"Well," burst out Bathsheba, "don't stay there with your ayes and sures, talking at me!  Get somebody immediately."   All then stalked off in consternation, to get somebody without any idea. They vanished and she stood alone with dying flock.

Never will I send for him, never -- never!" she said firmly.

At the instant, one of the eves contracted its muscles horribly, extended itself and jumped high into the air. An astonishing leap. It fell heavily and lay still.

Bathsheba went up to it.  The sheep was dead.

"Oh, what shall I do? -- what shall I do!" she exclaimed wringing her hand.  "I won't send for him.  No, I won't.

Her exclamation was not the reflection of her resolution. She was convinced that she must call Gabriel.

She followed her assistants through the gate, and lifted her hand to one of them.  Laban responded to her signal.

"Where is Oak staying?" 

"Across the valley at Nest cottage."

"Jump on the bay mare, and ride across, and say he must return instantly -- that I say so."

Tall scrambled off to the field, and in two minutes was on bay mare, bare backed and only a halter by way of rein.  He disappeared down the hill.

Bathsheba watched.  So did all the rest.  Tall cantered along the bridle path through Sixteen Acres, Sheeplands, Middle Field, the Flats, Cappel's Piece, shrank almost to a point, crossed the bridge, and assented from the valley through Springmead and Whitepits on the other side. The cottage to which Gabriel had retired before taking his final departure from the locality was visible as a white spot on the opposite hill, backed by blue firs.  Bathsheba walked up and down. The men entered the field and endeavoured to ease the anguish of the dumb creatures by rubbing them. Nothing availed.

Bathsheba continued walking.  The horse was seen descending the hill and the wearisome riding repeated in reverse order. Tall should have returned on foot after giving the mare to Gabriel.

Tall returned alone. Gabriel was not visible anywhere.

"Perhaps he is already gone," said Bathsheba.  Tall came into the enclosure, and leaped off. His failure was written on his face.

"Well," said Bathsheba, "has he left?" 

"He said beggers can't be choosers," replied Laban Tall.

"What!" said the young Bathsheba, opening her eyes and drawing her breath for an outburst.  Joseph Poorgrass withdrew a few steps behind the hurdle.

"He says that he shall not come unless you request him to come civilly and in a proper manner, as becomes any person begging a favour." 

"Oh, ho, that's his answer!  Where does he gets his airs?" Who am I? Shall I beg to a man who begged to me?" 

Another of the flock sprang into the air, and fell dead.  The men looked grave as if they suppressed opinion.

Bathsheba turned aside, her eyes full of tears. She burst out crying bitterly; they all saw it, and she attempted no further concealment.

"I wouldn't cry about it, miss," said William Smallbury compassionately.

"Why not ask him softly?  I am sure he would come then.  Gabriel is a true man in that way." 

Bathsheba checked her grief and wiped her eyes.  "Oh it is a wicked cruelty to me --it is -- it is!" she murmured.  "And he drives me to do what I wouldn't; yes, he does! -- Tall, come indoors." 

After this collapse, not very dignified for the head of an establishment, she went into the house, Laban Tall at her heels.  Here she sat down and hastily scribbled a note between small convulsive sobs of convalescence which followed a fit of crying, as a ground-swell follow a storm. The note was none the less polite. She held it at a distance, went through it again, and added these words at the bottom :--

                "Do not desert me, Gabriel!" 

The letter was despatched, and Bathsheba waited indoors for the result. 

An anxious quarter of an hour passed. The sound of horse's trot outside. Leaning at the old bureau at which she had written the letter, she closed her eyes, as if to keep out both hope and fear. And when the trot was heard passing the house in the direction of field, she went out and passed towards the field. Between her and the sky she saw the rider turning his face in receding. Gabriel looked at her. Bathsheba looked full of gratitude and she said, "Oh Gabriel, how could you serve me so unkindly?" 

Gabriel murmured a confused reply, and hastened on.  Bathsheba knew from his look which sentence in her letter had brought him.  She followed him to the field.

Gabriel was already among the swollen and distended poor creatures.  He had flung off his coat, rolled up his shirt-sleeves, and taken from his pocket the instrument of salvation.  It was a small tube with a lance passing down inside; and Gabriel began to use it with a dexterity that would have graced a hospital surgeon.  Passing his hand over the sheep''s left flank, and selecting the proper point, he punctured the skin and rumen with the lance as it stood in the tube; then he suddenly withdrew the lance, retaining the tube in its place.  A current of air rushed up the tube, forcibly enough to have extinguished a candle held at the orifice. 

The mere ease after the torment is a delight for a time; and the countenances of these poor creatures expressed it now.  Fifty-nine poor creatures were saved. Four died and three recovered without an operation.

Bathsheba came and looked him in the face.

"Gabriel, Will you stay on with me?" she said looking into his eyes smilingly.

"I will," said Gabriel.

And she smiled on him again.

End of the Chapter